Sky Remote - Get the Real Deal or a Cheaper Alternative?

The Sky remote, a highly treasured device in many people's homes. Used with the Sky Digital digibox, this remote has been around for many, many years with very little change.

It's managed to stand the test of time due to it's well thought out design, Sky have clearly put a lot of money and thought into getting the design right first time - and over the long term it's paid off.

One of the main benefits of the Sky remote is it's simplicity whilst still being highly functional and easy to use. A lot of regular television remote controls today feature a huge number of (often unnecessary) buttons packed into a small surface. With this, every button has it's place and is clearly labelled so that even someone unfamiliar with Sky Digital and it's remote can pick it up and use it - particularly useful for households with older people or younger children.

As well as the layout another benefit comes from it's ability to double as a universal TV remote. This saves you having to juggle multiple remote controls by having everything available from one remote at the press of a button. Simply spend a couple of minutes looking up your televisions unique code and configure it with the remote and you're good to go - just press the 'TV' button and you'll have full control of your TV. Forward thinking like this really shows the end user was in mind when designing the product.

So with all this said, why would you ever want an alternative?

Well over the years a number of other manufacturers have produced a number of Sky remote controls, usually as an alternative to the genuine Sky version. They make these for a number of reasons but the main one is that they can produce them at a lower price, undercutting Sky. However as with anything, when something is produced for a lower price there will be some compromises made somewhere and this Hub is here to inform you of what they are and if it should matter to you.

As mentioned one of the main benefits of getting an alternative Sky remote is the price - i have seen them going for around the quarter the price of the genuine one. Many households are going through difficult financial times and making savings on small items like this can make a huge difference overall. Generally the remote controls perform to the same standard as the original and often times incorporate additional features.

So whilst the products will both perform to the same level what are the downsides of buying cheaper alternatives? Well firstly, they aren't Sky. They didn't design the original remote and the manufacturers often don't have the years of expertise to produce the perfect product. So whilst functional, the cheaper Sky remote control may suffer from some odd looking design issues or some poor quality components. For the most part the use of cheaper components is fine but over time they may wear and cause the remote to break.

Sky on the other hand has a brand name and strong reputation to protect, it's because of this that they have a commitment to produce a higher quality product. This means that all the branded remote controls they produce will be in excellent working order and been produced to the exact specifications that were originally set for the device.

Overall i believe that whilst the Sky branded remote is definitely the winner as far as quality it is easy to see why many people may wish to turn to the cheaper alternatives offered by lesser known manufacturers. It is true that the same quality is often not replicated but for prices they can offer these remote controls i think it is a fair trade.