Logitech Harmony One Universal Remote with Color Touch Screen
by Logitech
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Logitech Harmony One Universal Remote with Color Touch Screen
Customer Review: Terrific Item - it is actually worth the money you will spend.
Summary: 5 Stars
I previously looked at this remote, concluded it was really awesome and decided I didn't want to spend the money to buy it. So, I went with another Harmony remote. However, after a while, I really felt that I had made the wrong decision. Batteries went bad much quicker than I thought, and the buttons were not all that great (they stuck and sometimes didn't work). Disappointed in the other Harmony remotes (though one of them is no longer offered). So I reluctantly bought THIS remote after not buying it in the first place (bad decision). All I can say is WOW! The HARMONY ONE ROCKS!
Pros:
1. Design: The design of this item is great. Ergonomically satisfying, aesthetically pleasing, the design of this item is really nice. Buttons are large and well thought out. The buttons seem to work easily and don't stick.
2. Ease of set-up: Since I previously had purchased a Harmony remote, all I literally had to do was plug the USB cord in and run the web-based software. Extremely easy. I cannot state how easy this would be the first time through, but I had no problems with the software in two previous applications with Harmony remotes.
3. Durability: I have had this for about a month. So far, I am very pleased. All the buttons work with ease. Not sticking or buttons that have to be mashed down.
4. Use with devices: Easy. Press and point the activity button you want to use and it will work, whether it is TV, DVD, Music, etc. You assign an activity button and it works all devices that are necessary for that operation.
5. Codes: there are electronic codes available for almost all electronic devices. I have not encountered any issues with finding my devices (tv, dvd, etc.) on the lists provided. Although I have mostly well-known electronic manufacturers. I would find it hard to believe that anyone would be hard-pressed to locate these codes to get a device to work properly.
6. Touchscreen: Yes, this has a touchscreen for location activities and some other functions. So far, no problems associated with this at all. You can upload pictures if you want as well to play as a screensave though I have not played with that feature.
Neutral:
1. Cost: Yes, Virginia, this is awfully expensive considering its function is for the operation of your entertainment system. I have found the cost expensive but worth it. Consider your price point and be the judge. I considered the cost carefully, and went for it and have been happy.
2. Charger: this item does not use batteries, but rather it uses a charging cradle. You can vary the signal light as well. Unlike my previous Harmony, this cradle fits securely and nicely. This idea seems foolproof and reliable.
Cons:
1. Here's an idea for Logitech: Make a silicon cover for this thing to protect the back of the remote. I am scared to drop this thing and I know that one day it IS inevitable. I have dropper it to the hardwood floor once and nothing happened. but, I sure would feel better that 'my precious' is protected. Why no silicon covers around? This would be a great item for these remotes, because we all know that they will try to drop to the floor despite your best efforts.
2. Cost: Well, yes, this remote is darned expensive. So it is a con! But, I guess good things do cost more.
Overall:
I knew this was expensive. But, I decided that it was better to do something right, and I have not been disappointed by this purchase. This remote rocks and seems to be worth the expense. It works easily every time and is pleasing to the senses.
Highly recommended!
Customer Review: Human intelligence combined with technology intelligence
Summary: 5 Stars
The Harmony One is a really great product with great customer support, including customizing software for those who need to solve a unique problem. For the first 60 days, they provide real people who speak English and who know their product. Their unlimited email support is also good, albeit slow. I have used both.
Why is a truly universal remote so difficult? With thousands of home theater products each with its unique functional trade-offs, we are all controlling a complex system. Many of us own a half-dozen remotes with unique commands and language. All of these are expected to function as a user friendly system. But there is no system engineer to make them work together. Manufacturers of equipment do not provide documentation about what their commands actually do, and what codes are supported. Many codes are not even present on the remotes that come with the equipment.
Take the following example of hidden codes and properties. My Samsung TV allows for a commands to set any of six inputs, such as HDMI1, but if you select the input that is currently active, it toggles back to TV, instead of doing nothing. None of these codes are present on their original remote but Logitech has them in their data base. Logitech has invested millions in engineering.
Logitech's remotes are trying to solve an impossible problem: automating the chaos of the market. They did as good a job as possible but ultimately, each user must do his own system design because every home system is unique. The Harmony One is simply a very powerful tool to create a system that functions seamlessly. But YOU have to become the system engineer of your system. Basic functionality, albeit with some bugs, is trivial to achieve with the Harmony One because Logitech did a great job of adding intelligence to their hardware and software. But the last 10% of functionality takes real work. This is not a criticism of their design. The big problem is that the home theater equipment cannot tell the remote what it is doing. The remote tells the equipment what to do but it cannot know if the equipment did what was intended.
