2nd update: My hub has now, again, lost its connection to my network, which means that if I need to make any changes to my setup, or want to use the app in any way, I have to go through setup FROM SCRATCH. There is no way to save or re-apply my existing setup, or recover from this scenario. I’m appalled at the software side of this solution. I have downgraded my review to 1 star.
Update: After I wrote this review, Sofabaton reached out through the marketplace apologizing and asking me to contact customer service to resolve my issues. The problem with this is that I *have* contacted customer service for each issue I brought up, and they are are still unresolved and/or continue to be unsupported in the interface. I'm glad they are responsive, but ultimately they are completely unhelpful.
Like many others, I’ve been searching for a replacement for my Harmony One remote. I’ve had two of these for about a year now, and have a pretty good sense of their quirks. I've been customizing smart remotes for over 25 years (starting with the Philips Pronto).
The hardware itself is nice; that's the only reason this gets 2 stars. It feels solid and good build construction. It feels good in your hand. Battery life isn’t quite as good as they implied, but I probably only need to charge it once a month or so, unlike my Harmony which needed charging every couple of days.
The software, however, is still rather poor, and it drags down the utility of this product. Here are some of the major pain points:
– As of 2024, you still cannot edit the devices in an activity. This means if you get a new piece of equipment, you have to recreate the activity from scratch. This is not a quick process, as every device you add to an activity requires downloading its configuration, and that takes a really long time. If you get a new device that’s central to your usage (such as a new TV), this means you have to basically redo the setup for the entire hub, hopefully remembering where you customized it. This is unacceptable for a product in this price range, and that it has still not been prioritized by developers is disappointing.
– At least once a week the remote will lose its connection to the hub, often while it is actively being used. The solution is to press the button on the back of the hub, but it means getting up and walking over to it. It’s especially annoying if it disconnects while you’re fast forwarding, so you better be quick about fixing it! I interacted with their support team for months and despite multiple debugging builds, they still have not solved the problem.
– Despite saying that it will control a PS/5, it will not effectively. You can move around in menus, but there is no play/pause/skip functionality when watching movies, which is arguably the most important usage. Support confirmed this is still not working.
– Using the IR and button database for setting up components is guesswork and confusing. The labels are sometimes nonsensical and there are multiple entries with the same name. With a large database, this seems par for the course, but I didn’t have such a confusing time with Harmony’s database for the exact same hardware.
– If your hub loses connection to your wireless network (which mine did), the only way to fix it is to go through the first-run setup process, which loses your entire configuration, and you’re starting from scratch.
– The remote will regularly reboot itself, which can be distracting in a dark room as the screen flashes back on. Sometimes it will not remember which activity was selected and it must be reselected to get anything to work. Again, this is during active use, so buttons just stop working until you realize what’s gone on and re-select.
– When used with an AppleTV, the hub will occasionally disconnect from the AppleTV and reconnect after about 15 seconds. Again, hope you aren’t fast-forwarding while it does this.
The company prides itself on its support and resolving issues, especially with devices or fixing IR codes, but turnaround is slow (at least 24 hours for each email, which can take a very long time to troubleshoot or clarify details), and IR fixes have been spotty. They have recently added in-app chat, but I have not used it.
There remain a lot of issues, as well as unsupported fundamental use cases that can be worked around, with a lot of patience. For a product that costs almost $200, I expected more. Much more. Unfortunately, there aren’t many alternatives.
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