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A comprehensive programmable touchscreen remote con­troller A huge variety of electronic equipment these days comes with an infrared remote control. From the everyday TV set, VCR and audio entertainment systems, remote controls are now used for projec­tion TV systems, pay TV, airconditioners, room lighting, cur­tains, burglar alarms and so on. By LEO SIMPSON JBL’s “Take Control” TC1000 I F YOU HAVE a component audio system, you are likely to have separate remote controls for the DVD or CD player, tape deck, tuner and so on. So much so that many homes may have five or six separate remote controls in the living room. In my own case, I have three remote control units in the family room just to watch TV plus several more in the lounge room where the main stereo system is. Thank goodness I don’t presently have it all combined in the one room, together with a home theatre system. That’s not to say that I won’t have this sort of setup in the future though. Clearly, most homes now have “remote control anarchy” and there are just too many remotes with teensy-weensy buttons, to many to keep stocked with batteries, too many to lose, drop or otherwise become unusable. What is the answer? No-one would suggest going back to the days when all entertainment equipment was solely controlled by knobs and switches on the front panels - perish the thought! There have also been some “learning remotes” which are intended to take over the functions of one or more remotes but there is a limit to how many multi-purpose buttons which can be fitted on to a remote control and how do you remember all the func­tions in any case! This problem has been growing for some time and now a new concept in remote controls has been introduced. Called the “Take Control” TC1000 (we hate the name but never mind) by JBL and Microsoft, it is quite different in approach. As shown in the photo, it has a large liquid crystal display (LCD) and just four buttons and a roller knob on its control panel. It is a fairly bulky but comfortable to hold in the hand October 1999  79 The Take Control Editor While you can do all the normal setup and programming of the TC1000 via its on-screen menus, you can also add considerable enhancements if you hook it up to your computer via a serial cable. This CD ROM is supplied with the unit and you can use it on any Windows 95/98/ NT system. Making the system work is easy – you just load the CD ROM and follow the on-screen prompts to add devices and to configure the controls. and quite heavy too, at 380 grams. Two buttons labelled + and - are there merely to control the audio volume on whatever equipment you are using. Then there are two buttons on the righthand side which provide back-lighting for the LCD screen and one to mute the sound, handy when those pesky commercials are on. On the lefthand side is the menu button. Pressing this brings up the opening screen on the TC1000 and then you can scroll up or down the display using the rolling selector to pick the function you want. Say you want to watch a video. You scroll to that bar and then press the selector to bring up another display with 10 buttons on screen. The TC1000 is now ready to control all the functions which may be involved: those of the VCR and TV plus the sound system if that is involved. For example, you can press Play, Rewind, Fast Forward, Pause, Stop and so on, just as you would with a normal VCR remote control. The on-screen display fades after a few seconds (the time is also programmable) so that the batteries are conserved. To bring it up again, just press anywhere on the screen and you can resume control as before. Naturally you can use the volume up, down and mute buttons at any time, without the need to touch the screen. Much the same approach applies if you want to watch TV. Rolling the Fig.1: the “Take Control Editor” launches when you load the CD-ROM. It provides an easy way of adding extra devices and customising the control layout. 80  Silicon Chip selector to “Watch TV” and pressing it brings up a 10-button screen so you can turn on the TV and select channels. Setting up the TC1000 is easy. In my case, I wanted to set it up to run a Philips TV, Sharp VCR and Jerrold Cable TV selec­tor. You just go to the Home menu, scroll to “Device Setup” and click it and then press “Add” on the Devices screen. You then scroll down the list and pick the one you want to add. In my case I wanted to add all three devices so I first of all picked “Cable Box”. You then scroll down through an astonishingly long list of more than 80 brands (fortunately they’re in alphabetical order). I selected Jerrold, and was told that there are eight different models to pick from. The TC1000 then leads you through a test procedure whereby you attempt to power up the cable box. When you finally do (in my case it was the seventh attempt) it informs you that you are now set up to control your Jerrold cable box. And lo and behold I was. I then went through the same procedure for VCRs. Would you believe it caters for 140 different brands of VCR and again, all the different models within each brand? By the time I had finished with the setup for the TV I was almost overcome with admiration for the amount of effort that must have gone into the development of this device. When I was finished I could control both the cable box and TV if I just wanted to watch TV and if I wanted to watch a tape, I could do the same. I know Fig.2: clicking the “Devices” option brings up this dialog. It shows the devices that have already been installed and lets you edit these and add new devices. Fig.3: to add a new device, you first select the device category as shown in this dialog. If the device isn’t listed, the TC1000 can learn from the existing controller. the average child would take to this device like a duck to water but I still find such things amazing. The fact that this device can store such a huge variety of codes made me go to the handbook to see how much memory it has. Alas it doesn’t say but it is non-volatile because it does not lose the settings if you remove the batteries. By the way, you can easily delete any device that you may have programmed in and if you have a device that is not included in the comprehensive lists, there is a procedure whereby the TC1000 will learn all the relevant codes. But wait, there’s more. While you can do all the normal setup and programming of the TC1000 via its on-screen menus, you can also add Fig.4: after you select the device brand, you disconnect the unit from the PC and follow the instructions on the TC1000’s display to complete the setup. considerable enhancements if you hook it up to your computer via a serial cable. The TC1000 comes with CD ROM and you can use it on any Windows 95/98/NT system. Making the system work is easy. You just insert the CD ROM and it comes up with a prompt screen to tell you how to connect the TC1000 to your PC’s serial port. It then finds it and asks whether you want to synchronise your TC1000. Clicking yes brings up another screen and it tells you it has found extra devices; in other words, the devices that are already programmed into the TC1000. You can then go through a number of screens to add or delete functions or customise in particular ways to suit your wants. Overall, as I have already indicat- Fig.5: once a device has been added, you can edit its control layout by adding or deleting buttons and by moving them to new locations on the activity screen. ed, this is a very impres­sive product, considering the huge amount of effort which must have gone into its development. Is it perfect? No. I would have liked better contrast on the LCD screen, particularly when you are using it in brightly lit rooms. It does have a contrast adjust procedure but I still found it a bit weak. On the other hand, the screen can be backlit so you can use it in dark rooms as well, which is not the case with the vast majority of remote controls. It works well in large rooms too, so it must have good infrared output. The price of the JBL “Take Control” TC1000, complete with CD-ROM and serial cable is $669. For further information, contact the Australian distributor for JBL, Convoy InternaSC tional. Phone 1 800 817 787. Fig.6: if it’s necessary for the TC1000 to learn from an existing remote control, the “Take Control Editor” takes you through the procedure step by step. October 1999  81