Logitch Harmony 520 Remote
Posted September 7th, 2005 @ 09:08am by Erik J. Barzeski
I've heard good things about the Logitech line of universal remotes, and the 520 caught my eye. Carey and I currently have, oh, four remotes we use regularly (TV, TiVo, Receiver, DVD Player). All but the TiVo are Sony remotes, so there is some overlap, and the TiVo I programmed to power on both the receiver and the TV… but it may be nice to have all of the functionality in one place, particularly if it's truly universal.
Clearly a remote like this would handle the TV and whatnot, but I'm not so sure it can handle the TiVo stuff - record, switch channels, etc. The TiVo remote gets around 80% of the use in the house, so this would be a waste of a hundred bucks if the thing couldn't handle some of the TiVo things like "record" and "select," "skip," "replay," "ffwd/rewind," etc.
Donate Life
Posted 07 Sep 2005 at 9:55am #
For a TiVo, I'd highly recommend the Logitech Harmony 680. It claims to be the Media Center PC remote, but they are all the same, just placement of buttons different, and it has all the transport controls around the center button.
It's awesome. Controls my TV, TiVo, Receiver, DVD Player, and Mac mini.
I'm not a big fan of the button layout on the newer logitech remotes.
Posted 07 Sep 2005 at 3:02pm #
Erik,
Received the Harmony 659 for Christmas last year. It is fantastic. Can't speak to the particulars of the various models, not as many were available last Dec when I made the choice, but the whole experience is outstanding. Am using it w/ a Mitsubishi projection TV, Denon receiver, Replay TV, Aiwa DVD player, and airport express. It doesn't actually control the express(although Keyspan makes an IR remote it could probably be programed to run) but sets up all the other components to stream iTunes to the receiver and out to the speakers. We can actually have different modes for the same activities, for instance - everyday TV watching goes through the TV speakers and for other shows/broadcast movies in stereo can run it through the receiver.
Don't think you'll be disappointed. Did buy ours through Amazon, cheaper than retail but supposedly not an "authorized" distributor.
Posted 07 Sep 2005 at 6:06pm #
The Philips Pronto is great... although you have to program it and I think it's PC only. It's somewhat expensive but you get to design EVERYTHING and that is really cool 🙂
http://www.pronto.philips.com/
Posted 07 Sep 2005 at 9:59pm #
The concept of a remote control with a help system just boggles the mind... But it does speak to the gadget freak in me 😉
Posted 10 Sep 2005 at 9:40am #
Has anyone had any experience with the 880?
Posted 19 Sep 2005 at 1:30pm #
A few weeks ago I mentioned that the Logitech Harmony 520 caught my eye. A friend of mine mentioned that he could get me the Harmony 880 for about the same price as the 520. I took him up on...