What Hi Fi Sound and Vision
11 MAY 2009
One For All XSight Touch
Unless the XSight Touch is massively discounted and you have a very simple system, leave it on the shelf
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Logitech's Harmony range revolutionised the universal remote. It signalled the end of painstakingly teaching every IR command you send to your system to a single remote, and heralded the era of intelligent, computer-based configuration of your devices and activities.
Now One For All, established purveyor of the old type of universal remote, is aiming to take down the Harmony One.
Like the One, the Touch has a web-based configurator, so a large degree of its success must be dictated by the quality of its software. Sadly, it is dire.
Insists on using German
It's got a few little bugs; with language and location set to UK, the program insists on using German to describe components. We were calibrating not a TV, it seems, but a Fernseher.
There are more serious usability issues. You must continually unplug the remote from the computer, take it into the lounge, and test the codes it thinks might work.
The list of models under each brand is woefully out of date, so this can mean trying a lot of codes – seven in the case of our Rotel RSX-1550, a product our Logitech knew without fuss.
It just works you too hard
It doesn't work out the activities you're likely to use, complete with relevant button configurations, a la Logitech. No, you have to configure every option manually, including the sequence of IR commands you want to send to your equipment.
The Touch has a couple of features over the One. It can be calibrated without the PC – but this is just as frustrating as using the software – and it has support for user profiles.
In every other way – ergonomics, touchscreen quality, build of the charge cradle – the One is the better device.