The effort to make a nice system is significant but it is a one time investment. It would have been nice if Logitech provided a programmer's reference manual. They could have done that but probably did not want to scare the average user. Logitech maintains an active user forum with inputs from very smart people but finding critical information also takes work. The information is not sorted or indexed.
Unlike the 500 series, the Harmony One has a good mechanical design and good layout. The basic functionality is the same for all their remotes. They made some good trade-offs in the Harmony ONe. To have clear visibility in the dark, they use a big screen and backlights on buttons. But because that would kill ordinary batteries they used rechargeable batteries. To avoid loosing all your work and to avoid complex button learning, they use a software system that keeps a permanent copy of your configuration on their servers. This allows for a trivial cloning to another remote, and you do not loose everything if the batteries goes dead.
Some people are disappointed because they expected the remote to be like buying a car, get in and drive. In this case the automobile manufacturer did the system design. For a simple home theater, the Harmony One is like a car. For a complex system, it more like designing a kitchen for a chef.
My comments are to intended set expectations. Many of the negative comments are the result of unrealistic expectations. Within the constraints of expectations, the Harmony One is probably the best choice in the market.
Customer Review: They really got this RIGHT!
Summary: 5 Stars
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
This is my third Harmony Remote. I also own the 880 model and the 720. I have been sold on them ever since I started using the first one, but this one really gets everything right!
I have found the programming to be very easy. Just collect the model numbers of the equipment you want to control and write all the information on the handy form that is supplied with the remote. Then sit down at your computer, install the included software, and enter the information about your devices (as Harmony calls them). You may get further queries about some of the equipment which will require you to hold the original remote close to the Harmony remote to transfer a few commands. Or not. For my 7 devices, I only had to transfer commands from my Tivo remote. The others were all automatically programmed by the software.
Then you choose the activities, such as "watch TV," "record video," "watch DVD," etc. and choose the order in which you want them to appear on your remote. Everything is loaded onto the remote, you get a chance to check out how it works, and further tweaking if you want. And that's it. It took me about 15 minutes and everything worked on the first try.
The remote is then ready to be used by anyone in the household. It is so friendly in its usage that even a visitor could pick it up and know just by looking and following the prompts, how to control all of your entertainment devices. In case of problems, you push the "help" button and it talks you through what might need fixing to get everything working right. My husband used to complain that he never knew how to turn on the TV because the system was so complicated. He loves the Harmony remotes.
Now, as to what makes the Harmony One the epitome of Harmony remotes. First, it is just cool looking. It's shiny black with silver accents, and is pretty in a techy way. Next, the ergonomics are right. It fits well in your hand (either hand) and the buttons are laid out logically in groups.
Next, the button controls are bumpy so that you can use the remote without looking most of the time. You soon learn what the most-used buttons feel like, and they are in the "right place" so you can use them without thinking about it. Also, the touch screen portion is bright and easy to use, even if you have big fingers.
Another great improvement to this Harmony model is the charging cradle. The remote drops fully into the cradle so the contacts connect without any "jiggle factor." On my other Harmony remotes, I find that I sometimes need to tweak the position in the cradle to make sure the battery contacts are connecting. This one takes care of that completely. And again, it even looks good enough to leave out in a handy location while charging.
Even though I tend to be an early adopter of tech goodies, I resisted the Harmony remotes at first because I was skeptical that they would really work as they claimed they would. My skepticism vanished with my first Harmony remote. Now with the Harmony One, the design has matured into a near-perfect package. The designers and engineers are going to have to think really hard to come up with improvements on the next model, because they got everything just right with this one. An unqualified success!
Customer Review: Unbelievably easy and intuitive set-up, a nearly flawless remote
Summary: 5 Stars
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
I need to qualify my perspective by allowing that the last time I took a chance on a universal remote, it was the Phillips Pronto. A thick, wide, heavy brick of an object with a monochrome touch screen. The programming process was so drawn out, that I never got all of my devices into it, and subsequently, this expensive piece of electronics sat in that box full of cables and other bits that resides in everyone's closet. So I admit to being apprehensive a bit when the Harmony One Advanced arrived.
Immediately as I opened the box, I was delighted at the look and feel of the remote. It has some substance, but isn't too heavy. The weight is fairly balanced front to back even with the battery inserted. The front face is a high gloss black, with a touch of silver at the bottom, the back a comfortable matte black rubber-type feel. It is, for lack of a better word, a 'pretty' remote.
