Which Universal Remote to Use?

Yeah,

I got the Harmony 1000 for free, and it's barely worth that. Initially Harmony had told me they were going to allow you to customize the screens, but that is never going to happen, they also needed to add an RF to RS 232 controller to it but that too won't ever happen.

I use the 890 for my main rig which is a complicated dual use (movies/music) system and it works very well and I love all the hard buttons, I keep the 1000 in my bedroom which is much simpler a system and it barely is good enough for that. I often have to reboot the 1000, and the IR emitter stinks!

Glad I could help!

Wow - the Harmony 1000 is really that bad huh? Thanks for steering me clear - nice to know that there is an upper limit to getting what you pay for when it comes to remotes.

Just spent a few hours reading reviews of the Harmony remotes on Amazon - looks like the biggest issue with the Harmony 880-890s is an issue with survivability due to "regular" wear and tear. The remotes appear to be fairly delicate. While I don't intend to subject my remote to Underwriter Laboratory testing in my media room, I'm curious as to how big a factor this is for the Harmony owners out there.

Any thoughts?

Maxim,

I have had my 880 for ~5 years, it works flawlessly, my 890 is slightly younger but not by much and again, works perfectly, neither has ever had an issue, and I would highly disagree with the statement that they are 'delicate'.

I have big dogs and had young children (well, 9 and 13 then) and they both survived without a scratch. The one complaint many have is the charging dock for the 880/890 is not the greatest design, some times the remote won't make good contact and it doesn't charge when in the cradle.

I do not find this to be an issue, and in fact, my 890 still runs for weeks without recharging, even with regular use.

Oh, BTW my entire house is tiled, so every time the remote has fallen, it's landed on tile, and both still are hanging in strong.

I guess by now you can see I am hooked on the Harmony remotes, and have been now for seven years (when I got my 690, which BTW is still working perfectly as well, no cradle issues as this one runs on batteries, again which last MONTHS between changes!)