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My Sony Bravia delivers tomorrow, and Cablevision won't be here with CableCards until Tuesday, so my Series 3 is still in the shipping box, but I've had the new remote out for a week, and I HATE it!
Skip the flash and patent look, or the minor button moves on the face <I do like having Select in the middle of the ring>. The hideous thing is that the remote itself now CLICKS! Whether it is just an illusion created by the interaction between the audible 'boinks' and the key clicks of the remote, or a whole new physical interface, I simply CANNOT STAND the new remote, and after a week of trying to become friends with it, have simply put it aside forever.
I upgraded to the current remote with its two-DVR switch and display input selector button two years ago, and love it with all the passion of my original 2002 Series 1. I see now that it has a 'picture' button where the new one has an 'aspect' button, and I assume that they are the same. Which means that the only functionality that the new remote adds is the learning mode.
That is not nothing. It doesn't happen to be something I need, but I can readily imagine users for whom it would be major.
Hence this formal Complaint!
The new remote for the Series 3 is a blunder. The clicking keys are timed with the audible commands in such a way that the whole input experience feels soggy and sluggish. The move to put all the button labels in high visibility, while moving all the background to slick and black, has resulted in a major transfer of the basic interface experience from tactile to visual. With the visual itself tilted in the direction of dark rooms, since I have never at any time in my whole life had any problem reading the face of my TiVo remote visually, even in low light. But the tactile side has now been compromised, if not completely splattered.
I am serious in reporting that I have spent a week trying to get comfortable with what I expected would be my new TiVo remote. Tonight, I simply gave up, and went back to the older one. It was like falling in with old friends.
The clicking keys add both an aural and a tactile interposition between electing a key and experiencing its effect. Since everything about TiVo's interface design up till now has seemed so perfect to me, this blunder <as I see it> seems particularly ominous.
Thankfully, the older remote looks to be able to do all the new things, except the learning. Pity, if true. Because it isn't worth it. Cherish your old remote, because it will appreciate.
merry chrysanthemus,
p
Skip the flash and patent look, or the minor button moves on the face <I do like having Select in the middle of the ring>. The hideous thing is that the remote itself now CLICKS! Whether it is just an illusion created by the interaction between the audible 'boinks' and the key clicks of the remote, or a whole new physical interface, I simply CANNOT STAND the new remote, and after a week of trying to become friends with it, have simply put it aside forever.
I upgraded to the current remote with its two-DVR switch and display input selector button two years ago, and love it with all the passion of my original 2002 Series 1. I see now that it has a 'picture' button where the new one has an 'aspect' button, and I assume that they are the same. Which means that the only functionality that the new remote adds is the learning mode.
That is not nothing. It doesn't happen to be something I need, but I can readily imagine users for whom it would be major.
Hence this formal Complaint!
The new remote for the Series 3 is a blunder. The clicking keys are timed with the audible commands in such a way that the whole input experience feels soggy and sluggish. The move to put all the button labels in high visibility, while moving all the background to slick and black, has resulted in a major transfer of the basic interface experience from tactile to visual. With the visual itself tilted in the direction of dark rooms, since I have never at any time in my whole life had any problem reading the face of my TiVo remote visually, even in low light. But the tactile side has now been compromised, if not completely splattered.
I am serious in reporting that I have spent a week trying to get comfortable with what I expected would be my new TiVo remote. Tonight, I simply gave up, and went back to the older one. It was like falling in with old friends.
The clicking keys add both an aural and a tactile interposition between electing a key and experiencing its effect. Since everything about TiVo's interface design up till now has seemed so perfect to me, this blunder <as I see it> seems particularly ominous.
Thankfully, the older remote looks to be able to do all the new things, except the learning. Pity, if true. Because it isn't worth it. Cherish your old remote, because it will appreciate.
merry chrysanthemus,
p
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