Despite limitations that
keep us from crowning it the best Blu-ray player out there, the PS3 is the most popular way to get into the format. The PS3 also gets dinged as a Blu-ray player because of its Bluetooth remote control. Who knows what Sony was thinking -- maybe IR was just too old timey for their next gen console or maybe they just wanted to get as much "blue" as possible. Whatever the case, the use of Bluetooth makes it pretty much impossible to integrate the PS3 with your system's remote scheme. While there are USB-based workarounds, they leave out some functions (most notably power on/off). Enter the IR4PS3, which adds an IR receiver to the Bluetooth PS3 remote, effectively turning your Bluetooth PS3 remote into a IR-to-Bluetooth transceiver. IR goes in, Bluetooth commands go out, and you get full functionality. You want it, right? Well, you'll have to wait for the manufacturer to prepare a DIY-friendly revision (giving you time to polish up your soldering skills).
[Image courtesy
RemoteCentral]
posted Jan 25th 2008 10:41PM
Well a hack solution to this dumb problem is better then the garbage B.S. solution a PS3 owner has to deal with now.
argh. poor harmony, you're just going to have to keep sharing space on the coffee table.
I have a PS3 and the BT remote is annoying.
Having said that BT is better than IR in many ways - its just that no-one else uses it.
Because of the PS3, all of the all-in-one manufacturers will right now be designing BT compatibility in their future remotes, and once these are available, I can see BT being used alot more in TV's etc, as the other manufacturers wont have to worry about compatability.
Its a pretty bold step by Sony, but in 10 years everything might be BT
Just no excuse for it. If they want to lead CE tech to move towards BT for remotes, that all fine and dandy, but they haven't even included it in any other CE product they make (except laptops). It was not a bold move, they were just too damn cheap to put it in for pennies.
I will get a PS3 regardless, but I refuse to give the PS3 a pass on the no IR fiasco. I will bitch about it until they finally decide to include it on future models.
I think the remote is okay. Not great, but not bad. In its favour, you don't have to even see your PS3, let alone point at it to control it. The controller is also nice and weighty and feels pretty solid. It's also not bad value. On the minus side, the battery life doesn't seem hot and no other devices have gone bluetooth. Still, I think on balance I'd still prefer it to be bluetooth than IR.
If you absolutely must have an IR controller, there is at least one IR remote for the PS3 but it uses a dongle. Lots of PS3 accessories seem to use dongles rather than bluetooth. It's quite annoying really.
If they really wanted to push the industry towards bluetooth tech instead of IR, or RF they would put bluetooth tech in their Televisions as well as their standalone Blu-ray players. I think this was a cheap way of getting out of including another hardware piece in an all ready bloated and costly console. I find that it works great, but suck for me and other all in one "harmony" remote users.
No IR? Wow, I didn't even know about that. I am very close to getting one but I love my Harmony remote. Lame.
It's really not a huge deal. Just get a Nyko Bluwave remote, and stick the USB dongle in your PS3 (hopefully you have more than 2 USB ports) and go to your Harmony programming app and the search for "nyko" or "bluwave" and get the commands. Works just fine with the PS3, only thing you can't do is turn it on/off. You can't use the "PS" button either, but that's really only necessary for turning off the PS3.
Still, it was a boneheaded decision to not include something so simple, cheap, and obvious on the PS3.
And it's a bonehead decision every day that Sony doesn't fix the problem.
That's great, but it doesn't solve the problem whereby you can't program a universal remote for it.
Read the article.
What's wrong with the standard PS3 remote?
Because lots of people with fancy HT setups want a universal remote - and you can't do that with the PS3. I have a Home Theater Master MX700 and it works so well that even people who aren't familiar with it can use it. Press "off," and it shuts down the DVD player, the projector, the receiver, turns on the lights, etc, etc. Can't do that with the PS3 which is a major issue for an integrated HT. I don't want to turn everything off with one remote, then have to pick up a second remote and turn off the PS3, and neither do a lot of other people.
To the people who say "just buy a new remote," why should I, I already have an expensive remote that does everything except control the PS3. That's Sony's fault, not mine, and I won't spend money for it.
Man am I confused! I love my BT remote...I paired it once and then I have been able to control the BT player inside the PS-3 from almost any 'listening' position...including sitting on the loo next door. Now what else could a man want for in his Man-Room? EG-HD! Grow UP!
There's absolutely nothing wrong with having a Bluetooth remote. The real problem is that the boneheads at Logitech have not designed a new Harmony remote with Bluetooth.
Yeah, think that through for a sec... Logitech should include BT ONLY because Sony decided to NOT include IR on the PS3... yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
THey would be designing a controller around the tech need of ONE device... defeats the UNIVERSAL aspect of their controllers. IR is a STANDARD, which even SONY follows on all their other CE products. If SONY was serious about BT, we would be seeing it on more and more of their TV's and receivers, and possibly moving other manufactures to begin using it. But clearly, they were just too cheap.
False Dichotomy.
It's not that sony opted to use bluetooth to control the ps3. Its that they did not provide us with the option of using IR to control it. They could easily have offered both- its not like the bluetooth remote came with the ps3...
If sony were sincere about pushing bluetooth as a standard for CE equipment, we'd see more wireless controllers for the ps3 using it (like the guitars in guitar hero 3 or rockband), we'd see more BT accessories (steering wheels, maybe in the PSP slim, etc.), we'd also see Sony and other CEs using this tech (which isn't proprietary like the RF in MS's xbox 360). Since the ps3 came about we've had 2 CES's in 14 months. Have you seen ANY indication at all that there are going to be any bluetooth capable/equipped stereos or tvs or other devices?
listen, the not being able to turn off the ps3 isn't that big of a deal, let it run, and install the folding at home app, and have it doing something very useful in between movies and games....
I for one would rather have BT for everything else, my stinking SA 8300HD DVR, you have to practically be directly in front of it to control the thing....I think Sony had a excellent idea, too bad everyone else has to catch up...
Including Sony. Don't praise sony and knock other CE companies if they don't even include it in their other products.
That's fine. BT seems better.
hold down the PS button, choose "turn off system"
how hard is it to turn it off with the remote for you guys?
I do it all the time
Looks like these guys, IR2BT, might have a slightly more "elegant" solution out very soon.
www.ir2bt.com
I'm glad to see we finally have a few options!