The frustration of a Logitech Harmony universal remote... or is the LG TV to blame!?

After seeing and hearing a bit about universal remotes, I finally decided to give one a go. Reading through online reviews, it seemed that the Logitech Harmony line of remotes stood out above any of the competition. Checking for compatibility with my devices via Logitech's Harmony Device Compatibility site, it quickly became clear that I needed a remote with a Harmony Hub. At this point, I was quite impressed with the details provided by Logitech - their compatibility page was extremely helpful and had a large number of devices listed. Thumbs up there.

So after doing some shopping around I found a good deal at JB Hi-Fi and got myself a Logitech Harmony Smart Control.

After unpacking it and successfully connecting it up with my devices, the frustration started to creep in. And it only grew as the compatibility problems could not be resolved. To this day, I am unable to effectively create any workable solutions. The dream of getting rid of these four remote controls...

...by replacing them with this universal remote...

...seems as though it may never become a reality.

After literally spending hours and hours, day after day, configuring "activities" (that's Logitech Harmony lingo), I just couldn't get the remote to reliably do what I wanted. The culprit, though, I believe is my TV rather than the remote itself. Let me explain...

The devices I have are:

• LG 55" LED LCD Smart TV (55LN5710)
• Philips Soundbar Speaker (HTL3140B)
• Amazon Fire TV (1st Generation)
• LG DVD Player (DV7821P)

The basic "Watch TV" Logitech Harmony activity that I setup uses the LG TV and the Philips Soundbar.

Now, the fundamental problem I have with the LG TV is an inconsistent input changing method - menu toggle (or menu cycle) - due to media server connectivity. Logitech has a very good support article explaining the different input changing methods, but there is no way that I know of to work around an inconsistent listing of inputs. The LG TV may or may not have my DLNA media server and / or my Plex media server showing, and there are no LG TV settings to disable them from showing or to change the order in which they appear.

Here is the LG TV input list without any of the media servers showing:

And here is the LG TV input list with both of the media servers showing:

This is a big problem, as the remote needs to know precisely in what order all the inputs are listed otherwise it will select them incorrectly.

The LG TV does have a direct input button for TV / Radio, but that simply toggles between the two. So if it is used with a Logitech Harmony activity, you'll get TV one time and Radio the other time. No good.

About two months ago, I lodged a support request with LG via their website asking for assistance, specifically seeking a direct method of selecting the TV input. I have had no response. And since then, the Logitech Harmony remote has been gathering dust on our cabinet. I'd love to be able to use it, but if every second time it is used you have to go back to the original remote, it's pretty much useless. It just defeats the point of having a universal remote.

I intend to research this in more detail and will attempt to get technical support from Logitech and / or LG (again). With some luck, perhaps this dream of a universal remote can become a reality. If it can, maybe then I can look at integration with the likes of IFTTT and Alexa. Scheduling the TV to turn on at specific times or instructing it with your voice - now that would be neat!