I've been Betaboy with the Harmony since Friday last week, and I know some people are interested in hearing what this thing is all about.

First of all, let me say that everything posted about the remote on the easyzapper website is true: the Harmony will change the way you approach your whole Home Theatre system control. It may change how other remote manufacturers look at their own equipment.

Some of the overriding problems that Universal Remote Controls (URCs) have not been able to overcome are completely wiped out by the Harmony. I'll run through some examples:

- WAF, or Wife Approval Factor, and BUTT: Babysitter Useability Teaching Techniques. Many remotes require a little tutorial before anyone else but the owner can use them, either because you have to point out how a URC is operated, or where the Macro buttons are and what they do so a video can be watched, or which buttons--labelled by the manufacturer--actually do something other than what they say.

> > Using the Harmony, you can simply point out that the thumb wheel can be used to select any Activity (like Watch a Video or Watch a DVD, and that's it... everything comes on and all the inputs switch by themselves, just in time for the Play button to be automatically pressed. And it really works.

- Macros. Macros (recording a series of commands that can be accessed by one button press) have become more and more popular, as people add devices to their home TV viewing. Teaching a Macro to a remote can be fairly easy or extremely complicated, depending on the design of the remote itself. And the whole series of steps has to be changed, usually completely redone, if a Device is added or removed or setup differently in the system. As well, most keys that hold macros are not labelled with the macro name, unless you have a device with a screen.

> > Once your Harmony is taught which Devices you have in your system, and how they are hooked up, the Web software automatically figures out what Activities your system is capable of and sets them up for you.You add a Device or remove a Device, you don't have to worry: once it knows about the Device, it runs through its little procedure again and sets up everything all over again. No mistakes.

- Discrete codes are the bane of the remote control world... especially when one or more of your Devices doesn't use them. The simplest form of discrete code is the two that can turn your Device On, or Off, using different commands. Without discrete codes, your remote never knows what state your Devices are in, so you often need two macros for everything: one to turn stuff on, and one to turn stuff off. And if any of the devices in your system are in a state that is out of synch with your macros, you end up punching a bunch of buttons on top of having used your macro commands.

> > The Harmony doesn't care if your TV is on or off; it doesn't care if your Receiver has Discrete power commands or Input codes; it doesn't give a hoot if you have a digital cable box or satellite that requires a feed through channel 3 on your RPTV. Once you've told it how your Device works, it always knows what state your system is in! This is no joke, and it works. I've never seen anything like it.

- When your Home Theatre components get out of synch, whether through a Macro misfiring or someone just turning off the TV with a different remote, you know what you have to go through to get things back on track. It's just a part of life, right?

> > If the Harmony ever gets out of synch, you just press the Help button, and the LCD screen Wizard takes you through a quick series of steps with "Yes" and "No" answers. In seconds, things are back to normal. Not that a dude from RemoteCentral needs this feature... but what about your kids, your wife or girlfriend? Problem solved. No more "I can't get the picture to come on from the VCR!!!" shouts while you're off doing something more important, like updating a driver for your sound card that's not working anymore... .

Okay, okay, I admit the whole mess I've just written sounds like a sales pitch or a brochure, but I don't know how else to explain it. It just works. It really does.

The only problems I've had are during initial setup. The whole program is still in Beta, so the database of Devices available is pretty slim. However, the website wizards quickly walk you through the setup requirements for each of your Devices, right down to telling you if and when you need to teach the Harmony a sample of your original remotes. Some Devices I have needed only the Power key taught; others needed a number of keys digitized. But generally speaking the software recognizes the types of command in use, and applies the coding across the spectrum of commands for individual original remotes.

One very interesting aspect of working via the Web-based Wizards is that EasyZapper has built in some scripting that informs the software when you might be having problems. For example, I couldn't seem to get the hang of "characterizing" one of my Devices (I wasn't reading the webpage instructions carefully), and after my third attempt I got a message saying that it recognized I was having some problems and had sent off the pertinent information to the Support Team. Very cool.

I've had loads of interaction with the Beta Support Team, usually within a few hours of sending an e-mail or using a Wizard. Whether this is the result of the company being in an intensive round of testing or not remains to be seen. But they tell me that they consider their quick response and web-active interactivity to be one of their key strengths and selling points: the only way this whole thing will work is if they have satisfied customers who continue to supply them with new Device information and feedback.

Already, their Website has had several additions and changes based on my feedback and Device testing... most changes within hours. In fact, one message popped up so soon after I asked about something that I thought I must have been fooling myself: that I hadn't really told them, I just read it on their site. But nope, they had taken my e-mail and made the change that quickly.

Another problem I had involved the "Watch a DVD" activity (that's what they call 'em: Activities; once you've configured your Devices online, the software seeks out the kinds of Activities you might want to do): even though I selected "Watch DVD while listening with Receiver speakers", the volume controls on the Harmony wouldn't work on the Receiver. That afternoon, when I updated the Harmony once again, that had been fixed. I can't tell you how COOL it is to punch the "Watch a DVD" icon on the LCD screen and see my whole system go into action, all the inputs switching around, the Cable box turning off, and the DVD menu come up on screen. Why hasn't someone done this long ago? No excrutiating note-taking while trying to teach another remote all keys I need and then teaching it all the steps for a Macro that I can't even test until it's all done and recorded, only to find out I missed changing an input, or that of course it won't work right because I don't have discrete Power commands for the VCR... . It's almost impossible to get an Activity set up incorrectly, unless you feed the Wizards some incorrect information in the first place. And once it's in there, you don't have to tweak it every time you need a change. It knows your system already.

