Outlet Reviews

Guilty as charged! I do live my life through my son. I try to get him everything that I had or wished that I had, growing up...this is one of them!

I was having a tough time getting something nice for my son's 7th birthday. I asked him what he wanted...........he wanted NOTHING!!! And he wouldn't budge from this demand.

My son gets all tucked into bed and reads, without fail, every night. I thought I could save him getting a trip to the other side of the room to switch-off the light. So I started looking for a remote-outlet. I wanted a remote-outlet versus a light with a remote switch so as not to restrict myself to one applian...we could use the outlet with Christmas lights, etc.

I researched GE, RadioShack and a few other brands, but none had such sleek looking outlets or remot...they seemed oddly bulky or very 70-ish in their designs and were more expensive. I preferred the look and features of the La Crosse. I read the, only available, company reviews and decided to bite the bullet and purchase it from Amazon. (Free Shipping helped!)

PROS:
1. It has a sleek design, which will not stand out in the room. The silver on Black finish is attractive and feels good in the hand.

2. Setup is absolutely intuitive - Plug it in, press the silver button on the outlet and press the button on the remote you want to control the outlet with. YEAH! That's it!!!

3. Visual Indicators - The outlet is powered with AC current and if you remove it or switch it from one outlet to another you need to re-program it....complex instructions above! ;o)
There is a small vertical LED above the silver button (see picture) which flashes when not programmed and is steady when programmed. I think it's cool to know in an instant what's wrong.

4. The remote is radio-frequency controlled and it does not need to be pointed towards the outlet.

5. The remote has four separate on-off channels. You can add two more remote-outlets, to this remote, for individual remote-outlet control. BUT you can connect more than one remote-outlet to one channel. E.g. If, late at night, you need to switch on your night-light, the hall-way light and the bathroom light......you can program all three remote-outlets to operate with channel 1. So when you press channel 1 all three will come on.

6. A master switch which can switch on-off all outlets at once.

CONS:
1. There is a very distinct 'click' when you switch on or off. I think it's due to the remote-outlet having a mechanical circuit rather than an electronic circuit. Just a little noisy, nothing more.

2. The buttons on the remote are a little loose, so they kinda' wiggle in their slots. I guess I'm so used to seeing tight, rubber-coated buttons on our remotes, this plastic feels a bit odd. No loss in performance though...just a personal feel.

3. With a loss of power, you need to reprogram the remote-outlets. This means that if you have a wall-switch for the wall-outlet, you might be re-programming pretty often - Old habits die hard. I suggest using this on a wall-outlet without a wall-switch.

4. This is a SERIOUS CONSIDERATION. On a standard wall-outlet (two outlets) there is a high possibility that you will lose the other outlet. The shape of this product hinders use of the other outlet.

Overall, I give this product 4-stars. I think someone took the time to think this product through. It's cool, functional, nice looking, very intuitive to use.

1-star less, because of outlet hogging and remote buttons.

My son loves this product as do I. He did end up getting a lot of gifts for his birthday, but this was the one he raved about most!!