Nest thermostat, anyone?

[MichaelB]

Just wondering if anyone has any experience with Nest thermostats. We are away from home for extended periods and I've been considering some products that let us see and monitor while we are away.

 

[Walt34]

I think that's what he meant. There is a thread on them here: http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f27/nest-thermostat-66733.html

 

[MichaelB]

Do you mean thermostat?

I knew something was off. Senior moment.

I think that's what he meant. There is a thread on them here: http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f27/nest-thermostat-66733.html

Thanks for the link. Now I know why it didn't come up when I did my search (thermometer).

Maybe some of the people that had them back then can comment whether they still like them one or two years later.

 

[braumeister]

I installed a Nest almost exactly three years ago. Loved it so much I installed another one when we moved last summer. Could easily have taken the first one and reinstalled the old thermostat but I decided to be generous and let the buyers have that one.

There are several things I like about Nest. Obviously, the ability to take it out of "away mode" and activate the heat or a/c from your phone as soon as the plane touches down is a huge plus.

I also like how it gradually ramps up the heating or cooling to avoid a big spike in power usage. Both the old and new homes are total electric/heat pump systems and that can be significant.

I also have a couple of cameras (originally Dropcam, but they were bought by Nest) as part of our security, and when I open the Nest app on my phone I see the thermostat and both cameras, so it's kind of a dashboard look at the home. I like that.

I know there are other internet-enabled thermostats on the market, but Nest certainly has the user interface part nailed. Completely intuitive, as I would expect from a company started by a former Apple guy. "It just works."

 

[harley]

I've gone a different path, with a couple of Amcrest wifi cams and a Sensi thermostat. I have to access the cams and the thermostat separately, but since I won't be checking it more than once a week/month, no big deal. The cams have great HD video, are very responsive, and do the important things like send alerts with motion detection, and provide cloud access of video if you want it (I don't). The thermostat is standard looking on the wall, not cool looking like the Nest, but gives me all the control I need. I chose the Sensi specifically because I have an old heat pump system with just 4 wires (as opposed to the more modern and common 6), so I didn't have to run a new wire. And the prices are half or less than Nest.

Plus I had purchased a bunch of Nest equipment for the testing lab I work with a couple of years ago, and they had a number of issues (I don't remember the details). They've probably cleaned some of that up, but I had that bad first impression. And I didn't want to pay a subscription fee, since I'm already having to pay to keep my internet access hooked up. Once we get back up north to MD I intend to do the same for that house.


If you are into all the extra cool tech stuff like geolocating and learning, nest might be the way to go. If you want a thermostat you can check and make sure your system is behaving, you can do it just as well a lot cheaper.

 

[Senator]

I have two Nest thermostats.

When I was in FL, I could see that my house temperature was right at 50 degrees. I have hot water heat, so the morning I was going to leave to go back to MN, I set the thermostats to 70 degrees.

They also sync with my SimpliSafe system. When I leave, they go to the away temperature. When I come home, they ramp up.

And they are a real cool looking device.

Very flexible, very good device.

 

[Alan]

I have a Nest thermostat and webcam and plan to add another webcam for our house in the UK later this year. Have had the thermostat for 15 months and the webcam since Christmas. You can add cameras to multiple rooms in 2 houses and control as a single instance.

I'm sold on it. Being retired we don't have a regular schedule and the learning feature wasn't useful so I have timers set but it has learned our movements and will set to auto-away shortly after we leave and come back on when we re-enter. I like being to access it while we are traveling either from the laptop or smart phone app, and I will set the webcam to send an alert when motion or sound is detected. In September last year it was very hot when we returned so it was a nice little feature to change the set point an hour or 2 before arrival home.

 

[AllDone]

We had some HVAC work done and rhe contractor recommended the wifi enabled Honeywell. He said that he had had less trouble with them. Additionally, if you already have a Honeywell programmable thermostat, you can pop the old one off the wall and snap the new one into its place. It's not nearly as cool looking though.

 

[zinger1457]

We had some HVAC work done and rhe contractor recommended the wifi enabled Honeywell.

I have one of the Honeywell wifi thermostats and very happy with it, very easy to use.

 

[bizlady]

Love the NEST. We have 4 of them, 3 in our home and one at the cabin. So convenient to monitor, and preset temps as we come and go. I would check out Ecobee thermostats also, the reviews are great and many love these more than the nest.

 

[donheff]

I have two Honeywell web controlled thermostats in my weekend house. The problem I have experienced is that they regularly disconnect from WIFI. I can usually (but not always) get them to reconnect by calling the ISP and having them reboot the modem/access point. I set the access point to assign specific IP addres to the thermostats' MAC addresses and that helped a bit but did not eliminate the problem. I have no idea if this is Honeywell related, a factor of my WIFI setup, or what.

 

[target2019]

If I had a WiFi thermostat, would try to setup a fixed IP address. Also look in your modem and router for power saving settings. You would need to disable anything like that.

 

[Philliefan33]

I have two Honeywell web controlled thermostats in my weekend house. The problem I have experienced is that they regularly disconnect from WIFI. I can usually (but not always) get them to reconnect by calling the ISP and having them reboot the modem/access point. I set the access point to assign specific IP addres to the thermostats' MAC addresses and that helped a bit but did not eliminate the problem. I have no idea if this is Honeywell related, a factor of my WIFI setup, or what.

