Projectors Reviews, price and comparision

(3.50 out of 5)
Review by Will Greenwald • January 25, 2011Even though button pushes can feel a little slow, the Gear4 UnityRemote is an easy-to-use add-on that can turn your iPhone or iPod Touch into a universal touch screen remote control for your entire home theater system.

Most home theater devices use infrared remote controls. The iPhone and iPod Touch have touch screens that can constantly change to meet the needs of the device in use, but they don't have infrared emitters. They do, however, have Bluetooth, and that's where the $99 (direct) Gear4 UnityRemote comes in. It's an infrared emitter that can wirelessly connect to your iPhone or iPod Touch, so you can use it like a universal remote to control all your IR-based home theater gear.

Design and Setup
The UnityRemote is a simple, 2-inch-tall, 2.5-inch-wide black cylinder that weighs a scant 4.8 ounces, with a shiny metal base and a very dark red band around the top that houses the infrared emitter. There's a single black Power button and a micro-USB cable connector for firmware updates. Everything else is controlled on your iPod Touch or iPhone via a Bluetooth connection. The UnityRemote runs on two AA batteries, which can be installed by unscrewing the base.

Setup is extremely easy. Holding down the button on the UnityRemote sets it to pairing mode, to connect wirelessly with your iPod or iPhone. After that, all you need to do is download and install the free UnityRemote app and start configuring it to work with your home theater components. The device itself needs to be in line-of-sight with your home theater devices, but it casts a broad-enough beam, so that placement can be flexible. Once it's in position, though, you don't need any line of sight between your iPhone or iPod and the device, and you can control your components even if they're behind your home theater's cabinet doors.

The UnityRemote comes with codes for hundreds of models of TVs, Blu-ray players, DVD players, set-top boxes, and other pieces of home theater equipment. The app's setup wizard lets you flip through a list of brands, select the type of device, and then automatically test the configuration by cycling the power on and off through the emitter. If the device turns off/on, you've got the right code. If it doesn't, it moves on to the next code for that brand/device type combination. If that doesn't work, you can manually program the device with your own remote and the app's learning mode. During testing, I was able to program the UnityRemote to work with my LG HDTV and Scientific Atlanta cable box in just a few minutes.

Performance
The remote interface consists of nine buttons arranged in a square, with Power and Help buttons located above and below. The app automatically populates the screen with commonly used buttons, spreading out commands across multiple screens. The first screen of the TV remote mode might have Volume and Power buttons, a Mute button, and a button to activate a directional keypad (which is itself displayed in a 3 by 3 grid). The second screen can be accessed with just a swipe, and it might have Input and Guide buttons. If you don't like how the app lays out the buttons, you can customize the entire system, arranging multiple screens of your own most commonly used buttons, adding and removing commands as you need them. Besides buttons, you can configure actions, macros that execute multiple commands across multiple devices. A wizard can automatically configure many of these actions, or you can manually set them by creating a list of commands for the UnityRemote to execute. It's a very simple, accessible system that offers a lot of control.

In our PCMag lab tests, the Bluetooth connection stayed strong to about 20 feet, more than enough for most home theaters. The IR range of the UnityRemote was at least 8 feet, and its multiple emitters let it send signals to devices in different parts of the room.

Unfortunately, the UnityRemote feels a bit laggy. It'll send commands to all of the devices you want, but it'll take a few more seconds to control them than if you were using each device's dedicated remote. The convenience helps offset the wait between button presses, but it brings up the question of priorities.

You can easily shell out several hundred dollars for a touch-screen remote. The Logitech Harmony 1100 ($399.99, 3 stars) is the best touch-screen hardware option for controlling your home theater without a complex installation, but it's extremely pricey. The Editors' Choice Logitech Harmony One ($249.99, 4 stars) offers a combination touch screen and physical buttons for around half the price, but its more conventional "baton" form factor might turn off users who want the futuristic appeal of a pure touch screen interface. If you want to use your iPhone or iPod Touch to control every aspect of your home theater, the $99 Gear4 UnityRemote is an affordable, simple, streamlined solution. It feels slightly sluggish, but for some, that will be a small price to pay for easy all-in-one touch screen control of your home theater.

More Universal Remote reviews:

Simple to set upHighly ConfigurableDoesn't need line-of-sight between iPhone or iPod Touch and home theater devicesSomewhat sluggish button presses