In Search of the Best Programmable Universal Remote?

option8 asks: "Now that i have more components in my living room than I have room on the coffee table for their remotes, I'm looking into getting a programmable universal remote. I've looked at some of the spiffy touchscreen jobs, like the Philips Pronto and even some of the new color remotes, but it seems to me that spending more for my remote than I did on my DVD player is overdoing it somewhat. Also, all I've found are ones with windows support for building screens. Are there any out there that I can use with Linux?" There was a previous Ask Slashdot on this subject back in '99, anything new to report since then?

Comments

Re:why not get a helper monkey?

[Nightpaw]

1. Banana's will be more expensive than batteries over time.

I didn't know that bananas had wills. And I don't what a will belonging to a banana has to do with anything or why you're speaking Ebonics.

Re:OmniRemote/

[psych031337]

For those with a Palm Pilot, OmniRemote [pacificneotek.com] is an excellent universal remote application. It makes Palm IIs with the 2MB upgrade card useful again.

Well, using a palm as a remote is the same as getting up and pushing the button with your live fingers. The range of that cute IR transmitter is fine for beaming vCards but don't expect it to reach through your entire living room. Fresh batteries might help, but what really is needed here is a soldering-iron-h4x0r punching in a more powerful IR bulb.