Remotes

[vikhral10]

I have to change the batteries at least once a week, & that’s considering I only watch tv for about 4 hours a day after work. Sometimes even less. Is there another brand remote that works better? I’ve been using the app, the only complaint is that I can’t adjust the volume.

[makaiguy]

I am assuming this is a point-anywhere remote that controls the Roku via WiFi.

A casual stroll thru this community will show that many people have a severe problem with battery life in their remotes. But there are also lots of people (myself included) that do not experience this problem. Is that due to some remotes being defective and others not, some Roku models being harder on remotes than others, or due to some other factor? I don't know.

I *DO* know that if you have one of the remotes that has an earphone jack for remote listening, the earphone amplifier in the remote is activated and more quickly draining batteries whenever something is plugged into the jack, even when you are not streaming anything. Make sure you unplug the phones when not actively listening.

Beyond that, I've only seen one external factor suggested that may affect this.

There is some evidence that one cause of battery drain for those with point-anywhere WiFi remotes can be use of a router WiFi channel that is crowded by nearby routers using the same channel. This is more likely to be a problem in the more heavily used 2.4 GHz wifi band where it can also get interference from other sources like BlueTooth and microwave ovens, security cameras, etc., than in the 5 GHz band.

If you have access to your router's setup, try configuring it to use a different WiFi channel to see if this helps the situation. If you are connecting in the crowded 2.4 GHz band, channels 1-11 are supported. Channels 1, 6, and 11 do not overlap each other and so give you the best chance at reducing congestion, so try each in succession, although depending on what channels your neighbors are using, other channels in the 1-11 range may work best. Also, reducing router bandwidth from 40 to 20 kHz may also reduce interference.

Note that optimum channel choice can be a moving target as neighbors bring new routers online in your vicinity, or reconfigure their routers to use different channels. I periodically use a WiFi analyzer app on my smart phone that can show me which available WiFi channels have the least congestion and I change the channel my router uses accordingly. I don't know if that explains my battery longevity (usually 3 months or more with fairly heavy use) but it's probably worth a try to see if it helps.