General Feedback

[SomethingSomethingDarkSide]

Hi, I just found out about this today, went over your Kickstarter (great video) and YouTube videos.

Here are my 2 cents:

Why do you hate the Stop button? I have seen this on a few new universal remotes that have come out since Logitech killed Harmony, and it has been a common complaint from prospective buyers. There are instances where the Back button simply can't take that roll. Eg, Kodi for Android/Android TV, the back button will keep the media playing, and simply go back into the menu, they will not allow the back button to function as Stop. You can't use a Flirc to simulate a Stop Button for an Nvidia Shield, as there is no keyboard command for it. Of course we all use devices differently, but I don't think I have used the FF or RW keys in over a decade, I personally use the CCT to do that, but I use the Stop button daily.

Lack of colour buttons is a deal breaker for many in Europe.

 

Nate, I saw you post on the Kodi forum, saying a Harmony 650 has too many buttons, and this is where you will have two different schools of thought; those that like to have all controls within reach and can understand what they are looking at, and those that breath through their mouth and are scared of options. My house has both types, I want all the options on the remote, I found the simplified options to be counter productive, as they drive the interaction away from the single button press into multiple button presses to get the same result form digging into the menu. Take the Stop button again, many Kodi users simply say to press the button to bring up the control menu, then select down and across to the stop button. Ok, it's doable, but you have taken a single button press that was quick and just above thoughtless, into a multi action operation requiring concentration on where the commands are going.

My other half, she likes simplified remotes so she can't be bamboozled by something she does't interact with as often.

 

I see you plan on a Bluetooth model in the future, great, that will help with many devices.

 

Software, one thing I couldn't see in any video, and no surprised, it's a small population that will want it, is the ability to add timed delay to start up commands for devices already in the Power On chain, Harmony couldn't do this either. EG, power on LG TV, Nvidia Shield and AVR while eARC is in use, the CEC must be enabled. An LG TVz, and I am guessing others, can take quite a while to fully turn on, and even if it is the first item in the Power On activity, it may not be fully on until after the 3rd/4th etc.. item is powered on. What happens here, is the CEC chain will fire up late, and the TV will change it's input to what the Shield is on, when maybe you wanted the HDMI input to be on different one. So what you would want is the ability to send a delayed command to switch HDMI input to one of the devices already in the power on chain. I needed this in the past, and I found out quite a lot of Sonos owners wanted this function too.

Would love a screen. basically a Harmony 650 with IR and Bluetooth.

 

Will keep an eye out for your BT model when you post news for it.

 

Best of luck with the launch of the Skip 1s.

Edited November 14, 2022 by SomethingSomethingDarkSide

[Nathan]

There are color buttons. There's a "color" button below the navigation area that replaces the nav buttons with color buttons.

Also, it's a universal remote. Any button can be the stop button if you want it. 

[SomethingSomethingDarkSide]

The colour option goes back to the making it harder by trying to be simpler. On other remotes that have dedicated colour buttons, it’s a one click action that requires no thought once you have a little muscle memory, with your option it may require up to 5 button pushes right?

 

Yes, as a programable remote anything can be anything, and in my case as I’ve said I don’t use RW or FF, it would be the easy option. 
Let’s say I program it that way, and you come over to my place and I’m cooking you some food and ask you to stop the playback, what do you do, how on earth do you know what button to push to stop? You don’t, your friend doesn’t, your mum/wife/boyfriend/sister etc doesn’t. The Stop button isn’t some obscure command, it’s on most other remotes for a reason. It’s just these new super simple to make it harder remotes that it’s being removed. 

[Nathan]

I mean, you can also just use the stop button as the stop button. 

[SomethingSomethingDarkSide]

I must be blind, I can't see one.

RW, Play/Pause & FW are the only traditional media control buttons.

[Nathan]

On 11/19/2022 at 7:01 PM, SomethingSomethingDarkSide said:

I must be blind, I can't see one.

RW, Play/Pause & FW are the only traditional media control buttons.

Stop and Record are down at the bottom by the Zero of the number pad

[SomethingSomethingDarkSide]

Ahhh, yes they are. 
Ok, some more feedback, layout of media buttons has poor UI. This is akin to having the 6 and 8 buttons away from the rest of the numbers. 
 

I was recently on another forum/Reddit (???) where I saw another post about no Stop button, so I’m not alone with my targeted eyes.