Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

[jay (support)]

Ahh, never used the set points of the stat, I use Indigo for setpoints, everything really.

Confused - you have to set the setpoints for the thing to work correctly, no? The problem was collisions were causing the setpoints to get set VERY incorrectly (like 40° or 90°) at random times.

Fair enough, but what about your environmental controls need 100% uptime? I ask sincerely. See, for me, I have my thermostat pegged at 70 degrees year-round, and even if the net or cloud servers go down it still functions without any input from me or Indigo. The only modifications I make are at night I drop it to 50 degrees and it ramps up slowly from 3am until I wake up, if I get up and it didn't do that (which has happened a few times) then I'm cold but I'll live while I wait for the manually set temperature to warm me up.

Ahh, never used the set points of the stat, I use Indigo for setpoints, everything really.

Confused - you have to set the setpoints for the thing to work correctly, no? The problem was collisions were causing the setpoints to get set VERY incorrectly (like 40° or 90°) at random times.

Hmm, never touched ‘em, I literally took them out of the box, slapped them on the wall and added them to Indigo. The only setting I ever screwed with was adjusting the displayed temp to match the actual one one of them. That setting took forever to find, I don’t even remember how I did it now and hope I never need it again. I might have adjusted the heuristics at the same time but don’t remember now. They’re so reliable I honestly forget about them with Indigo controlling everything.

Terry


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[jay (support)]

Hmm, never touched ‘em, I literally took them out of the box, slapped them on the wall and added them to Indigo. The only setting I ever screwed with was adjusting the displayed temp to match the actual one one of them. That setting took forever to find, I don’t even remember how I did it now and hope I never need it again. I might have adjusted the heuristics at the same time but don’t remember now. They’re so reliable I honestly forget about them with Indigo controlling everything.

So, you never adjust the setpoints in Indigo? You just use the exact same setpoints that were defaults?? A dumb thermostat would have been much more cost effective...

Yes, I use Indigo to change the various heating and cooling setpoints. I don’t use the built in setpoints (if that’s even a thing with these). I’ve never had a problem with them setting to some arbitrary value though. If Indigo tells them to set to 73, they set to 73, every time. Maybe I just got two from a good batch all those years ago.

Sorry for the confusion, I thought you were talking about something that had to be set on the stat itself.

Terry


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[jay (support)]

Fair enough, but what about your environmental controls need 100% uptime? I ask sincerely. See, for me, I have my thermostat pegged at 70 degrees year-round, and even if the net or cloud servers go down it still functions without any input from me or Indigo. The only modifications I make are at night I drop it to 50 degrees and it ramps up slowly from 3am until I wake up, if I get up and it didn't do that (which has happened a few times) then I'm cold but I'll live while I wait for the manually set temperature to warm me up.

My setpoints adjust 4 times a day. If the one at night misses, then I end up with a house that's too hot and it wakes me up. If we go on vacation, the setpoints are adjusted accordingly after we leave the house. If that one misses, then it potentially runs a lot more than it should. If the ones that set everything back miss then we come home to a hot/cold house that takes a while to adjust. Sure, I can live with these issues, but I don't want to and I don't have to with locally-controlled thermostats.

So for me 90% isn't good enough. It's the same reason why I use Apple products (though, granted, it's becoming a lot harder to say this): they work, they work well, and they are reliable as hell. All without me having to do much work.

[jay (support)]

Yes, I use Indigo to change the various heating and cooling setpoints. I don’t use the built in setpoints (if that’s even a thing with these). I’ve never had a problem with them setting to some arbitrary value though. If Indigo tells them to set to 73, they set to 73, every time. Maybe I just got two from a good batch all those years ago.

The killer was when I came home after being gone a couple of days to find the A/C had been running non-stop pretty much the entire time I was gone. Some random Insteon collision had caused the setpoints to get FUBAR and I had a huge electric bill.

Some random Insteon collision had caused the setpoints to get FUBAR and I had a huge electric bill.

Could you really have guaranteed 100% that wouldn't/couldn't happen? I think that's the price for all this over automation we all do, sometimes it goes sideways on us and screws us up.

[jay (support)]

100%? No. 99%, yes. This bug hit a lot of people, so much that Insteon had to offer replacements with a firmware fix (and we added some artificial limits in the server). Quality is a big deal, particularly with things like HVAC which are about as mission critical as you can get in a home. Expecting anything less just because it's "smart" isn't acceptable.

Wow, so thank you for the inputs, greatly appreciated !
My heating/HVAC is Trane and would likely go with the ZWave/Trane solution Jay mentioned (my current controller is a manual Trane)
Will do some more reading before ordering it
Again much appreciated !! Eric
Happy New Year ))))))))))))))))

My experience is that the Insteon thermostats (I went through a variety of the plug in Insteon modules for Venstars and Insteon thermostats) are significantly less reliable than Z-Wave thermostats (I use one from Trane). I have a Honeywell WiFi Thermostat as well because of the esthetics, but I'm with Terry on the desire to have as much local control as possible. The Honeywell drops connections, doesn't like some router configurations, and their website is periodically unreachable. If I had to do it over again, I wouldn't buy it but would just buy another Trane as it's been rock solid since I installed it 16 months ago.

Thanks Jay, which model did you buy from Trane ? (I am seeing the XR524, XL624)
Much appreciated, Eric

[jay (support)]

I have this one:

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00SYP ... UTF8&psc=1

I have two Venstar/Insteon adapter units and they both have the nasty habit of randomly jumping to 0º

Rather than replacing them I did this workaround:

- Variable to store the current set-point.
- Schedule every 2 minutes that copies the current set-point to variable
- Heat & Cool triggers that if the set-point is not within a range (xº-yº) it resets to the stored variable

This has solved the runaway set-point issue for now. It's also cheap insurance for anyone who travels. (nothing like having your AC running 24/7 and not knowing it!)

I have five of the Venstar thermostats and have the same problem of the random set points documented above. I have variables and triggers to correct the crazy values on the fly and that keeps them in check.

I am intrigued by the new nest and ecobee thermostats. Just simply not sure if there are any better than the Venstar thermostats. The learning aspect of the nest is intriguing… but I was told by a friend that it really just looks to see if there’s any movement (IR) and if no movement has detected within about 17 hours it will then going to “away mode.“ Is there any more learning involved than this? Will it will it automatically adjust home and away and preferred temperature settings?

If you are in a climate that has temps below freezing, the thermostat is definitely something that should be considered 'mission critical'. I can't see how you guys could continue to use a thermostat that can not be dead-solid reliable on its own.

Nest has its detractors, but I have found its basic operation to be rock solid (6 nests controlling hydronic heating and a heat pump (heating and cooling)), regardless of internet access or not. The indigo plugin works great (tho it has to talk to the cloud) and I am pretty happy with the setup. (I also have no reliability concerns regarding the thermostats)

The nest does pretty well deciding if the house is occupied, it does use the motion sensors in the smoke detectors and thermostats as a way to tell if someone is home. It also can use family member's phone's geolocation to sense whether to be in home or away mode.

Schedules can be set, or they can be learned by nest (or a combination). The plugin can also control the set points. (so you can roll-your-own geolocation solution by using the nest plugin and the iOS app 'Home Remote')

Nest is pretty good, there are some more advanced commercial systems, but they are very expensive and many come with a monthly fee (like Cisco) for the on line control. I would like more flexibility on the heat pump fan control, more flexibility on the outdoor temperature data source (be able to pick the website, have a hardwired outdoor temp sensor, or use my netamo weather station data) and more flexibility on the heat source used during the transition from heat pump to hydronic.