gdgt

I have been using Harmony remotes for a few years now. I first bought the 550 which was great, but far from perfect. For my birthday, my wife got me the Harmony 1000 which is a touch screen-only remote. That thing drove me crazy for six months until I threw my hands up and asked her to return it. It was just way too frustrating to use as a "clicker" not to mention it was riddled with both technical and design flaws.

Enter the Harmony One. I had been reading great things about the Harmony One when scouring internet forums for help with my Harmony 1000 woes. The more I read, the more I wanted this device. So, naturally, the first thing I did after returning the Harmony 1000 was to order a Harmony One.

From the instant I held it I knew this remote was "The One". It's much, much lighter than the pictures lead you to believe and it fits in the hand like a glove. At first the touch screen surprised me because Logitech did a very clever trick of mixing a great LCD display with separate LEDs for navigation which all blend into one because blacks on the LED display match the bezel the LEDs are housed in. It reminds me of OLED displays which will be coming to devices like this in the next few years. A subtle optical trick, but it really makes the remote look sharp.

I set the remote up with my TV, two game consoles, HTPC, receiver, two Apple notebooks, and cable box and everything just worked. I even grabbed some great favorite channel icons from iconharmony. Things are working great and I couldn't be happier.

At the end of the day it's all moot if my wife does not like it. She has poo-pooed a lot of my gadget buys over the years and most of the time she is right because at times I am too techie and often do not consider the average user. She had off the day after I received the remote and got to spend the day with. When I came home that night I was prepared for, "I really hate this remote" but to my delight she said, "This remote is awesome!" It's a win-win across the board!