OK, first let me say that I do appreciate being able to switch channels and change the volume without having to get up, lean over, or for that matter move any muscles besides my fingers. Reaching into the bag of Dorritos is enough exertion; I don’t need to turn channel surfing into a workout.
However, it is a fact of life that remotes are not dependable companions. They get lost in couch cushions. Batteries go dead and there are only so many smoke detectors from which to pull good ones. This would not be such a big deal, except for the predicament in which one finds themselves in the absence of a remote.
All you have on the TV unit is Power, Volume, Channel, and then one Menu button which, through some convoluted interactions with the other buttons (which varies from unit to unit, and is never explained anywhere but some 13-language user’s guide that was discarded even before the first remote was lost) is supposed to let you access the other 101 functions of the TV.
Meanwhile, the remote has 70 buttons, and it takes me more time to find the only six I’ll ever use than it would to just get up and change the channel on the TV. What often happens is I unwittingly invoke one of 50 useless and unwanted features, such as the time I was stuck watching everything in French until my roommate came home and straightened things out. It would be like the phone company putting all the controls for their network on every payphone, while the guys at control central needs to work their way through a phone tree.
Why can’t they give you an idiot-proof six-button remote for the general public, and then put the other 64 buttons on the unit behind some little door with a warning note stating that only those still in possession of a user’s manual or kids under 16 with thick glasses should be pushing any of the buttons within? Not only would I avoid being stuck listening watching Friends in a foreign language, but I could leave the batteries in my smoke detectors, as it is less work to do without the remote than get out the stepladder.
If one button can perfectly exemplify an utter waist of remote-control real estate as well as the plastic it is made of, it is the “Eject” button. Are you kidding me? What is the point of ejecting a DVD if you are not already planning on approaching the unit and reaching your hand towards it? Is there something I am missing here, like the button than summons the guy in the closet to come out and change the disc for me?
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Kapusta,
Amen. Perfectly stated.
It even gets worse when people add the “home entertainment center” to the mix. Last year I was babysitting for my brother-in-laws kids. He had three remotes there: one for the cable box, one for the tv, and one for the stereo amplification system. I touched one wrong button, and after about 30 minutes of fiddling with it (making it worse actually), i never got to watch tv or listen to the stereo again. You can’t babysit without TV, you just can’t.
Then he comes home and says…. dude, it’s easy all you have to do is hit this {insert special button}, and go to this menu and choose {kill me}, then on the sony remote hit {somebody get me a beer}…..
HAHA I totally laughed at the eject key part
Lawrence on August 27th, 2007 at 11:03 pm | Link
While most of what you said makes a lot sense, the ‘eject’ button is believe it or not is very helpful to those persons who have a physical disability, or other inguiries such as back or other spinal issues, which limits there mobility. Guess the manufacturers ‘heard’ what you’ve had to say, as this ‘particular’ button seems to no longer exist most remotes today.
Bea K. on January 13th, 2008 at 8:08 am | Link
Think about this for a second: Are you suggesting that their are spinal conditions which allow one to get up, move to the DVD unit, remove a disc from the drawer, grab a new disc, place it in the drawer, and return to their seat/bed/wheelchair/whatever yet prohibits them from pushing the eject button right next to the DVD drawer? If someone cannot get up to reach the DVD player, what good is the ability to eject the DVD, unless it is to simply watch the DVD drawer go in and out?
Kapusta on January 13th, 2008 at 9:51 am | Link
LOL. YOU ARE RIGHT!
the “EJECT” button.
HAHAHAH
I”M so addicted to it, pressing this key makes me laugh :)).
WHAT is the purpose anyway?
I was so thrilled that SONY CD/VCD/MDP/LPD/DVD remotes also has an EJECT button every upper-left corner of the commander.
I still don’t know whats the purpose but Its really fun pressing it LOL :)).
Gian Franco Dy on April 29th, 2009 at 12:39 am | Link
I just bough a new dvd player and found out that remote does nto have an eject button. Before I always cliked the eject button on the remote and then went to the dvd and it was opened so I could get the old dvd and put the new one in. The whole operation took me about 5 seconds. Now I need to get up, bend down to click the eject button, streighten up and wait till the dvd player opens, then bend down back again, take the old dvd and put the new one in. The whole operation takes me about 15 seconds. You may comment 10 seconds more is not much and you are right. But as I am interested in cinematography I use DVD player a lot and missing eject button is very annoying. In fact for this reason only I did return a player today and bought another one, this time checking if the eject button is present on the remote. So while you may laugh that it is a waste of time believe me there are others that find it more than useful.
And another note. It is much easier to get to take dvd out and put the new one in, than to press eject button on dvd player. Usually players are placed in a way that we need to bend a bit down. When DVD tray is open it sticks out quite a bit and you need to use less coordinated movements than when you press a button somewhere deeper inside the furniture. I am a very fit person (playing tennis 3 times a week and ridign bike regularly even 100 kn at a time) without any health problems but it is simple physics as additional work by our brain and muscles is required. So for disabled person it must be more than noticable.
