Universal Remote - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

A universal remote is a remote control

Remote control

A remote control is a component of an electronics device, most commonly a television set, used for operating the television device wirelessly from a short line-of-sight distance.The remote control is usually contracted to remote...

that can be programmed to operate various brands of one or more types of consumer electronics

Consumer electronics

Consumer electronics are electronic equipment intended for everyday use, most often in entertainment, communications and office productivity. Radio broadcasting in the early 20th century brought the first major consumer product, the broadcast receiver...

devices. Low-end universal remotes can only control a set number of devices determined by their manufacturer, while mid- and high-end universal remotes allow the user to program in new control codes to the remote. Many remotes sold with various electronic devices include universal remote capabilities for other types of devices, which allow the remote to control other devices beyond the device it came with. For example, a VCR

Videocassette recorder

The videocassette recorder , is a type of electro-mechanical device that uses removable videocassettes that contain magnetic tape for recording analog audio and analog video from broadcast television so that the images and sound can be played back at a more convenient time...

remote may be programmed to operate various brands of television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

s. Because programming a universal remote can be a fairly complex procedure, it is most often performed by technically-minded individuals, although non-technical users can often operate the remote after it has been programmed.

History

On May 30, 1985, Philips introduced the first universal remote (U.S. Pat. #4774511) under the Magnavox brand name.

In 1985, Robin Rumbolt, William "Russ" McIntyre, and Larry Goodson with North American Philips Consumer Electronics (Magnavox, Sylvania, and Philco) developed the first universal remote control. Shortly after development was completed and patent applications filed, Magnavox initiated the "Smart, Very Smart" campaign, coining the "smart" axiom. McIntyre has claimed that the primary design challenge was fitting the well-crafted, tight code into an extremely limited memory space. At least two subsequent patents followed: US Pat. 4703359, on November 20, 1988 and US Pat. 4951131, in 1989.

In 1987, the first programmable universal, remote control was released. It was created by CL 9

CL 9

CL 9 was a universal remote control company started by Steve Wozniak, the inventor of the Apple I and Apple II computers. The company was in business for three years, from 1985 to 1988, coming out with the 6502-based CL 9 CORE remote control in 1987, the first universal programmable remote...

, a startup founded by Steve Wozniak

Steve Wozniak

Stephen Gary "Woz" Wozniak is an American computer engineer and programmer who founded Apple Computer, Co. with Steve Jobs and Ronald Wayne...

, the inventor of the Apple II

Apple II

The Apple II is an 8-bit home computer, one of the first highly successful mass-produced microcomputer products, designed primarily by Steve Wozniak, manufactured by Apple Computer and introduced in 1977...

.

In March 1987, Steve Ciarcia

Steve Ciarcia

Steve Ciarcia is an embedded control systems engineer. He became popular through his Ciarcia's Circuit Cellar column in BYTE magazine, and later through the Circuit Cellar magazine that he published...

published an article in Byte Magazine entitled "Build a Trainable Infrared Master Controller", describing a universal remote with the ability to upload the settings to a computer. This device had macro capabilities.

Layout and features

Most universal remotes share a number of basic design elements:

A power button, as well as a switch or series of buttons to select which device the remote is controlling at the moment. A typical selection includes TV, VCR
Videocassette recorder
The videocassette recorder , is a type of electro-mechanical device that uses removable videocassettes that contain magnetic tape for recording analog audio and analog video from broadcast television so that the images and sound can be played back at a more convenient time...

, DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....

, and CBL
Cable box
The term cable box can refer to:* Cable box an electronic device that controls cable television in individual homes.* Cable box a box located outside a residence that connects cable television....

/SAT
Satellite television
Satellite television is television programming delivered by the means of communications satellite and received by an outdoor antenna, usually a parabolic mirror generally referred to as a satellite dish, and as far as household usage is concerned, a satellite receiver either in the form of an...

, along with other devices that sometimes include DVR
DVR
The initialism "DVR", when used by itself, can refer to:* Digital video recorder* Discrete valuation ring* Distance-vector routing* Direct volume rendering* Derwent Valley Railway * Devco Railway...

s, audio equipment or home automation devices.
Channel and volume up/down selectors (sometimes marked with + and - signs).
A numeric keypad
Numeric keypad
A numeric keypad, numpad or tenkey for short, is the small, palm-sized, seventeen key section of a computer keyboard, usually on the very far right. The numeric keypad features digits 0 to 9, addition , subtraction , multiplication and division symbols, a decimal point and Num Lock and Enter keys...

for entering channel numbers and some other purposes such as time and date entry.
A set button (sometimes recessed to avoid accidental pressing) to allow selection of a particular set of codes (usually entered on the keypad). Most remotes also allow the user to cycle through the list of available codes to find one that matches the device to be controlled.
Most but not all universal remotes include one or more D-pad
D-pad
A D-pad is a flat, usually thumb-operated directional control with one button on each point, found on nearly all modern video game console gamepads, game controllers, on the remote control units of some television and DVD players, and smart phones...

s for navigating menus on DVD players and cable/satellite boxes.

Certain highly reduced designs such as the TV-B-Gone

TV-B-Gone

TV-B-Gone is a type of simple universal remote control device for turning off a large majority of the current available brands of television sets. It was created to allow people in a public place to turn off nearby television sets. Its inventor has referred to it as "an environmental management...

or keychain-sized remotes include only a few buttons, such as power and channel/volume selectors.

