Universal remotes have been commonplace ever since their introduction in 1985. They allow the control of a television or other media when the original remote is not available. There are many different kinds of universal remotes available today, with very high tech remotes available that can control a whole house.
A majority of the older universal remotes require codes to work on the TV and other devices. These remote control codes are listed by brand in the literature included with the remote and online. The codes have to be typed in on the number pad, resulting in multiple codes being tried at times before the correct one is found. This can be tedious.
Many of the newer universal remotes offer a solution to this problem. They will have multiple codes for different brands already programmed in. To use these remotes, a sequence of buttons would be pressed on the keypad. This would cause the remote to search for the right code. If the code cannot be found, there is a chance that a manual code would need to be used.
The high end universal remotes do not use the codes at all. Most of these can clone the controls of an existing remote by scanning it. This is highly effective and very quick to do. If the original remote was lost, the universal remote can be programmed online. This makes setting up the remotes very easy to do. They also offer the most features copied over from the original remote that came with the device.