That is probably the crux of the matter right there: although I abhor this word, the Harmony represents a "paradigm shift" in the way you'll look at remote controls. Yeah, it's a stubby little thing that looks more like a cel-phone than a sophisticated controller, but so what? It works. This company is doing what I often wished I could do, and have often complained about concerning other remote control designers: they want it perfect, they want it to replace all the other remotes hanging around "just in case", and I believe they will achieve that goal. You can now think in terms of simple tasks, just like the old days when all you needed to do was turn on your set and change the volume and channels. Just "Record Television" and boink!: it's happening.

I'm wrestling with another issue, too: I have an RCA TV, and the software just doesn't want to see the IR commands from it's remote. Yes, the Harmony has done it's own thing and figured out the code structure, so that I can watch TV, change channels and Volume, record a tape, watch the DVD, all kinds of stuff... but it refuses to set my TV to channel 3 when I turn the system on. Instead, it wants to set it to channel 33. I need channel 3 because I feed the set from my digital cable box, otherwise it wouldn't matter. I can see it onscreen as it tries to do just 3, but for some reason it always adds another 3 to the thing. Even more strange, it will correctly select channel 3 if I'm just surfing.

I have a number of other URCs that have been taught the RCA command set, and I've been able to use my Onkyo (the Best Remote in the World, although the Harmony is going to change all that) to digitize the codes for the Harmony. But that may be where the problem lies: perhaps, when I originally taught the Onkyo remote, I held down the RCA remote keys too long and the Onkyo absorbed multiple shots of the IR command. The EasyZapper team has been working on fixing me up day and night since Monday, and they promise they'll have a new version of the software soon that may overcome my difficulties with this. And I have to hand it to them: I think the problem is on my end. I'll be working on this some more tonight to see if my double-click theory is correct.

So how does it work? Well, you plug the Harmony into your PC with the provided USB cable, and on most Windows systems the drivers required are installed automatically. I needed the Windows ME disk for one file, and then all was well: a Harmony remote Monitor is installed that watches for when you plug in the Device, and then automatically takes you to the sign-in page on the Web. Your e-mail address is your personal identifier, and you can actually create separate accounts to try different things without losing your other settings.

You need to know how your system is wired and whether your Devices have discrete codes for power and for inputs. It doesn't matter if they don't; the software just needs to know these details as it prepares your system profile. To assist with this, the Website is basically a series of Wizards that steps you through the questions. A nice touch is the inclusion of Worksheets that you can print out for each Device to record pertinent information that you will be asked to provide.

If one of your Devices is not in the database (and right now, there isn't too much there), you get the chance to include it for all future Harmony owners. You may be asked to digitize a couple of commands from your original remote. This is as simple as teaching any other URC, except that the software requires three good blasts in a row, and then it records it and analyzes it. Then you get to see the results: I learned, for instance, that my Onkyo remote consists primarily of infrared commands from Hitachi. Weird. don't got no Hitachi equipment. Because I have 10 direct input keys for my receiver, I had to teach the software each of these commands and assign them the appropriate names.

Once a Device is configured, the software scans all the Devices you have added and figures out just what you can do with your system. As I mentioned before, these are basically Activities like "Watch a DVD", or "Record Television". Then it sets everything up, and you download a file to your PC which is used to configure the remote. The designers have been kind enough to include progress bars onscreen, so you are always aware of where things are in the process. The remote reboots, your personal message or Title comes up on the LCD screen, and away you go.

There are a number of utilities and subsets of procedures you can do at any time on your personalized Web area to change or add Devices or Activities. You can even access the XML code for your controller for each Device. This is extremely handy sometimes, and the software won't let you enter any bad code. (I found this out first-hand: I left off the ending slash in one case and had to e-mail 'em to find out what I had done wrong...!) I used the XML editing tool to change all the channel configurations for the Ottawa area; the website will have cable and satellite defintions for all of North America in about a week and a half, but I couldn't wait.

One very cool feature is the ZAP button: you're watching a classic football game and the stats come up on screen.... you press ZAP, and the next time you go to your website and hook up the Harmony, you get a link directly to those stats via the WWW, if they're available. Or to Movie credits, travel sites from commercials, even if you're just listening to the radio. WAY cool.

To sum up, I should tell you that while the Harmony is the perfect remote for "everyone else in the house" because of its ease-of-use, at this stage of the game there is some serious setup work to get it to that level. EasyZapper has made this part of it about as easy as anyone could, but I know my wife woudn't be able to do it. So keep your boyfriend handy. On the other hand, part of the master plan is to take both Beta user comments and customer comments and continue to streamline both the Wizards and the software to make it a truly simple and enjoyable experience. There I go, sounding like a Shill again... but I believe they will do it.

