It’s taken forever and a half for Logitech to introduce a new universal remote — but they finally have. Meet the Logitech Harmony Touch, a new universal remote that changes the Harmony button layout and replaces most of its actions with a touchscreen.
Harmony remotes have had touchscreens before, but not to the extent of the Harmony Touch. The 2.4-inch capacitive touchscreen can show up to 50 channel icons, and handle all the buttons, activities and settings you want, in any order you want them.
Logitech wants you to stop caring about channel numbers and just tap the channel icons (they look like little app icons). In fact, most of the remote’s actions will take place on the touchscreen.
Of course, it doesn’t mean that all the buttons are gone from the remote — you can still control basic settings like the volume, channel up and down, select, fast forward, rewind and more, but the remote’s button layout seem slightly, um, unpleasant. Namely the DVR controls — which are probably the most used features on a remote these days — are all the way at the top, out of the way. Who knows how well that will translate in day-to-day usage.
The Logitech Harmony Touch supports over 225,000 devices and can control up to 15 at one time and will probably be one of the best universal remotes available. Are you ready to give up some clickiness in your clicker? $249.95 RRP in Australia, October. [Logitech]