If you have an iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad, or even an Android device and you have it docked on a stationary speaker unit, you probably find it quite inconvenient sometimes to have to stop whatever you are doing in order to go to your device and switch song if it hits a song you don’t like or if you need to load another playlist. Of course most of us solve this problem now by wirelessly pairing our devices with a Bluetooth speaker so that we don’t have to leave our device docked and can just carry it around with us. But if you don’t have that luxury, you can always pick up to a Bluetooth remote to control your device from a distance. Scosche makes such a device and it’s called the controlFREQ II. It’s a Bluetooth remote that works for all iOS devices as well as Android devices. I’ll be testing this with iOS.
Design and Build
The Scosche controlFREQ II is a tiny remote about 3-1/2″ tall and 1-1/4″ wide. It’s very small and easy to hold or carry around in your pocket. It’s made mostly out of plastic finished in a matte black with shiny black buttons and white print. It kind of looks a tiny bit like the official Apple remote except of course its color.
The main reason to for using the controlFREQ II would be to control your music/video apps. It can control Volume Up/Down, Mute, Play/Pause, Fast Forward, Rewind, and Track Forward/Backward. I’ve tried it with a few apps like Pandora, Netflix, and iTunes and it works flawlessly. It even seems to have very good range with me being able to control my iPhone from another room.
What you’ll find interesting though about the controlFREQ II is that it doesn’t just control music and video. It has a few dedicated iOS tricks up its sleeves as well. For starters, there is a “home” button that you can use to exit an app and go back to the home screen, which is kind of useless in that respect but it can also be used to activate Siri if your device supports that.
Another neat feature that I really like is that you can activate the Camera app’s shutter remotely. That means you can set up your iPhone for instance on a table and then take a photo of yourself several feet away using the remote. It’s a neat feature and definitely worth mentioning.
Lastly, there is a door that slides down on front that reveals a hidden numerical keypad. I haven’t quite found a use for the keypad yet other than the initial code I had to enter to pair the remote up with my iPhone.
Final Thoughts
You might think that having a remote would be useless especially if you are using your device with a Bluetooth speaker. Well, I’m going to tell you that that isn’t the case. I actually found that it comes in handy in instances when you have to actually plug your device in to charge. I can charge my device while using a Bluetooth speaker and the remote at the same time while being able to move anywhere around my room. This also works for playing video if you have your device attached to a TV. I actually found it quite convenient keeping the Scosche controlFREQ II in my pocket as it was a lot lighter to carry around that my iPhone was.
I really love the fact that I can use this as a remote for the camera app. I’ve always wanted a way to remotely activate the camera shutter and now I can. The only downside is that it doesn’t work with a lot of the third part camera apps out there unless they can make use of the iPhone’s volume + button as a shutter.
Overall, I’d recommend this remote to anyone who wants to control their music and video remotely. It works great, is very responsive, and very easy to carry around in your pocket. It’s also pretty inexpensive at around $40.
