Here is the situation. You find that your TV or music system is not responding to your remote. You frantically try pressing this key and that key but to no avail. Ah…probably the batteries in the remote are out of juice. You replace the batteries with new ones and still its the same.

Now, you realise that problem could be  either your remote or your TV/music system. But how do you make sure which one is the culprit. If you have a digital camera or a camera mobile phone, you can at least make sure whether the remote is the problem device.

To troubleshoot, point your remote control into your camera lens and then push some buttons on the remote. Now look at the camera’s LCD screen (not in the optical viewfinder). If the remote works, you’ll see a flashing light where the remote’s infrared emitter is. If you see no such light, then you can be pretty sure that the problem lies with the remote.

This trick would work for any remote control that works on the principle of infrared.