So I did what the instructions said; I gathered the make and model numbers of the nine (9) pieces of equipment I wanted to control. I set aside an hour to start the process, and figured I'd continue later as necessary. After installing the software on my laptop, I connected the remote to it, and started following the prompts. I entered all those make and model numbers -- and lo and behold, that was the whole of my set-up experience. I chose how the devices work together, what settings they each need in order to perform an 'Activity' (such as watching a DVD, or playing an Xbox 360), and that was it. After about 10-15 minutes, I was disconnected, and using my new remote without a single hitch. I love that you can hit different activities on the touch screen, and the remote will control multiple objects at the same time, or you can select devices and control each individually as if you had the original remote.
After nearly a month of use, I only have a few concerns. That high gloss black on the face shows fingerprints and grime very easily. I feel like we're constantly wiping it down with a cloth they provided with the package. This isn't a complaint so much as it is an observation. Furthermore, there are already some very fine scratches over the touch screen. I may have to blame one or more of my three dogs for this one though, and not Logitech's choice of materials.
All my old remotes now live in that box with the old pronto. I don't keep them around just in case, because no scenario (no matter how complicated) has required them in my use over the last month. I added a new device (an HD-DVD player) a week or two ago, and it took just a few minutes to have it working just as well as the rest in the Harmony One's interface. This is a brilliant remote, and I literally couldn't be much happier with it. The only feature I wish it had, was its own 'sleep' timer for all the devices. Not all of my electronics do that on their own, and it would have been a nice touch to have been granted that ability by way of the remote's function.
Outside of those with specific RF or Bluetooth needs, I can't imagine anyone being unhappy with this remote. A wonderful addition (subtraction, considering I went from 9 remotes to 1 in this room) to my entertainment experience. Thank you, Logitech!
Customer Review: Awesome remote
Summary: 5 Stars
This is only my second advanced remote like this - first was a Phillips Pronto. This one leaves it far behind.
I didn't research too much, just knew I wanted something programmable for my media center and TV. So it was a great surprise to plug in the remote, tell it what I had, and offer preprogrammed options based on those devices. So it has all the steps to get to all the options on my media center PC, saving me even having to set up the steps! It does it automatically. Incredible.
What I expected to be about a 30 minute job to set up the various macros for the options on my media center (listen to music, watch DVD's, watch my movie files, look at pictures, watch live TV, go to recorded TV, etc) was actually about 4 minutes, and it wouldn't have taken that long if I had been familiar with how the software was going to work rather than just delving into it blind. But it's so straight forward and simple that you CAN delve into it blind. Even the remote will double check that things worked right and offer to adjust things if they don't, asking obvious things like "did the TV turn on?" and fixing it if it didn't.
Even turns on the backlight and screen as soon as it senses it was picked up, so unlike most, you don't have to press a button to get the lights even to turn on. Very nice touch that I had never though of, but once I experienced it I thought "This is obvious, why don't all of them do this?"
Selectable 12/24 hour time format (something nice when I find it since I prefer everything in 24 hour format), even can program how long the backlight buttons and screen stay illuminated.
Ergonomics are outstanding. It has, for lack of a better term, two "detent" positions. There are two major parts for use, one is the normal transport buttons, one is the main select d-pad. So the bottom of the remote is sculpted so that it fits perfectly in the hand if you are holding it in either of those most used spots. So it's always comfortable regardless of whether you're holding it farther back for the transport controls, or farther forward for the selection controls.
Buttons are about the best I've ever felt on a remote. Nice positive feel when you press them. Like my preference for Thinkpad keyboards for laptops. It just feels better than everything else.
I was expecting something good, but this exceeded even my wildest expectations. I used to think the Pronto was a cool remote, but this one is just outstanding. Worth every penny.
EDIT after a month of use - I returned the unit. Nearly 10 years ago I had my first Philips Pronto, and was able to program buttons anywhere for anything. I've spent a month trying to get Logitech to add a TV Power Toggle button, that already exists on the remote's screen for my TV device, to my Media Center device screen on this remote. They can't. Nearly a decade later and they can't do what joe average could do on his own PC. This was a deal breaker for me since I hated having to jump all the extra steps to get it under another "device". The whole point of these is to make things easier, and after seeing what can be done when I had my Pronto, the limits that even the company itself can't get past were a dealbreaker, which is too bad because this is the most comfortable remote I've ever had, and I spent a month back and forth with Logitech trying to get it to be useful for what I want, and they just can't do it.