I have the Honeywell wifi thermostat in our vacation home, but mine doesn't have that problem. It stays connected and automatically reconnects after a power outage. I'm very happy with ours.

 

[Tandemlovers]

We had the Honeywell wifi thermostat installed December 2014 in our up north house, and it has worked well, no problems with the wifi disconnecting.

 

[pb4uski]

I went the cheaper route since our programmable thermostats were only a few years old at the time I wanted to be able to monitor the temperature in the house while we were away for the winter.

I bought a temperature/humidity sensor from Lacrosse that as a wireless battery operated sensor and a base unit that attaches to my internet via wi-fi. About $85 as I recall and I can look at the house temp anywhere I have an internet connection, but I usually just use the phone app.

It saved my bacon last winter when I got a text that the temperature had dropped below what I had programmed as the lower limit and I was able to call my plumber and have him check it out before the house froze. It turned out that a part in the heating system had failed and needed to be replaced..

The added benefit is that I can see the temp rise when one of the kids use the house while we are away and it fall back to the preset when they leave.

 

[eytonxav]

DS has a Honeywell wifi unit and loves it, never has problems making remote changes.

 

[Peter]

No problems here either, with the Honeywell wireless thermostat. Strictly speaking, it's not WiFi, which implies spread spectrum to the 802.11 standard. Instead, it uses frequency hopping, which is arguably a more robust technique for this type of use.

Very well designed and reliable product.

 

[folivier]

Also have the Honeywell wifi thermostat. Works great. Actually use it to see if our electricity has gone out after a storm.
One caveat on this one and others is that you will probably need the 5th wire which has 24Vac already hooked up (or need to hook it up) for it to work. Our original thermostat was battery operated and this wire wasn't hooked up. Pretty easy to hook up but had to find it upstairs in the a/c unit in attic using my voltmeter.

 

[Peter]

Well.

Seems I was wrong in my previous post. Honeywell does indeed have WiFi thermostats, broadly similar to the NEST. My comment referred to the Honeywell Redlink system, which is different.

With Redlink, the thermostat is completely wireless. It doesn't replace an existing thermostat; rather, it's something you would install in a room that doesn't have wiring in the wall. It communicates by spread spectrum wireless to a base station that *is* wired into the rest of the HVAC system.

That's what we have, and that's what I was talking about in the previous post.

 

[RAE]

I went the cheaper route since our programmable thermostats were only a few years old at the time I wanted to be able to monitor the temperature in the house while we were away for the winter.

I bought a temperature/humidity sensor from Lacrosse that as a wireless battery operated sensor and a base unit that attaches to my internet via wi-fi. About $85 as I recall and I can look at the house temp anywhere I have an internet connection, but I usually just use the phone app.

I also went with the Lacrosse temp. sensor a couple years ago, and have been very satisfied with it so far. I have two sensors (one for upstairs, one for the basement), and one probe, which monitors the temp. in my big chest freezer (full of meat and other food). I check the sensors daily (via laptop or smartphone) while we are gone for the winter, and can see not only current temp, but temps over the last week, on a graph. Never had any problems with the furnace (or freezer) so far, but if I ever detect one, I can call my neighbor asap, and he'll help get the problem fixed before there is a disaster. Gives me great peace of mind, for less than $100.

 

[ExFlyBoy5]

Also have the Honeywell wifi thermostat. Works great. Actually use it to see if our electricity has gone out after a storm.
One caveat on this one and others is that you will probably need the 5th wire which has 24Vac already hooked up (or need to hook it up) for it to work. Our original thermostat was battery operated and this wire wasn't hooked up. Pretty easy to hook up but had to find it upstairs in the a/c unit in attic using my voltmeter.

Also have the Honeywell and have had it for about 3 years with no issues. Works great and was MUCH cheaper than Nest.

Sent via mobile device. Please excuse any grammatical errors.

 

[W2R]

I'll leave these fancy thermostats to the travelers and others here who may need them or find them fun to play with.

For me, the ideal thermostat is manual, non-programmable, simpler than simple, and with HUGE PRINT and numbers.

My present thermostat is more or less like that. Close enough.

 

[tulak]

Another alternative to the Nest is an Ecobee. I installed one a couple of years ago and it works great. I didn't want the learning features of the Nest and if I remember correctly, the Ecobee was around $100 cheaper.

 

[Sunset]

I went the cheaper route since our programmable thermostats were only a few years old at the time I wanted to be able to monitor the temperature in the house while we were away for the winter.

I bought a temperature/humidity sensor from Lacrosse that as a wireless battery operated sensor and a base unit that attaches to my internet via wi-fi. About $85 as I recall and I can look at the house temp anywhere I have an internet connection, but I usually just use the phone app....

My solution came about as DW seems pretty reluctant to get rid of the land line.

I bought home-sitter, a device that plugs into the phone line.
It will phone 3 numbers if: the temp drops too much, the floor gets wet, or the temp rises too much (fire?).
It also phones if the power has gone off for 10 minutes.

It has phoned me a couple of times regarding the power failure, and I can always test if the house has power by phoning the house and see if the answering machine turns on.

 

[Sunset]

I'll leave these fancy thermostats to the travelers and others here who may need them or find them fun to play with.

For me, the ideal thermostat is manual, non-programmable, simpler than simple, and with HUGE PRINT and numbers.

My present thermostat is more or less like that. Close enough.

My buddy won't use a NEST themostat, even when they were offered for free to him.
He does not like that someone can track if you are home or not.