SR on February 4th, 2010 at 4:33 pm | Link
SR: Might I also suggest a feed bag that eliminates the brain and muscle work involved with hand movement to the plate?
Your sarcasm is rather immature. You simply cannot agree that there are things that annoy others even though for you there are perfectly OK.
Eject button on the remote is a very convenient thing and I actualy did some survey among 100 people in the past week. I tried to pick up different environments and guess what? Only 3 of them replied that it does not matter if the button is on the remote or not. 97 strongly voted for and ticked the box that they will be checking this option on the next dvd purchase. None of them actualy said that they definitely do not need this button.
I also taked to 4 shops selling electronic equipment in different areas of Melbourne where I live. All of them admitted that they have customers complaining about missing eject button and had some returns for that reason only.
And nobody is trying to turn off the brain or the muscles. You still need to go to the equipment to take dvd out and put the new one in. It is much more practical when you get there and can do it straight away without wasting unnecessary time till the tray opens after you press the only eject button on the player as such.
SR on February 12th, 2010 at 4:38 am | Link
SR: This is MY biggest complaint dot com. MY complaint, not yours, or ours, but MINE. You don’t have to even remotely agree with it.
Your survey (assuming you are not simply blowing this out you rear end, which I highly suspect) only goes to show what a bunch of lazy, mindless couch potatoes we have become as a people. We are already becoming like the humans in WALL-E, and this eject button is a wonderful step along the way. I could write another whole complaint about what a bunch of sheep we are in regards to companies telling us what we need, and us believing it. And yet another about people who actually waist their time correcting others on their complaints.
This is not our-complaint.com, what-do-YOU-think?.com, solve-my-problem.com or do-you-agree-with-me?.com. I think the eject button is idiotic, and IMO that just says something sad (but not surprising) about the lazy people in your survey (if they exist).
Of course it is your complain and I never even once corrected it. You may revisit my messages again. I pointed it many times that while this is your opinion others may feel differently . But to be sure I am not taking into account just my feeling I did make the survey (you may believe it or not). Working with statistical and financial data every day it is very easy for me to obtain a representative population of people who will answer 3 simple questions very easily.
By the way is your nickname based on a Polish word for cabbage or it is just a coincidence?
SR on February 12th, 2010 at 7:29 pm | Link
SR, I appreciate your concern in the matter, and I will respect your love of this button. However, the fact is that I could care less if others feel differently than me on this. Obviously some people like it, or (more likely) have been convinced they need it, or the button would not be on there. However, popular opinion is in no way validation of it’s worth. Look at the success of American Idol, the 14 mpg SUV, and fast food if you are not convinced of this.
I would point out is that if those 100 people you polled are truly a fair representative sample of Americans, then roughly ~67 of them are overweight, and ~33 of them are enough so to be considered obese. Sounds like these folks would do well to get rid of the remote altogether.
Further, depending on the poll, between 25 and 50 of them flatly reject the theory of evolution, and slightly less than 40 actually fully accept the idea. 37 of these people have a favorable view of Sarah Palin (there were even more up until recently).
So, the question is: how much should I care what a bunch of fat, stupid people think about this issue?
Kapusta does mean cabbage in Polish, and it is “sort of” a coincidence. It is a now-defunct family name, and was the result of a phonetic butchering at Ellis Island many generations ago.
Any DVD player I buy dang well better have an eject button on its remote. My technology should be waiting on _me_ since that’s why I buy it, to make things easier or better. I should not be waiting on technology. Why should I have to wait for the DVD player to open its drawer? And Blu-ray players take much longer to open up after you hit eject. My CD changer takes forever to open after hitting eject. The less time I waste waiting for simple things to happen, the better! And on top of that, the overall gist of entertainment devices is to make you happy, and having to wait on them goes against that.
Fin on March 24th, 2010 at 2:10 pm | Link
Fin: Good point. That button has surely gained you valuable time. I’ll bet you’ve been able to watch a few more movies as a result, or maybe taken some online courses with all that free time. I now realize how much of my life I have been pissing it away, waiting for the DVD door to open.
No, stick with your complaint Kapusta, do you think waiting for the tray to release the disc is really advantageous? and besides what if your remote is always in your hands, you`re at the climax of the DVD movie (probably it may be scary or something so exciting) and you hit the eject button by accident. How misfortune can you be in? And of course, your focus is at the DVD movie, not memorizing the movie’s track/chapter number and duration, So you`ll have to digest by fast forwarding the movie until you get to the point from where the movie stopped. So to compare between the time to release a disc and the time to load, read the TOC, and digest the disc by fast forwarding. Which of the two waste too much time if it isn`t because of an eject button. You wouldn`t be in habbit to place the remote commander away from you. (The STOP button may have a RESUME feature added, but not an EJECT).
Anyway, I still remember the last time I saw this complaint since I was in 5th grade (elementary); posted a comment since I was in 6th grade and now that I am an incomming 3rd year High School student, Your complaint really impressed me and made me realize about this matter.
Gian Franco Briones Dy on March 25th, 2010 at 5:16 am | Link