My 13-month-old son, Connor, managed to lose my remote to my Netgear MP101, and, like all really great gizmos, it's completely useless without the remote.  My wife Michelle called Netgear, and the customer service rep claimed that they won't sell replacements (I later found this to be untrue, but that's another story).  After doing a little research, it seemed that Netgear apparently couldn't be buggered to use anything resembling a common remote scheme, and short of getting a JP1-compatible remote and hacking it myself, I was going to have to either retire my MP101 or purchase a new one off of eBay just for the remote.

Then I happened to find Logitech's line of remotes.   Convinced it was the best way I could again be able to use my beloved networked MP3 player, I decided to go ahead and get their slightly-better-than-entry-level offering, the H659.   At a price of less than $100 at Amazon, it wasn't an impulse buy, but I'd been craving a new gadget to play with, and this fit the bill.

Setup is easy.  The remote attaches to your PC by way of USB.  You then browse to Logitech's wizard-based configuration site that walks you through the setup process.

The slowest part of the setup was the first step (after creating an account on the website), entering the device information.  The wizard requires make and model of all of your devices.  Not that it's hard to come up with model numbers, it's just time-consuming.  We had to get a flashlight to inspect our 10-year-old Sanyo bookshelf stereo (left over from college), and we had to write all of these model numbers down and transcribe them faithfully into the wizard.

Once equipped with a knowledge of what devices you own, the wizard sets up some default activities.  By activities, it means what you do with the devices and how they relate to each other.  For instance, when we want to watch a DVD, we need the TV on, the DVD player on, and the TV set to Input 3.  When we want to listen to music, we need the MP101 on, the stereo on, and the stereo set to VIDEO input.  I tried as hard as I could to be creative and outline every possible activity we perform with the living room entertainment center, but in the end, I could only come up with 3:

1. Watch Cable DVR

2. Watch a DVD
   

3. Listen to MP3s

For each activity, you set the devices for that activity and any settings they require.  When you think you're ready to go, you click a button that generates a small binary file which is opened by Logitech's client software on your PC.  After about 3 minutes, the remote reboots itself with its new configuration.

After playing with my new toy for five minutes, I was in love.  The remote keeps track of what activity you're doing and what each system's state is.  For example, if I'm watching Cable DVR, then the TV is on and tuned to Input 1, the DVR is on, but everything else is off.  If I were to select the "Watch a DVD" activity, the DVR would shut off, the DVD player would turn on, and the TV would switch from Input 1 to Input 3.  If any of the devices should be in a state contrary to the remote's belief (like the TV is off when the remote thinks it should be on), just press the help button and a step-by-step troubleshooting guide corrects the issue.  Even Michelle, who isn't afraid of technology but balked at spending $100 on a remote, was impressed at the intuitiveness of it all.

If there's a limit to the customization of the device and activity configurations, I haven't found it yet.  The interface allows you to map any function to any button, as well as creating text-based custom buttons at both the device and activity level.  The approach I've taken is to have a simple list of necessity custom buttons for activities, and then set up the device menu with every function I could ever need.  The result is that most of my usage is activity-oriented, and only occasionally do I need to browse through all the commands for a given device.  I have yet to need to get out any of my original remotes.

Not everything is positive, though.  The remote has some other less-interesting features, like the ability to load some channel guide and program information for display through the LCD screen.  I tried to use it, but it's ultimately useless in the face of the DVR's GUI interface.  And my first H659's LCD screen died after 2 weeks, but, on the up-side, this gave me a chance to enjoy Logitech's awesome customer service.  They gave me my RMA number and dispatched another remote immediately, without requiring me to send in the broken one first.  It showed up via DHL five business days later.  (I actually still have the broken one on my desk...  Note to self:  send it back to Logitech ASAP!).

Overall, I have to recommend it whole-heartedly.  It's not exactly cheap, but it's not their most expensive model either (Scott Hanselman recently reviewed the Harmony 880, which is significantly more expensive).  I'm so enamoured with it, I'm thinking of buying one for my den, in which resides my DLP projector and Xbox 360.

Pros:

• Intuitive interface

• Easy to setup and customize

• Pretty backlit display and buttons

• It works with my MP101

• Awesome Logitech customer service

Cons:

• What's the point in the on-remote program guide?  Doesn't everyone who would buy one of these have some sort of on-screen guide?

• What happens when Logitech decides to no longer provide setup via their website?  Will they provide an offline solution?  Or will I just be expected to retire the remote?

• Casual consumers may be put off by the price