Universal Remote's Days Are Numbered 429
theodp writes "While the universal remote has served humanity with distinction, its days are numbered, and your smartphone is to blame. Whether you want to control your music, your television or your PowerPoint presentation, there's probably a solution using your phone. Try as it might, the universal remote simply can't navigate the digital world the way the smartphone can — it's a lot easier to put the remote's abilities in the smartphone than vice versa."
Yeah.. (Score:5, Insightful)
But a smart phone has limited "hard" buttons. .. and as nice as touch screens are.. it's hard to operate them lying in bed through one half-open eye.
Personally I`m waiting for voice recognition to become practical. I think that's more the future of how we control our devices.
Like my grandma is going to buy a smart phone... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Yeah.. (Score:5, Insightful)
I love articles that proclaim the impending death of $TECHNOLOGY just because you can now use some other device as a half-assed supplement.
Yeah, I really want to be lying on the couch underneath a blanket, and fiddling with/rolling over onto my touchscreen smartphone. Also, show me a smartphone that has the battery life of a good old remote control that can last for months or more.
Not really. (Score:5, Insightful)
If I want to change the channel on my TV I'm not going to muck around with the 'remote' app on my smartphone. I'm going to pick up an actual remote and press the button.
Smartphones are great for a lot of things, but proper remote controls have a set of fixed, tactile buttons that respond instantly. Versatility isn't worth much if it's a pain to use.
Modding the article (Score:5, Insightful)
If there was a way to mod articles, I'd mod this -1 Troll and -1 Flamebait.
The universal remote has its uses, the smartphone has its own, and, last I checked:
Just because it has less use for presentations doesn't mean that it's dying. If anything, other uses may be found for it, including presentations.
Also, why replace a $20 item (or even less) with a $200 item (or even more) if all you're going to do is watch TV and DVDs with it? If the universal remote is truly dying, then the big phone companies have won the war of overconsumption: sell a product that will be obsolete in two years, make it have tons of uses, and have the buyer depend more and more on it such that s/he deems it absolutely necessary and buys it again and again as newer versions come out with even more feature creep, while making everyone pay the full price for all the features despite many of the buyers not using even an eighth of them.
I'd rather keep that remote, thanks. Mine has lasted around... 10 years now?
Yeah but... (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't remember having to sign a contract, nor pay a monthly fee to use a universal remote,or better yet a "learning" remote. Those lists of manufacturers + models for your TV set/stereo/etc always seem to list all the models in the world..except the one you bought. Somehow I got lucky with my Advent home entertainment center, where I can use my Comcast remote to move up/down the volume. Felt a small sense of accomplishment since now I can now control everything with that remote, save for the video game consoles + VCR.
Why, because NYTimes says so? (Score:3, Insightful)
There's no way a cell phone can replace the simplicity and multi-device support of a good universal remote. These remotes are actually _designed_ for their function, whereas a phone is designed for, you know, taking calls and running a few apps.
- You dont pay a monthly fee to use a remote control
- Who wants to pay for multiple goddamn cell phones that work as remotes, so if you are gone your visitors or spouse can watch tv? Be srsly
- Good remotes are designed to be simple for the technologically inept. You select a simple action like "Watch TV" "Watch DVD" "Play Game" which are customizable and switch everything on or off as needed. If there are errors, the help button will resolve the issues in a simple way your grandma can figure out
This is akin to taking a simple, small tool and trying to replace it with a monolithic "do everything" solution. It would be overly complex and would fail, fail, fail.
How are these terrible articles getting through? Modding queue with a hangover, are we?
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Harmony remotes (Score:5, Insightful)
The person who wrote this article has clearly never used a Logitech Harmony remote. Best remote I've ever owned.
FFS NO NO NO!!!! (Score:5, Insightful)
I hate having to learn to use my new nokias as it is, without piling in more crap.
Whatever happened to "Do one job and do it well".. Seems nowadays it's lets cram as much crap into something that half works.
Re:Harmony remotes (Score:3, Insightful)
What happens when (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm using my phone/out of the house and someone else (sat the 13 year old kid) wants to watch a DVD?
Or does everyone need a smart phone as opposed to one $20 remote on the coffee table?
Re:Yeah.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed. Universal remotes also crash less, require less charging, and are more likely to be found near a tv instead of in the pocket of the owner or charging in a different room.
This article is retarded (as in handicapped, not special).
universal remote for PS3? (Score:2, Insightful)
The PS3 may be a nice BlueRay player but it does not nicely work together with the rest of appliances: it's remote is bluetooth.
Is there a universal remote which includes a bluetooth module for the PS3?
Re:Yeah.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Yeah.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Definitely most retarded non-story in the last couple of weeks.
Smartphone as a remote is a niche application for mega-geeks who will become bored with it very shortly.
Wrong WRong Wrong (Score:2, Insightful)
Whoever wrote that has not set up a TV for a relative (or themselves in the future ) in an "Assisted living Facility".
