Logitech Harmony remotes

Headshot

im thinking of buying one of those Logitech Harmony remotes

never had one before ,so are they any good ?

so i have a ps3,xbox 360, sky+ and jvc surround sound system

will it work with the above ?

byte

It shoudl work with anything that uses Infra-Red (IR) remotes. If you use Sony's official PS3 remote control, it won't work the PS3, as this uses bluetooth and not standard IR. There are some third party remotes for PS3 though, that use a USB dongle thing for IR, and Harmony should work with this.

As for XBox, you'll need to check, as I dunno if remotes use IR or BT.

Headshot

byte wrote: »

It shoudl work with anything that uses Infra-Red (IR) remotes. If you use Sony's official PS3 remote control, it won't work the PS3, as this uses bluetooth and not standard IR. There are some third party remotes for PS3 though, that use a USB dongle thing for IR, and Harmony should work with this.

As for XBox, you'll need to check, as I dunno if remotes use IR or BT.

thanks byte

are they easy to program?

Mr E

Pretty easy to setup, but you could find yourself tweaking the settings for a week afterwards! Once its done, its done. Works fine with xbox360 (great for navigating streamed content from your PC), sky(+), and should work with your JVC.

Headshot

Mr E wrote: »

Pretty easy to setup, but you could find yourself tweaking the settings for a week afterwards! Once its done, its done. Works fine with xbox360 (great for navigating streamed content from your PC), sky(+), and should work with your JVC.

which harmony remote should i go for

Mr E

There are a good few out there. I got a Harmony 885 (I think!) on an iBood special offer about a year ago and haven't looked back. Seems to pop up every 2 or 3 months too. Its about €121 on pixmania at the moment. I'm sure its available cheaper elsewhere if you look around. There are a few newer models out since then....

00sully

I have the harmony 555 fairly basic model but does the job with most devices. As pointed out its IR only so my Wii wont work with it nor my remote plug sockets which use some proprietary standard It works with all tv's, dvd's, vcr's, surrounds etc.. (has learning mode) and yes it will work with the 360

Its programmable too, so I have several activities programmed into it. eg: 1 which will:

1. put on my tv
2. change the input to HDMI
3. put on the surround
4. change the surround input to optical 2 for xbox
5. turn on the xbox360

with a single button press! slick. you can program several activities each with its own subset of controls. veryyyyy customisable and highly recommended! altho I do not really like the Logitech software for it (web based n' fairly slow and unintuitive)

one caveat, even for a basic remote I constantly get numpties in my house wondering how the hell to use it - was thinking of getting one for my parents until I realised most of my friends (in their 20's) had a hard time using it

byte

I've a Harmony 555 and don't think it's great if I'm honest. It does do most things, but buttons are finicky. I think the 885 might excel in this regard, also helped by a colour screen.

I agree that the software is slow and sometimes annoying. I've my 555 about a year now, and still have not got it working how I'd like it, mainly because I've got bad patience with these things! I really must spend a few hours on it to get it working properly.

Rsaeire

I have the Logitech Harmony One and love it; I can't imagine going back to using my old 5 remote controls to control all my equipment.

Sleipnir

Rsaeire wrote: »

I have the Logitech Harmony One and love it; I can't imagine going back to using my old 5 remote controls to control all my equipment.

Me too, couldn't believe it when they came out with a touchscreen at that price!

OP - easy to program, it's done via software on a computer and a USB connection. You add your devices (model numbers are useful), setup your activities, save that to the remote and away you go.

Rsaeire

Sleipnir wrote: »

You add your devices (model numbers are useful), setup your activities, save that to the remote and away you go.

Or you could call Logitech support if you're having trouble setting your devices up, advise them of exactly what equipment you have, and ask them to set it up for you. I did that and asked the person I spoke with to tell me what they were doing and they walked me through step-by-step so I knew how to tweak things, if needed, in future. Very helpful, very polite and one of the best customer support experiences I've had.

sdevine89

just a quick question will a logitech 1000 control windows media centre when run through an xbox?

Headshot

finally got the harmony 885 last week and have been playing with it

its ok tbh

sky digital is very slow on the remote and the buttons are also small on the remote

im not a fan of the buttons beside the screen tbh very small

and I just dont understand whats activity for in the harmony menu??????

and i can't get my Mvision hd 200 going with it ,even used the IR thing but no luck

byte

There's a configuration option somewhere in the software to adjust the IR emitter, maybe making a slight change will help with Sky delay.

Activities, when configured right, can in theory control all devices from one button press. For example, you sit down and have an Activity setup to watch a DVD. The remote will tell the TV and DVD player to come on (also your AV receiver, if you have one), and put TV (and AVR) onto correct output channel for DVD playback. At the same time, it can turn everything not in use off. Takes a wee while to configure though.

WRT the MVision, it should work (all else failing) when put thru the learning procedure, where you've to aim your MVision remote at the Harmony. Again, takes time to configure.

At the end of the day, the Harmony can be a great device, but it takes a lot of patience IMO to get it to work the way you want it to.

Headshot

byte wrote: »

There's a configuration option somewhere in the software to adjust the IR emitter, maybe making a slight change will help with Sky delay.

Activities, when configured right, can in theory control all devices from one button press. For example, you sit down and have an Activity setup to watch a DVD. The remote will tell the TV and DVD player to come on (also your AV receiver, if you have one), and put TV (and AVR) onto correct output channel for DVD playback. At the same time, it can turn everything not in use off. Takes a wee while to configure though.

WRT the MVision, it should work (all else failing) when put thru the learning procedure, where you've to aim your MVision remote at the Harmony. Again, takes time to configure.

At the end of the day, the Harmony can be a great device, but it takes a lot of patience IMO to get it to work the way you want it to.

thanks byte,ill see can i get that activity thing going
but when i set it up first it kept turning my tv off for some reason

its a very frustrating remote that amount of times iv went through joining the mvision remote and the 885 by infrared
it recognizes the mvision remote but im still not happy,it just doesnt work
the only button that works on the harmony is menu


edit

nope that activity keeps turning of my tv,i dont know whats wrong

Rsaeire

Headshot wrote: »

thanks byte,ill see can i get that activity thing going
but when i set it up first it kept turning my tv off for some reason

its a very frustrating remote that amount of times iv went through joining the mvision remote and the 885 by infrared
it recognizes the mvision remote but im still not happy,it just doesnt work
the only button that works on the harmony is menu


edit

nope that activity keeps turning of my tv,i dont know whats wrong

When choosing an activity, the remote control assumes all devices associated with the activity are already turned off. You can test and confirm this by turning off your TV, selecting the activity and see what happens.

byte

There's anohter option in Activities tab > Settings/Change Options, where you can choose to leave on unused devices.

Similar options under Devices tab.

Headshot

finally got the activity going and speed up the sky and tv controls

now for the mvision