Universal Remote Control Review

Comprehensive tech news and reviews from GetConnected. This video focuses on a universal remote control.

Universal Remote Control Review AJ Vickery: You could probably guess what we’re going to talk about in this next segment. But essentially, we want to talk about the number of devices that you get in your house and how many different remote controls you actually end up with needed to control those. When you think about it, there are probably three prevalent game box systems on the market today with the Sony, Xbox 360, the Nintendo Wii and all of those different things use remote controls. Think about your TV comes with the remote, your satellite or your digital box, or PVR, your Media Center if you use computer. Lindsay Smith: Stereo systems. AJ Vickery: Stereo system with your amplifier and all the rest of that. So you’re controlling your volume, you controlling your channels, you’re recording your television; you’re playing your video games. Well, what’s interesting is every one of those devices actually comes with the remote control. And in many cases, they’re universal remotes. What I mean by that is they have the ability to control the TV, the audio or stereo system, the cable box and auxiliary devices like DVD players. But what ends up happening is that for you to control any one device or use it effectively, you have to constantly switch between them and remember which one you’re controlling to do things like turn up the volume or what whatever. What we want to talk about today is getting rid of all of those devices. Lindsay Smith: Totally! AJ Vickery: And using one device, a universal remote that you buy stand alone and these things cost upwards of 3, 4, $500.00 by the time you look at the different models. This one’s is by Logitech. It’s called the Harmony 1. And what you can see right away as a difference is this one has a screen on it and on that screen is a number of choices that I can make. But what I want to talk about is the fact that how easy it is to actually integrate this into your home system. Lindsay Smith: Yeah, it comes with —. It’s got a touch screen on it which makes it quite easy to use with your interfacing with it but it also comes with a software that you can put on your computer and it basically plugs in with the USB cable into your computer and the software l walks you through a wizard to setup various activities. So, you got two choices on there. One, you can use the remote to control each individual device or you can setup the activities to say it turn on your TV which will control both your stereo, your television and whatever other devices are working in your home entertainment system. AJ Vickery: And I just clicked one of the activities right now, watch TV. And essentially what’s happening here is depending on how I set it up again using the software and the computer which is pretty easy to do. I have the ability to choose. Whether or not, I want that sound to come through the stereo system, through television, whether I want the picture be HDMI or through a different devices but I don’t have to worry about controlling each of those devices separately. Push one button to turn the devices on. Push on the button to turn the devices off. And if you’re really technical or if you really want to take to another level, you get home controllers as well. So you can do things like close and blinds dim lighting when you want to play a video or watching movie, really take it another level. This is called the Harmony 1 remote. It’s from Logitech. There are a number of companies that make them including Monster and a few out there as well. Definitely, it something that you want to check out if you want to take control in your household then controlling your devices to a whole another level.