Channel change, on/off and volume are at the edge (and sometimes beyound ) the capabilities of these people.
These are people who have trouble telling if it's 3:00 pm or am (the phone calls in the night tell me that).
Days of the week and date are nebulous concepts.
Something as complicated as a cell phone is just a paper weight.
NB: Small remotes also disappear. They don't remember where they put them.
Re:Modding the article (Score:2, Insightful)
Also, why replace a $20 item (or even less) with a $200 item (or even more) if all you're going to do is watch TV and DVDs with it?
I guess they recon that in the not-so-distant future every phone will have the equivalent features of todays smartphones. And seeing as just about everybody's got a cellphone these days, people will stop buying remotes because 'hey, I'll just switch channels using my phone, saving me 20 bucks!'
This also adresses the problem of finding the Goddamn remote. It's always on you.
Though I can foresee quite a few arguments with the mrs. when we both have a remote...
Re:Yeah.. (Score:5, Insightful)
I love articles that proclaim the impending death of $TECHNOLOGY just because you can now use some other device as a half-assed supplement.
Yeah, I really want to be lying on the couch underneath a blanket, and fiddling with/rolling over onto my touchscreen smartphone. Also, show me a smartphone that has the battery life of a good old remote control that can last for months or more.
Not only that, but my universal remote has real buttons that I can navigate in the dark easily; doesn't walk out the room when I leave; and can be use by somebody else while I am on a call.
You are right - just because some new tech can sorta do what existing tech can does mean it will replace it. A IR smartpone could also replace you car key as a remote - I don't see that happening very soon either.
Re:Yeah.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It will die, but not at the hands of smartphone (Score:4, Insightful)
Nope. Sorry - I can't see it.
As soon as you said this (for argument's sake, let's say a 24" iMac.) your argument was blown.
For every "perfect solution" there will always be a competing product or a competing standard and they're not going to play nice. Its not even in the best interests of the electronics companies to provide a one size fits all solution (which is technically feasible now). They need pricing points and upgrade paths to continue generating profit.
They need built in redundancy to ensure an ongoing market. And most consumers (not all, but most) end up with a rag-tag mix of equipment and configurations, based on need and willingness to fork out cash.
Like LAN networks, noone has an identical system when it comes to media solutions in the home - and as a result, there will always be a market for tools that aid in bringing them all together.
Re:And nothing of value was lost. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Yeah.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Television will last forever. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you had the faintest idea of the network requirements to do that, you would understand why broadcast TV (and radio) are going to be around for a long, long time.
Today, people can pretend that broadcast radio might die because they can stream content to their phone. And as long as they can do this, they think "this must be what the future looks like". It doesn't, it won't and as soon as 10-20 people in their physical area try to do the same thing they will discover the truth.
The bandwidth requirements of feeding individuals their own streams at 1080i (or even 720i) would require pretty much dedicated fiber home-to-provider. No, that doesn't exist. You can get fiber to a local node that is dedicated but then you are competing with your neighbors for bandwidth on a shared resource. And that shared resource does not have anywhere near the aggregate capacity to handle the sum of the fiber coming in to it.
When will it? Probably never. Dreaming that broadcast will end when it does is fine, but keep in mind someone has to justify the costs. A local node may serve 1000 homes. Getting fiber that will support 20MB/sec is no problem but getting a channel from the local node that will support 20Gb/sec is another proposition entirely. And at the head end where 100 of those 20Gb/sec fibers come together to compete with the incoming bandwidth now ups that requirement to 2Tb/sec.
2Tb/sec? And that is merely a small town with 100,000 homes.
Broadcast TV is going to be around for a long, long time. As will broadcast radio. The bandwidth requirements of a broadcast are so incredibly modest compared with individual streams that it is a no-brainer for anyone.
Will the bandwidth exist someday? Maybe. Will it be used to replace broadcasting? Doubtful. There will be some other use for it which will once again mean broadcast content is the only practical way to do it.
Voice Recognition (Score:5, Insightful)
I think voice recognition is more the future of how we control our devices.
Please leave me out of your future. Few things make me more angry than calling a support number and getting a menu where I'm required to speak to the computer.
If I have to deal with a computer, at least give me the choices and let me press a damn button. Don't make me guess the right keyword, especially not in earshot of my officemates.
The Swiss Army Knife Fallacy (Score:4, Insightful)
I call this the Swiss Army Knife Fallacy. It's like thinking that screwdrivers, scissors, and toothpicks are all going to vanish because a swiss army knife can do all of those things.
Just as you might carry a swiss army knife in your pocket, smartphones are handy as a portable solution when you are out and about. But when I'm at home and I need to tighten a screw, I don't dig in my pocket for my swiss army knife; I reach into my toolbox and get a dedicated screwdriver that is designed to do just that one task as well as possible, instead of being adequate at multiple tasks.