If you've ever spent any time fiddling with remotes in an attempt to hit that ultimate sweetspot, you owe it to yourself to try this baby out. I'll report more as I go along. ... Mike

In the midst of writing the above, I get notification from EasyZapper that they've uncovered what may have ben an anomoly in their software's protocol, and that by later today I should be able to update my Harmony to discover that the RCA set will now correctly tune to channel 3 when I fire up the system.

Now, that's service.

So I guess I've saved all you other RCA owners a peck of trouble... ;-) ... Mike

Great report, Mike!

I just got mine, so I'll hopefully be reporting on my trials and tribulations soon. One thing I'm very interested in finding out is how well it will work with my two Tivo units. At first glance it doesn't seem to have enough buttons to efficiently handle all the functions without going through a multitude of task screens. Only time will tell.

I think TiVo and ReplayTV will present the best stress-test for these puppies, if the Harmony can handle PVRs it should be able to handle anything.

If Mike is that impressed, this has to be a pretty good remote (he has quite a few in his collection!)

Rob.

Mike,

Excellent review (almost sounds too good to be true though). I do have a question though. You mentioned fairly specific "activities" that are defined. Are they user defined or defined by default by the Harmony. For example, if I wanted to watch a DVD using DTS processing, would I have to create different activities that may say:

"Watch a DVD using DTS processing"
"Watch a DVD using Dolby 5.1 processing"
"Watch a DVD using..."
(etc., etc.)?

I checked out the Harmony website, and the remote itself doesn't look like it has many hard buttons. I'm guessing that the user has to scroll through menus using the scroll wheel. I can imagine that defining all conceivable "activities" would be overwhelming and probably isn't how the device works. However, considering the lack of hard buttons, how can you fine tune the activities? (did this make any sense?)

John

Also, my wife and I like to use the on-screen channel guide provided by our Dishplayer satellite receiver. I can't imagine preferring the use of the on-screen guide provided by the remote itself. It sounds like the only reason to connect the remote to the website ever so often is to update its' internal channel listings. Since I probably wouldn't use the remote for this, would I need to connect ever after the initial setup?

I am assuming that the Harmony still allows you to use on-screen channel listings via satellite receivers. Is that correct?

Thanks again,

John

Sorry for overloading this string. However, while writing my last post, I received a response from Glen Harris (Harmony CEO) regarding the channel listing questions (I had sent him an e-mail earlier...excellent response time!).

His answer was that you can use the remote to control the satellite receiver channel guide. Also, if you choose not to use the remote's channel guide, there really is no need to log-on/connect to the the web every so often.

John

I have a funny feeling that this thread is going to become a very, very long one!

That's an incredible review Daniel,...(oops!)...I mean Mike.

PapaJohn: I don't know if Glen also told you about the Activities, so here goes: no, you don't have to do those steps to set up an Activity; the software figures them out for you. For instance, during initial setup, it asks you "When you watch TV, do you: listen with the television speakers? Listen with the Receiver speakers? (choose one)". Same with DVD, VCR, etc. Then, it auto-creates the Activities based on your input.

There is a complete set of tools to change, modify and streamline your Activity parameters. You can also modify the XML code governing most aspects of operation. So, after the initial set-up, you can pretty much have it run the way you want. You could even, as I will, have two Television choices: one with Receiver on, and one off (for everyone else in the house who doesn't really care as long as the picture comes on!).

As of this moment, there is no specific direct access to Receiver Modes, but I am told that this is already well in the works. ... Mike

PS: The TV Guide listings on the LCD, which you select by using the scroll wheel, will soon also have "Info" available, so you can see program descriptions just like on the dish. The main advantage, should you choose to use this method, is that none of your picture is hidden on the screen while you scroll. Now in the case of my digital cable, it puts a picture of whatever channel is active up in the corner of the Guide, but in my son-in-laws RCA DirectTV, the picture is completely replaced by a slow, full-screen Guide, which drives me nuts.

I asked Glen about changes that may be made to the final release version of the remote that won't be available on the beta test model. I was wondering if beta test models could be exchanged for final release models after the beta test period. He said that the only difference would be a speaker in the final model (although I don't know what it would be used for). All other changes would be to firmware which would be downloadable for the beta model. He also said that for a nominal fee, beta testers could exchange their unit for a final release model if they so chose.

Mike, do you know if there is some kind of a limited time money back gaurantee if you are not satisfied with the beta unit?

John

Good review Mike.

Does anyone know if they sent one of these to Daniel?

I don't know if they've sent one of these to Daniel, but from what I hear, the features are in a state of flux, so sending it to Daniel would be superfluous at this time, unless they want Daniel to beta test it for them.

But, for review purposes, it is far too early.

Also, since beta testers are vital to a project like this, I would hope that a Final Release model would be given to the beta testers, or the fee be a "shipping only" nominal fee.

... Greg

Greg, I thought the beta testing was more software related the Hardware. And since all (Or most) of the work is done on the web, I would assume (I know) thatall the "updating" would be related to the site.

BTW did you order one? Has anyone told Arjen there is a new remote :-)?