Remotes

[der0225]

Roku should develop a Rechargeable Remote that can be placed in a Charging Cradle rather than having to plug in a charging cord. The remote and cradle should be designed to enable the cradle to be placed on a table or wall mounted.  I have an old (12+ y/o) Logitech Harmony One Universal Remote with the Roku remote codes programmed into it.  Because I stream everything including my local cable TV provider, the Harmony One is used daily with my Roku device.  The Harmony One remote is the only rechargeable TV remote I have because it has its own Charging Cradle that is conveniently located always in the same place on a table and the remote can be easily placed or dropped into that Charging Cradle when not in use such as charging overnight.  My other two Roku remotes require AAA batteries which have to be changed occasionally but definitely not as frequently as having to remember to find the plug-in wire to a rechargeable remote. I would certainly buy Roku Rechargeable remotes to replace my battery powered ones if the rechargeable units came with a Charging Cradle that the remotes could be placed in when they are not in use.  Doing so would facilitate ease of use and convenience. I trust to hear from Roku soon about this. But until such time, I will continue to use my battery powered Roku remotes.

[RokuMary-F]

Hi @der0225,

Congrats on your first post in the Roku Community!

We can understand you are inquiring about the Roku Voice Remote Pro having a charging cradle instead of the regular charging cable that came with the remote. 

Currently, we don't have any information to share that at moment, feel free to
keep an eye on our Roku Blog for any future announcements or updates. 

You may also share or suggest a feature request here: Roku Feature Suggestions & Requests | Roku Community

Thanks for using our services as we continue to deliver a better streaming experience for our customers.


Best regards,
Mary

[atc98092]

@der0225 including a cradle would increase the cost of the remote. Since Roku is attempting to keep the price as low as possible, using a cable is an acceptable way of reducing that cost. I have many rechargeable devices, some with a cradle and some without. It's simply a business decision they have made. 

[der0225]

Thank you for the quick response.  However, I cannot accept your response as a solution. I chose Roku streaming devices more than 10 years ago because of their universal streaming capabilities and their ability to accept all or nearly all streaming apps. I was given a Fire Stick as a gift several years back but because it still to this day cannot support my local cable TV provider's streaming app that Roku can, I replaced it with your Roku 4K Stick. Roku Streaming devices are definitely far superior to similar devices on the market today. But while Roku has placed its primary focus on its streaming devices, it cannot lose sight of its Remotes. Granted, voice and headphones are nice add-ons, but recharging with a plugin cord is cumbersome. Yes, it is like charging cell phone, but that device displays the percent of battery left before charging is needed. As such, charging a Roku remote is easy to forget to do. That is why a Roku Remote with a Charging Cradle would help ensure that charging the device is not forgotten and it would facilitate ease of use and convenience because the Charging Cradle is always located in the same convenient place. That is why it is so surprising that Logitech developed and implemented this Charging Cradle feature and even the Backlit capability (another suggestion) more than 10 years ago, Roku certainly should have been able to easily develop and implement those features long before now. The technology has been there for years.  I can pick up my Harmony One out of its Charging Cradle and the Back Lighting automatically turns on. It also times out after t30 seconds but pressing any button turns it back on. It is also interesting that Logitech loaded the Roku remote codes more than 10 years ago on their frontend software that is downloaded to the Harmony One Remote. It looks to me that Roku has some catching up to do.

[atc98092]

Oh, I'm not saying it's not a valid suggestion. Far from it, as having a cradle to store the remote when not in use is a great way to keep it from disappearing in the couch cushions, or under a chair. 🙂

But as I mentioned in a different thread, it would take a complete redesign of the remote to eliminate the need for a physical connection to charge the remote. Wireless charging is certainly possible, as I have that on my phones and ear buds. But that requires additional hardware the remote does not have, and will increase the cost. 

Backlit remotes are great when you have lots of buttons. But for a Roku remote, there's really so few buttons it's pretty simple to find the one you want by touch. Again, it's a valid suggestion, but Roku has ignored that request for quite a while now, and I'm sure it's again related to cost.

