Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

Posted on
Tue Jan 02, 2018 8:18 am
Swancoat offline
Posts: 503
Joined: Nov 20, 2009
Location: Houston

Re: Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

jay (support) wrote:
roussell wrote:
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.


Similarly I was woken up in the night by when my house was too cold and found that somehow my Venstar Thermostats had set themselves down to something in the 30s or some stupid thing (also had them go above 200 at some point, but had built in some triggers to catch extreme events).

So I started with some Honeywell Thermostats the builder had put in (which were perfectly fine, but I wanted them linked to Indigo...), switched to the Venstars, and then back to the Honeywell's after that debacle. I've now moved to the Ecobee 3. They're ok... but I don't think I like them as much as everyone else here. I've had the endless authentication issue with the servers for the plugin (that may be fixed now, I don't know. I kind of gave up and haven't updated in a while). Plus I'm firmly in Jay's camp re: cloud-linked automation (partially for reliability, but partially for latency). Even with Ecobee's app, it seems like you change the setpoint in the app and then maybe it updates. Maybe not. Just not good feedback.

So I've probably used all of the rope my wife will give me on Thermostats and will be stuck with these Ecobees for a while. If I were to replace them though, I see that Lutron is now selling a rebranded version of the Honeywell thermostat I originally had (boring LCD display and resistive touchscreen) with Lutron Clearconnect in it so it will work with RadioRa2. I'm pretty sure that's the best solution. Direct communication with the automation system, and I have RadioRa2 lighting installed now and it is lightning fast and bulletproof.

http://nerdhome.jimdo.com

Posted on
Tue Jan 02, 2018 5:09 pm
Seeker offline
Posts: 440
Joined: Aug 05, 2013

Re: Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

I've got a Trane TZEMT400AB32MAA, one of the very first z-wave devices i got 5 years ago during the radio shack z-wave clearance. it is probably the most reliable z-wave device i own. i have never noticed a hiccup.

I do use indigo to set timed set points (warmer near wakeup time, cooler when leaving for work, warmer near arrival time, etc) and i routinely override this from a control page. i also have a HOLD button to ignore the set point schedule.

this has been perfectly reliable for me.

Posted on
Wed Jan 03, 2018 8:08 am
johnpolasek offline
Posts: 911
Joined: Aug 05, 2011
Location: Aggieland, Texas

Re: Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

My two Honeywell TH8320ZW1000s have also worked perfectly since they day I bought them (one 2 years ago, the other last January). They'd be a pain to program as stand alones, but since I use Indigo to push set points to them based on a half a dozen OSI temperature sensors scattered throughout the house rather than letting them do their own thing based on just their location (the bedroom stat in particular is in a place that doesn't correspond to most of the rooms it's heating and cooling), that's not an issue.

Posted on
Wed Jan 10, 2018 6:25 pm
Ericbo offline
Posts: 133
Joined: Sep 18, 2012

Re: Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

jay (support) wrote:



Thank you Jay, exactly the one I picked on Amazon, next X10 purchase !
Appreciated, Eric

Posted on
Sat Feb 03, 2018 7:53 pm
Ericbo offline
Posts: 133
Joined: Sep 18, 2012

Re: Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

Father Christmas was good to me and got me the Trane 524 :) (same Jay is using)
Installed it and doing good in manual
If anybody has time sharing their Trane 524 setup (device, programing) thank you !!
Eric

Posted on
Sun Feb 04, 2018 12:38 pm
jay (support) offline
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Location: Austin, Texas

Re: Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

Ericbo wrote:
If anybody has time sharing their Trane 524 setup (device, programing) thank you !!


What specifically are you looking for?

Jay (Indigo Support)
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Posted on
Sun Feb 04, 2018 3:44 pm
Ericbo offline
Posts: 133
Joined: Sep 18, 2012

Re: Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

The first thing would be the device setup (or maybe it is using a plugin) ?
Thank you Eric :)

Posted on
Mon Feb 26, 2018 2:34 pm
Ericbo offline
Posts: 133
Joined: Sep 18, 2012

Re: Your preferred heating/HVAC controller hardware ?

Great, installing ZWave and linking the Trane controller was a breeze, love the Indigo Touch interface !
Eric :)

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