old_prop's Full Review: Logitech Harmony® 659 LCD Remote Control
ONE-YEAR UPDATE, Dec. 07: Still going strong, still my best buddy. The quick-disappearing backlight mentioned below turned out to be a fault in my unit. After a courteous, pleasant exchange of e-mails and some on-line work, Logitech support determined (last March) that the unit was dying. The original warranty was no longer valid (I'd bought a refurb), but Logitech offered to fix the unit for $25. Sounded good to me -- and, when I got the "repaired" unit back, it was a brand new one! I just logged on to my Logitech account, downloaded my settings again to the new unit, and away I went. And the backlight works just fine. So does everything else. I've upgraded my Overall Product Rating from "Above Average" to "Excellent."
ORIGINAL REVIEW, Dec. 06: I've grown up with technological gizmos and have learned to accept a certain level of failure: the Logitech Harmony 659 comes as a pleasant surprise. I have tried other (cheaper) "universal" remotes without joy. There were always things that those "universals" couldn't figure out how to do, so I had to keep the device-specific remotes around anyway. Now my collection of little plastic handfuls has migrated to a cardboard box in the cupboard where it quietly sleeps, not needed, not wanted and not missed.
Because the 659 is now an "older" model you can find it very reasonably priced. I got mine off e-Bay for just over half what they sell for in the big box stores. The newer models from this maker may be even better, but the 659 handles my reasonably complex system (Motorola satellite box, Hitachi TV, Toshiba DVD, JVC VCR, Technics CD, Panasonic receiver) without even grunting.
Yes, programming it does require a computer and access to the Internet, but the way I’m writing and you’re reading this review suggests you will have no fear of that. You install Logitech’s software from the included CD (or after downloading it), get set up on the Logitech website with a username and password, and away you go. The whole process will take about half an hour.
First you tell the website what specific devices you have. It needs to know the manufacturer and the model number of each. Is this a hassle? I don’t think it’s unreasonable. You do have to root around the back of your devices to find the model numbers (or you read them from the User Manuals – you do have all the User Manuals?), but, trust me, it’s worth it. Even at this stage you get an encouraging sense that the remote might know what it’s doing when, say, you tell it your VCR is from JVC and it tells you the model number you’re looking for will be something like “HR-D750U,” and then you tell it you have a Technics CD changer and it says, right, that’ll be something like “SL-PD8.” Once you’ve given it a list of your devices it pulls up the relevant command sets from its data base (which must be enormous) and gets them ready.
Then, it has you tell it how you use your system. In playing a DVD, for example, do you control the volume via the TV or the receiver? In watching TV, do you use the TV set’s speakers or your surround system? That sort of thing. Once that’s all established Logitech flashes it into the firmware on your handset via an (included) USB cable from your PC and you’re good to go.
To tell it you want to watch a DVD you push one button and it turns on the DVD, turns on the receiver and sets it for surround sound, turns on the TV and sets it to the proper Auxilliary input, and does everything but open the DVD case and hand you the disc. To change your mind and tell it you want to watch TV you push one other button and it turns off the DVD, turns off the receiver, turns on the satellite box and changes the TV to the normal input on Channel 3. Amazing.
You’ll probably need to add some less-common commands later. In my case, for example, the 659 didn’t at first know how to call up my list of favourite channels on the satellite TV. No problem. You just log back onto the Logitech website, get recognized via your username and password, and add the missing command: it’s on a dropdown of available commands for your specific satellite remote control – the 659 just didn’t immediately realize that you’d be wanting to use it. I added the “Open/Close” toggle for my DVD the same way: not everybody wants that command perhaps, but I do. There is a “learning” mode for adding instructions that the website doesn’t know about, but I haven’t had to use it.
Problems? Only two that I know of. First, the display is dimmer than I’d like, and when you bring up the backlight it pops back off again so few seconds later you’d think it was a submarine periscope trying not to draw attention. I suspect both of these are tradeoffs to prolong battery life. Second, sometimes the remote won’t turn on multiple devices (say, the DVD, the receiver and the TV) all at once. I think this is because my components are fairly widely dispersed for my normal viewing distance (50-inch TV was right for a former house, too big now). Stepping back further from the units seems to bring improvement.
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