[der0225]

I understand the business concept but that does not mean that it should not be developed, implemented and made available for those who are willing to pay for it.  I paid about $150,00 for that Logitech Harmony One universal Remote more that 12 years ago. I was willing to pay any amount to have a universal TV remote that would replace all my other remotes and control all of my devices for Cable, DVD, CD, Turn Table, Surround Receiver, Media player (I pod) and Gaming device. I have never regretted that purchase, it was the best deal around. Being willing to spend some initial tedious quality time with the programming, the Harmony One performs all of the desired functions flawlessly. For every activity set up, it turns on the specified devices and switches inputs on the Receiver and TV with the touch of one button for that desired activity.  It even turns off everything with the touch of the one and only Off button. On top of all of that, the Harmony One has its own Charging Cradle for ease of use and convenience, and the Remote Is automatically Back Lit as soon as it is picked up from the Charging Cradle. A touch of any button turns the lighting back on after the 30 second time out. At the time I purchased the Harmony One, it was advertised as having a very high WAF, Wife Acceptance Factor. That is very true to this day.  My wife of nearly 55 years, 77 y/o yesterday, sometimes knows more about the Harmony One's functionality than I do.  Roku is a fantastic streaming device, and I would not change to any other brand, but I still think Roku has some catching up to do.  I believe much of this functionality has now been copied to a cell phone APP but, even those devices now have charging pads. Also, at 78 years old, I'm ok with making that next leap of faith technological change a little more slowly. I have spent more than enough time wordsmithing this response as it is. I need to now pay some attention to my replaced knee surgery of 5 weeks ago. 

[atc98092]

I agree that Harmony/Logitech really offered some great remotes. I have a couple still kicking around here. But the fact that Logitech shut down their remote line completely says something about the potential market for such a device. If a company with their resources couldn't make it go, it really seems the market simply isn't sufficient to make it profitable. 

[der0225]

I would suggest a complete and thorough examination of how the Logitech Harmony One remote is designed and constructed.  I believe there are some similarities that should be noted. The Harmony One remote has metal charging tabs at the outside the underside of its front end that match the charging connector tab location in the charging cradle. The front end of the Harmony One also contains a USB port for connecting to a computer when programming the remote is needed. Would it be possible to run parallel charging wires in the Roku remote to the underside bottom end of the case from wherever the charging port is now located?  With the charging tabs located on the bottom outside of the remote's case, connection to aligning charging tabs in a charging cradle would be possible. It may be a "nice to have" to keep the remote's charging port but it's possible removal of the port adapter might provide some, if needed ,additional space within the remote's case to facilitate the outside bottom connection tabs. Then the rest, I think, would not be pretty straight forward.  With the Roku remote's charging connections now positioned at the bottom on the outside of the case of the device, a Charging Cradle could easily be designed to accommodate the location of the remote's charging connectors at the bottom of the case.  Ideally, if the remote's charging connectors were at the underside bottom end of the device that would lend itself perfectly for a vertical wall mounting as well as tabletop location. 

 I worked in many factories during summer jobs while going to college nearly 60 years ago. So I do understand that this means going all the way back to creating a new design that modifies the mold design for the rechargeable remote case. And while the cover is up, so to speak, also add back lighting.  I do get the reluctance of doing that because of the intended small number of buttons on the remote. However, it is a royal pain to find the right button while lying in bed in a dark room, sitting in your favorite chair in a media room or outside on your porch on a nice summer evening.  TV's cn now be anywhere, even under water, I think. 

I

[der0225]

After seeing all these other posts about problems Recharging Roku remotes, in my opinion, Roku made a serious mistake by proceeding with a charging port rather than going straight to a Charging Cradle which have avoided many of these problems. 

[atc98092]

@der0225 How would a cradle make any difference? Most of the battery life complaints about Roku remotes are not related to the rechargeable version. I agree it's easier to simply put a remote in a cradle for charging, but connecting a cable isn't that much more effort. People who forget to plug it in to charge are just as likely to forget to even put it back into a cradle. They simply leave it where they were last using it. 

Would you pay an additional $10 for a charging cradle? Most people would not. Yes, there is certainly a subset of users that would, but would it be enough to justify the additional engineering needed to design a new remote? My opinion is that it's doubtful, and I expect that Roku did some customer research into it before they came out with the Voice Remote Pro.