When I'm using my entertainment center, I want a remote that is ideally adapted to that one task. I don't need it to browse the web, or answer the phone; I've got devices optimized for those particular uses ready to hand in my home. For example, touch screens are great for general purpose devices that have to serve many functions. But when I want to adjust the volume on my TV set, I want a device with fixed, physical buttons with distinctive shapes that I can feel in the dark.
Re:Yeah.. (Score:4, Insightful)
How does making the same buttons act differently based on context make them easier to use? I don't see any logic behind this.
I imagine he's referring to those remotes that have more buttons than Mr. Spock's science station. I just moved and the cable company gave me a new DVR with Remote. Same damn thing, but maaaaaaan, this remote has a lot of buttons for fuctions I'm not using right now. It is easy for me to picture something like a PDA running a nicely designed interface for what I'm doing. If I'm watching a DVD, for example, I don't need the buttons that are all about changing the channels or setting up the DVR. In that context navigation would be much more simple and intuitive.
There's also the matter of setting up the remote. It's not the hardest thing in the world to tell a universal remote what brand the tv or whatever is, but it sure would be nice to just grab it from a pulldown.
I agree with the spirit of your post in that I personally don't think there's a huge NEED to consolidate remotes. At the right price range, though, it sure would be nice. If my appliances used RF (bluetooth or even 802.11), my iPhone could easily control them all and the stuff I'd buy in the future. That's kinda neat and it most certainly would be easier to use than this stupid lump of over-designed plastic I have controlling things right now.
Re:Yeah.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Yeah.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, show me a smartphone that has the battery life of a good old remote control that can last for months or more.
Most importantly, show me a smartphone that'll let me change channels in the 45 minutes after my mother's called my mobile and asked to talk to my wife.
Re:Harmony remotes (Score:3, Insightful)
And anyone that thinks the Harmony is the best, has never used a JP1 remote. $20 for a remote [radioshack.com] (I picked it up on sale for $10), and ~$20 (or do-it-yourself) for the cable, and you can program a JP1 remote to do any IR you want. The flexibility people have programmed for these remotes is amazing.
The real value of a Harmony comes from the "usability" of the remote, not the "flexibility" of programming it. (As an aside, the Harmony wins on programming at least 95% of the time, too (Samsung TV IR codes completely suck.) I can have a Harmony remote fully programmed for five devices in 15 minutes or less.)
The key is that Harmony remotes are "use case based", and are not device oriented. Pick one up, and the buttons are labeled with things you want to do: "Watch TV", "Watch DVD", "Listen to Radio", or "Control Lights". The power of this is immediately apparent when you run these remotes through the Mom Test.
Park your mom in front of your entertainment system and hand her the JP1. The first thing she'll do is go to the kitchen and make you a sammich, because she has no frakking idea how to turn your TV on, or how to make the sound come out, or how to change channels. But put a Harmony in her hands, and she'll push the "Watch TV" button. The TV comes on, the cable box comes on, the sound system comes on, the TV sets its input to HDMI-1, the sound system sets its input to AUX-1, and your mom is watching TV.
And if the system gets out of sync, with the TV showing cable and the audio playing FM radio, push the "help" button. It asks questions about the problems and then sends the IR signals that help resync everything.
The Harmony completely changed how I thought about human-TV interactions, and raised it up a level. I own two for my systems, and have bought them for my elderly in-laws, aunts and uncles. Device-oriented remote controls are horse-and-buggy-whips by comparison.
Sure, if your budget is $20, and you've got all the time in the world to mess around with programming it, and nobody else needs to use it, the JP1 is probably more than adequate. But I spent more than that in time wasted answering the first phone call my father-in-law had about getting his TV to switch between Dish and DVD. The Harmony made those phone calls end.
Re:Yeah.. (Score:3, Insightful)
In which case, the 'Universal Remote's' days are far from numbered, unless you are already an iPhone user.
Seriously, my remote cost only a small fraction of any telephone device. I could probably use the argument that the days of the car are numbered now that space travel is here. It might be true, but I'm prepared to bet not in my lifetime or in the lifetime of my children. There is absolutely no justification on the grounds of cost and, as others have already pointed out, it is actually simpler to use the remote than a iPhone.
Although many people think that the mobile/cell phone is an essential item, I know that the majority of my friends and acquaintances do not agree. We do not own one - why on earth should we? There is the much cheaper landline telephone and internet communications including VoIP and email. I have never felt the need to be in contact with everyone else when I am traveling by public transport and my life is very pleasant having periods when I can enjoy the peace and quiet of being alone.
Now, get off my lawn....
Re:Voice Recognition (Score:3, Insightful)
As a victim of Identity Theft, I always hate those that ask you to "speak or say your Social Security Number." If I am going to give my SSN, it'll be pressed on the keypad, not spoken out loud where a dozen co-workers could hear and copy it down! Not that I don't trust them, but it's pretty easy to figure out a co-worker's birth date and you already know their name. Add in that spoken SSN and some random co-worker with an ax to grind could steal your identity (or sell it to someone else so the ID theft would be all but untraceable).