With CEDIA almost upon us, I thought it’d be nice to take a quick look at Philips new remote control, the Pronto professional TSU9800. This new remote has all of the hardware features and software capabilities of the existing TSU9600, and going only by photographs you might initially think them identical – until you realize that the color LCD touchscreen is a big 6.4” diagonal compared to 3.7” for the TSU9600!

This new control harkens back to the big-screened iPronto TSi6400 in concept, but is less overly ambitious. By utilizing the same basic architecture of the TSU9600, and even the same screen resolution at 640x480, it manages to piggy back a bigger and bolder remote onto an already stable and well supported platform. Indeed, the new ProntoEdit v2.0 released this weekend allows programmers to work with the TSU9400, TSU9600 or TSU9800 without switching applications.

To help utilize some of that extra case space around the outside of the screen, Philips has added an additional two buttons below the jog wheel for [Info] and [Back]. The rechargeable Lithium Ion battery has been doubled in size to 4200mAh, and the docking station now sports a wired Ethernet connection for fast communications (wireless 802.11g is of course still included as well). An optional mount allows fixed placement on a wall or tabletop.

The TSU9800 is not yet available, and exact pricing was not available, although B&H had it posted briefly for $2199 USD.

Update: the official MSRP is $2399 USD, or Eur 1799.

Talk about the TSU9800 in our Pronto Professional forum.