wifi thermostat

[Salesleader]

The Lennox i comfort is very nice and will soon be able to be used with any brand and non communicating systems

[duckman06]

I like my Ecobee thermostat, but the "cool factor" of being able to control it from
my phone wore off pretty fast.
Most people loose interest when they find out the cost.

I agree with you. We have installed many comfort link t-stats and some comfort linkII stats. Customers uses for a few months then the new goes away.

Then when it is time to start to pay for it most don't renew. It is a great tool if someone travels or has camp house so they can see what the there systems are doing or adjust before getting home or to there camp.

I had a demo in my home and just like most customers i used and then didn't really see the need after a few months .

[tedkidd]

Control, to me, is a secondary advantage.

The reporting is primary. Looking at the chart (ecobee) you can see how the house behaves under varying conditions, and how the house behaves when the equipment operates.

You can see and manage deadband, play with setback and see if there is benefit, keep an eye on humidity. Understand conditions equipment saw before failure. I'm just beginning to see these opportunities, I'm sure more will present themselves.

[NCHeat]

Not many customers care for such a thing. I have installed a handful of the Redlink units. I just did a heat pump/zoning system for a customer who had a "control 4" system installed for his boiler. The Control 4 HVAC thermostats are almost as atrocious as the Mitsubishi thermostats... Steer clear of that brand

I had a horrific experience with "Control 4". I was using dual fuel with a ground source GEO heat pump and 2 stg. gas furnace.

[valentyn]

Try this www.nest.com

[Brent Ridley]

I've installed the new Carrier touch infinity control and the Trane XL950. They are both good thermostats. The wifi was easy to setup. Carrier's is free and Trane's just became free if your are only controling the HVAC. With Trane (and Schlage-link), you have the ability to control alarm systems, door locks, blinds, lights, all remotely thru wifi....but they do charge for that.

I personally think the user control is the 1st priority. A thermostat can have a million features but if it is too complicated for the homeowner...then it worthless. I service a light commercial account that has several Ecobee's. I like the tracking but the customer hates them due to a complicated user interface.

[tedkidd]

Brent, does carrier or Trane do charting like ecobee?

I put 2 ecobees in my rental and am learning a LOT from the "home hq" time line charts.

[Brent Ridley]

The Trane XL950 does the charting. I don't think that the Carrier stat has that feature. I have only done (2) of the Infinity touch controls so I am still learning. The Infinity does have the option to input the price per KW and let your know how much it costs to operate.

[tedkidd]

That is fantastic news. I'm going to replace a system that is using Time Warner's service (Trane stat) and I'd like to reconcile past operation to my model. House has twinned 80,000/4ton units and I'd love to drop to one 100k 4 or 5 ton unit, but that's pretty aggressively below modeled load.

Tranes new communicating zoning should help, but seeing current behavior will improve understanding of actual need.

[oldertech]

Venstar has very good residential and commercial color touch thermostats with WiFi. www.venstar.com or www.us-ac.com. I have a residential model on my wall.

[thermojohn]

Control, to me, is a secondary advantage.

The reporting is primary. Looking at the chart (ecobee) you can see how the house behaves under varying conditions, and how the house behaves when the equipment operates.

You can see and manage deadband, play with setback and see if there is benefit, keep an eye on humidity. Understand conditions equipment saw before failure. I'm just beginning to see these opportunities, I'm sure more will present themselves.

teddkidd, does the online chart for ecobee show humidity along with dry bulb? If so, how long of a time does the graphing allow? Week, month, year, etc...?

[Keith73]

I just put 2 Ecobee's in my rental house. Nice to have charts showing how the house is behaving. I'm hoping to optimize differential temperatures to the largest delta the tenants will accept. Furnaces are grossly oversized.

Pretty slick stats.

Now this makes the most sense of any use I have seen.

[tedkidd]

teddkidd, does the online chart for ecobee show humidity along with dry bulb? If so, how long of a time does the graphing allow? Week, month, year, etc...?

Pic:
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-e...012205DF5D.PNG

Rh, not wet bulb.
Week now (see pic) but allows XML download. Hopefully they'll improve charting flexibility. Annual overlays would be really cool!