Our Harmony ®

We got a new HD TV for Christmas*. And after we got our carpet, we couldn't find the remote for our DVD/Surround Sound system. Luckily, the surround sound system and the little DVD player in our room are made by the same company, so we could use the one for both. But it didn't change the volume. And either way, we had a remote for the TV, the DVD/Surround Sound, and one for the Cable. Too many remotes.

So we got this lovely item. The model is "Harmony," so we keep calling it "our harmony." Not the harmony, but Our harmony. We're funny, deal with it. It's little pricey (more than the $20 universal remote...), but it's awesome. You set up the remote on your computer. Not by pushing a billion codes into the remote, hoping for one that will work so you don't have to try the next code on the list. On top of that, if something doesn't exactly work right (after you've programmed the remote... on your COMPUTER), you push the "help" button, and it will do something else to fix the function, then asks if that worked. If it did, you click "yes" on the view screen (oh yeah. it has a view screen), and presto, it's fixed.

On top of fixing problems automatically, it has "events" you can set up. Like, if I push the "watch TV" button, it will turn the TV on, make sure the cable is on (but I programmed the remote to know that the cable box never turns off so it can record stuff on the DVR when we're not watching TV), and turn the TV to the right input setting. If I push the "watch a movie" button, it turns the TV on, turns it to the right input setting, and turns the DVD player on and starts playing.

And the view screen. There are certain buttons on the TV remote that aren't standard on this universal remote. So the view screen adds them. Four buttons can show up at once, and you can scroll through multiple pages of additional buttons. Like the aspect ratio. I can change that whenever by pushing button 1 on page 2 on the view screen. Pretty awesome, huh?

Ok, not that awesome, but on top of that, it has a GLOW button! I mean, come ON! It GLOWS when I tell it to! Oh, and we only have to use one remote now. And that's pretty awesome.



*We actually got the TV in August... for Christmas.