Is there any universal remote control out there with add/delete channel buttons?

October 2, 2006 12:23 PM

Is there any universal remote control out there with add/delete channel buttons?

We own an older television set (about 10 years) to which the original remote control was lost. The original was rather bulky and included most of the tv's functions as buttons on the remote as opposed to in the tv's menu like all sets made today. (This tv's menu is short and fairly useless.) That being said, we are unable to add/delete channels and have been manually entering each one in to change. I found the original remote for sale but it's $50 and I'd rather not pay it. Is there any universal remote that has those buttons or is there a way to access those features of the tv (some sort of button combination cheat)? Thanks all for your help.

posted by redhotchips to technology (3 comments total)

A high end programmable remote would either have those features or be able to be programmed to access them (although it might require a lot of research) but they also cost a lot more than 50 dollars.
posted by TedW at 12:30 PM on October 2, 2006

The original remote has these buttons you seek, right?

The preprogrammed databases in universal remotes don't usually have the more exotic functions; you may not be able to find one with your channel add/remove buttons preprogrammed. Since you don't have the original remote to "clone" the code from, you'd need computer programmability. This can be done fairly inexpensively (Google: JP1), but you'll probably still end up spending close to $50 and a bit of time; not really worth it unless you have some other use for this newfound power.

http://www.remotecentral.com/cgi-bin/mboard/forums.cgi
posted by trevyn at 12:46 PM on October 2, 2006

RemoteCentral is the place for this info for sure. One thing you may be able to leverage if you don't want to shell out $50 for a remote, a PalmPilot with an infrared transmitter can run software to fill in the menu functions you need. However, a PP needs more power to function as a full remote from across the room. Of course, there are adapters for this if you want it.

That said, if your TV is fairly commonplace, you should be able to get a cheap universal that will give you everything in a remote that your TV needs. Most of them have "menu" and arrow buttons.
posted by rhizome at 1:44 PM on October 2, 2006