Higher-end remotes have numerous other features:

Macro programming, allowing the user to program command sequences to be sent with one button press
LCD
Liquid crystal display
A liquid crystal display is a flat panel display, electronic visual display, or video display that uses the light modulating properties of liquid crystals . LCs do not emit light directly....

to display status information.
Programmable soft keys, allowing user-defined functions and macros
Aliases or "punchthroughs", which allow multiple devices to be accessed without changing device modes (for example, using the TV's volume control while the remote is still in DVD-player mode.)
IR
Infrared
Infrared light is electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength longer than that of visible light, measured from the nominal edge of visible red light at 0.74 micrometres , and extending conventionally to 300 µm...

code learning, allowing the remote to be programmed to control new devices not already in its code list
PC configuration, allowing the remote to be connected to a computer for easy setup
Some universal remotes have the ability to also make phone calls replacing your home phone in that room.
Repeater
Repeater
A repeater is an electronic device that receives asignal and retransmits it at a higher level and/or higher power, or onto the other side of an obstruction, so that the signal can cover longer distances.-Description:...

s are available that can extend the range of a remote control; some remotes are designed to communicate with a dedicated repeater over RF, removing the line-of-sight requirement of IR repeaters, while others accept infrared signals from any remote and transmit them to the device being controlled. (The latter are sometimes built as hobby projects and are widely available in kit form.)
Some devices, such as some computers and game consoles, use Bluetooth
Bluetooth
Bluetooth is a proprietary open wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances from fixed and mobile devices, creating personal area networks with high levels of security...

or a similar RF
Radio frequency
Radio frequency is a rate of oscillation in the range of about 3 kHz to 300 GHz, which corresponds to the frequency of radio waves, and the alternating currents which carry radio signals...

protocol rather than infrared as the main transmission form; universal remotes compatible with those designs are available.

Upgradable and learning remotes

Some universal remotes allow the code lists programmed into the remote to be updated to support new brands or models of devices not currently supported by the remote. Some higher end universal learning remotes require a computer to be connected. The connection is typically done via USB from the computer to mini-USB on the remote or the remotes base station.

In 2000, a group of enthusiasts discovered that universal remotes made by UEI and sold under the One For All, RadioShack

RadioShack

RadioShack Corporation is an American franchise of electronics retail stores in the United States, as well as parts of Europe, South America and Africa. As of 2008, RadioShack reported net sales and operating revenues of $4.81 billion. The headquarters of RadioShack is located in Downtown...

, and other brands can be reprogrammed by means of an interface called JP1

Jp1 remote

A JP1 remote is a type of Universal remote, usually with a six-pin interface connector labeled "JP1" in the battery compartment, manufactured by Universal Electronics Inc. The JP1 interface allows the remote to be reprogrammed, adding new code lists and functions...

.

IR learning remotes can learn the code for any button on many other IR remote controls. This functionality allows the remote to learn functions not supported by default for a particular device, making it sometimes possible to control devices that the remote was not originally designed to control. A drawback of this approach is that the learning remote needs a functioning teaching remote. Also, some entertainment equipment manufacturers use pulse frequencies that are higher than what the learning remote can detect and store in its memory.

Touch-screen remotes

These remotes feature an LCD screen that can be either monochrome or full color. The "buttons" are actually images on the screen, which, when touched, will send IR signals to controlled devices. Some models have multiple screens that are accessed through virtual buttons on the touch-screen and other models have a combination of the touch-screen and physical buttons.

Some models of the touch-screen remotes are programmed using a graphical interface program on a PC, which allows the user to customize the screens, backgrounds, buttons and even the "actions" the buttons perform. The "project" that is created is then downloaded into the remote through a USB cable or, in the most recent models, wirelessly by Bluetooth

Bluetooth

Bluetooth is a proprietary open wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances from fixed and mobile devices, creating personal area networks with high levels of security...

or Wi-Fi

Wi-Fi

Wi-Fi or Wifi, is a mechanism for wirelessly connecting electronic devices. A device enabled with Wi-Fi, such as a personal computer, video game console, smartphone, or digital audio player, can connect to the Internet via a wireless network access point. An access point has a range of about 20...

.

The newest touch-screen remotes include an RF transmitter to allow signals to reach locations much farther than the usual range of IR (approximately 6 meters). RF also does not require line of sight.

Smart Phone And Tablet Computer Universal Remotes

Smart phones

Smartphone

A smartphone is a high-end mobile phone built on a mobile computing platform, with more advanced computing ability and connectivity than a contemporary feature phone. The first smartphones were devices that mainly combined the functions of a personal digital assistant and a mobile phone or camera...

and computer tablets

Tablet computer

A tablet computer, or simply tablet, is a complete mobile computer, larger than a mobile phone or personal digital assistant, integrated into a flat touch screen and primarily operated by touching the screen...

such as those running Nokia's

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

Maemo (N900), Apples's iOS and Google's

Google

Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...

Android operating system can also be used as universal remote controls.

Nokia's N900 being built-in with IR port can be used as remote, others require a physical attachment, or 'dongle', be connected on to the phone when used as a remote. The dongle is required to convert the electrical control signals from the phone into infra red signals that are required by most home audio visual components for remote control. However it is also possible to implement a system that does not require a dongle. Such systems use a stand alone piece of hardware called a 'gateway', which receives the electrical control signals from the smart phone in Bluetooth or wi-fi form and forward them on in infra red form to the components to be controlled.

Smart phone and tablet universal remote software is usually highly customisable. As with traditional universal remotes some are programmed using the handset (phone/tablet) itself and others are programmed using a computer. The latter is usually the most customisable.

History

Layout and features

Upgradable and learning remotes

Touch-screen remotes

Smart Phone And Tablet Computer Universal Remotes

See also