The Monster Controller 300 can beat up your remote

We'd just like to go on the record here that we are 100 percent behind any and all forays into the realm of complicated and over-featured remotes, preferably with large screens and whole regions of buttons with absolutely zero purpose whatsoever. There, we said it. That's why we're totally digging the upcoming "Home Theater and Lighting Controller 300 featuring OmniLink" remote from Monster Central -- even the name is overreaching. Along with the natural AV controls, Monster packed in iPod, PC, home automation and other fancy functions into this beast of theirs, with a browser-based configuration tool to get it all up and running. The full $600 setup includes an RF-to-IR bridge / IR blaster, known as the OmniLink, along with a tabletop charging station and ControlLink Extender IR emitters to extend your couch-based dominion even further. All this can be yours as of now, just don't let your newfound power go to your head -- the first rule of huge-ass remotes is that there will always be another contender to the crown.

[mase @ Nov 10th 2006 6:54AM]

That's the worst button layout I've ever seen! Vol and Ch up/down are left and right? No directional arrow keys?

[Gil @ Nov 10th 2006 7:38AM]

Exactly! Where can I get one :)

[Martin Ramos @ Nov 13th 2006 1:00PM]

I love this remote. The button placement is great.

[DWesnor @ Nov 10th 2006 8:11AM]

I'll bet $5 you get into this thing's head and you'll find out it's just a Harmony in a poorly designed shell.

[dmek @ Nov 10th 2006 8:33AM]

That is by far the ugliest piece of industrial design that I have ever seen.

[SuperChuck @ Nov 10th 2006 9:25AM]

Looks like an overpriced Harmony to me...

[Tsunamii @ Nov 10th 2006 9:27AM]

Ill keep my money on my Harmony....

[Heath Stahl @ Nov 10th 2006 9:59AM]

To the people that think they need to spend $100 on a Monster HDMI cable to get audio/video performance above the crappy cables that come with our equipment this is probably a good buy. For the rest of us there is the Harmony line from Logitech.

[Slim @ Nov 10th 2006 10:13AM]

Wonder if its touch screen

[Dave @ Nov 10th 2006 11:11AM]

They are over priced Harmony with BAD support, and firmware bugs. Monster has Harmony build them but Monster provides first level support.. If you go to second level support you get Harmony.

Sad thing is that the Harmony remotes don't have half the bugs that these do. My brother works for a high end home automation home theater installer. They refuse to stalk the Monster remotes any more because of too many complaints.

[Ed @ Nov 10th 2006 12:03PM]

As Dave said, this is basically a rebranded Harmony 890 with crappier firmware and a way uglier design.

Get a Harmony 890 or 1000, instead. More worthless products from Monster.

[Jesse @ Nov 10th 2006 2:10PM]

I work as a technician in a big box electronics store. There was two monster reps coming to the store to setup the display not too long ago. I saw this damn controller and they had to spend an hour and a half on tech support in my tech room for instructions on how to setup their own product.

[Mark @ Nov 11th 2006 1:47PM]

Will it work with the PS3's Bluetooth? I'm thinking no.

[Rick Lyon @ Nov 10th 2006 2:34PM]

$600? I guess Monster thinks their name will get them cash in a market of much better products made by better companies for much cheaper with more features. Wow, kinda like their overpriced cables.

[Pete @ Nov 13th 2006 1:50PM]

The only thing this has over the Harmony is it supports lighting control. Though those that need lighting control are using AMX, Niles, or Crestron remotes.

[Mike @ Nov 13th 2006 3:03PM]

If this has lighting control over Crestron, AMX, Niles, etc. isn't it MUCH cheaper than those options? I checked out the website and they sell light switches and dimmers that work with existing lights.

[roy @ Nov 29th 2007 3:03PM]

The remote sends crzy commands to the systems. sometimes the tv starts to roll screen format or its very slow to execute. or it is confused. then after two months it died. went black and the software couldn't recognise it. No manual with product online manual is very brief. tech support is very hard to access. better then bankers hours I guess.I am a Laser Development engineer.