My AliExpress Android TV remotes

I had two Android TV (one of them Xiaomi) set top boxes needing remotes. AliExpress’s selection is both bad and expensive. There isn’t really a simple remote, which would make sense to anyone picking it up. Everything wants to have 20 features and 40 buttons. Benchmarking towards something like this:

¶G20S Pro BT (VIV000600) – died after 4 months

• Died after 4 months (refunded in full)
• If the remote was sleeping (as remotes normally are inactive), a key needs to be pressed to wake the remote up. The key pressed isn’t transmitted after wakeup. This means most of the time you have to press the remote twice for it to do anything.
• Consumed a pair of alkalines every month.
• The USB dongle stops working when Bluetooth is paired with no way to switch back to the dongle.

¶Xiaomi remote with numbers (XMRM-19)

Bought for use with Xiaomi TV Box S 3. gen EU 4K (PFJ4191EU). The original remote looks like this (on the right):

XMRM-19 (on the left) was bought in addition for the number keys. The remote’s power button doesn’t work as it should. It reboots the device. To turn off the TV Box, you have to hold the button down and select Shut Down. I didn’t find any way to change this behaviour.

The remote didn’t come with instructions on how to put it into pairing mode. Now the listing says to hold down the Mi and Home button. You have to have a USB keyboard or another remote, as the TV Box doesn’t have a pairing button. Both remotes are cluttered with buttons waiting for an accidental press. Compared to pretty much all remotes, they have the back button in the wrong place (not left side, which has been replaced by Mi button).