Great remote for presenters!
Written: Sep 20 '01
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Small, comfortable in the hand. USB interface is a big plus.
Cons: Wish it had a laser pointer built in.
The Bottom Line: Best remote for presenters and speakers - keymapping features let you expand well beyond the sufficent capabilities you find out-of-the-box.
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| dtoombs's Full Review: Keyspan Digital Media Remote |
As an author and a professional speaker, I often find myself speaking at large conferences several times a year. This is a situation where there's a few hundred people in a large room, with a very large projection screen set up.
A year ago or so, I was working with another presenter and he had this awesome little IR remote that hooked into the serial port. He let me borrow it for a presentation I was doing later that day, and I was instantly hooked. I was down in the audience, walking amongst the crowd, and was still able to change slides on my laptop.
I looked around online for that remote, but sadly I couldn't find it, nor anything close to it. So, I gave up my hopes of ever having a cool little remote like his.
Then one day - completely by accident - I stumbled across the Keyspan Digital Media Remote. This thing looked awesome - it was exactly what I needed! Immediately, I purchased one.
As soon as I received the unit, I was impressed with the construction. It is very well built, but has a very small form factor so it won't take up a lot of space in the ol' laptop bag. The interface to the unit is USB, which is perfect because I'm currently using a single-spindle mini laptop that has no serial port (see my other reviews for information about the Sony VAIO Picturebook). I plugged the device in, installed the drivers, and was instantly flipping through PowerPoint slides from across my living room!
I was easily able to get a range of about 20+ feet to this unit, so the signal is very good - you'll be able to move around freely and still control your system. In addition to that, there are multiple keys available on the remote which can be "mapped" to different features based on whatever program you're running at the moment. Want to make it an MP3 player remote? No problem! Want to use it to control pull-down menus in an application like Word or Excel? No problem!
As a matter of fact, what really floored me about this was when I pressed the "*" key on the remote while using PowerPoint. This simulated an "Alt-Tab" at the keyboard, which switches between programs running on the computer. This will be great for me as I often have to switch from PowerPoint into other applications to demonstrate what I'm trying to teach.
I wish this unit had a laser pointer embedded inside of the transmitter, but alas it doesn't. So, I'll still have to carry a separate laser. But other than that, there's nothing else I imagine needing that this unit doesn't already have! Definitely worth the money!
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 49
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Epinions.com ID:
dtoombs
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Location: Washington, DC
Reviews written: 14
Trusted by: 2 members
About Me:
Technology consultant and part-time author.
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