For about 6 months I’ve had my eye on the RicaVision SideShow Remote but they were not available. Diligent monthly searches eventually turned up a purchase link for the Manufacturer Samples @ $249.99 and decided to go for it. My 2 year old really helped me out when he recently found a way to flip my Pronto into ‘Toddler‘ mode, meaning its bricked.

So 5 days later the RicaVision Remote has arrived and so far I am mostly impressed and very excited about the potential not just of this specific device but of SideShow in general. SideShow really is one under hyped platform that Vista enables and Microsoft is really not doing it justice.

Why this remote and why SideShow? Mostly because the default SideShow Gadget gives you full control of Windows Media player, that means headless song selection that is bi-directional! Cover Art on the remote, bluetooth control etc, you get the idea.

I am going to do a detailed review of it shortly but my initial impressions are :

Packaging : NICE, came in a nice faux leather box

Build Quality : Pretty good for a sample. The chrome is a bit chintzy and you can see waves in some of the plastic but really nothing that impacts usage or even is noticeable unless your looking for a problem

Software : Drivers took immediately although I did have to remove/insert the device post driver install to get it to appear in the SideShow Control Panel.

Configuration : None, it Just Works

BlueTooth : So-so, it seems to lose connection randomly but just hitting back and enter tends to get the job done. Slightly annoying but I imagine they are fixing this with the new version coming out later this year. I was able to change songs from 50 feet down the hall so that was cool. Additionally, sometimes you have to hold the button for a full second or so to get a response. A second doesn’t seem like a lot but try it, you’ll see.

IR : It includes an RC-6 Windows IR Receiver so its plug and play and works as expected

Ergonomics : Pretty weird actually. The remote has 3 distinct ‘areas’, a top black area that controls the SideShow app (QVGA screen + 5 way thumbstick + Back + Menu buttons), a middle area that has another 4 way button pad for Media Center and then the bottom area with the standard Play/Pause buttons. Instinct is to always use the 4 buttons, not the thumbstick. You get used to it but a single 4 way with a selection switch might be nicer.

Overall : I am impressed and excited. This remote will let me control the music in the backyard from the comfort of my lounge chair, no laptop required and no more NetRemote. It also controls Media Player in headless mode, this means you can use it on your primary PC and never see Media Player.

What is more exciting is how dead simple SideShow is to develop for. If you can output XML then you can start building basic SideShow apps. My current plan is to use SideShow to control my Matrix Switch and eventually my Sprinkler overrides. As I get those Gadgets rolling next week I will post about them.

So, more SideShow coming soon and a real review with photos this weekend.

Here are some pics of the final product (read on for pics and more)

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Whats a guy to do at the office with no music? Turn to streaming music of course. This is how I happened upon SomaFM. Of course, everyone knows SomaFM but not as many people listen to it. Tuning in I instantly became a fan, specifically of the Secret Agent channel. Its just fabulous music for tuning out while you write some software or otherwise need to disengage the brain to really focus on something.

Of course, this leads to the quest to bring SomaFM: Secret Agent into my home and my MediaPC is just the conduit for that since it, amazingly enough, can be used in every room in my house!
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STARTUPDATE (Sept 8.2006)
Some interesting things have happened.

1) A LIRC module was released for Ruby and this will let me accept the raw codes and get rid of the totalitarian lird.conf file! Hooray! Now I can allow people to, via a RIA app (Flex) remap arbitrary IR codes to switcher activities!
2) Ruby actually works on my device! Having trouble packaging it up to return to the SH4 community but I’ll work on that more later.
3) I learned how to build RIA apps in Adobe Flex.

This means some progress is being made, just slowly. Lots going on as I put the finishing touches on the huge home remodel I did All On My Own With Help From My Dad.

oh, and now I don’t have to code in C. All Hail Ruby (this month at least).

ENDUPDATE

As my 2 regular readers know, I am deep into my Whole House A/V Distribution installation. Overall the results have been fantastic but there is one missing component, its just not turnkey enough. If anyone else had to maintain it they’d rip it off the wall and plug all the RG-6 into a splitter from the local Cable Co.

Thats not the goal here, the goal is to build a Distribution system to stand the test of time, one that Ozymandias himself would be proud of. Wait. Bad example. So, the latest quest has been for a small appliance that can act as the switching system. (more…)

In order to make my switching system ‘Wife Compatible’ (verified) I had to devise a simple and bulletproof method of managing it. At first it was a web portal but I realized fairly quickly that not only did it have to be simple, it also had to be in context and unfortunately browsing a website while trying to control the TV is not in context for most people.

What is in context? Why a remote control of course.

Read on for the full scoop..

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• Idea 1.0: “Lets watch Tivo in the office so we can watch Survivor there.”
• Idea 1.5: “Why only watch Tivo in every single room, we should be able to watch ANYTHING in ANY room!”
• Idea 2000++ Service Pack 5: “Lets watch ANY source in 0 or more rooms and control it with an intutive user interface!”

And so was born our A/V Switching system. It consists of the following components. (more…)