NVE2181 Zigbee module but how to I connect to Smartthings or Alexa?

I just got my free smart home thermostat from my power/energy company here in Las Vegas, NV and it says its model “NVE2181” and could not find another part number for it and it clearly has a zigbee chip that say “Zigbee Moudule Model No.: CTL2607” on that chip. I can control it from its own smart app which is neat and ok but would be great if I could integrate into Smartthings and/or Alexa can anyone help?

And yes I searched all forums here and did not come up with anything,

Thanks!

Have you tried just a regular device discovery from Alexa? “Alexa, discover new devices”

(I hate to suggest the obvious… but just in case…)

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That is the very first thing I did. She didn’t find it.

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The zigbee protocol is made up of a group of profiles, SmartThings supports the zigbee home automation v1.2 profile. It’s possible your thermostat supports a different profile, or your power company locked it down to their own bridge in some other way.

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Someone else opened a thread over a year ago. You might inquire with that person to see if they made any progress

FYI: After doing a search, it appears that this is a Honeywell Thermostat. Find the actual model number versus what NV Energy rebranded it as.

And if you can find the specs, that would be even more helpful. It might show the Zigbee protocol it’s using. I couldn’t find it, so if they sent it with the Thermostat, share it with the community.

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Since they gave it to you for free, they probably require that you be enrolled in their mPower program, and that means you have to be connected to their zigbee network.

Unfortunately Since zigbee Home Automation (ZHA) Devices can only belong to one network coordinator at a time, you cannot also use it with SmartThings. :disappointed_relieved:

You should talk to them about whether they have an Alexa option.

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Ok I got some more info. A lot more info. Wasn’t easy but customer service was able to tell me this:

The hardware thermostat is:
Make.: COMPUTIME
Model.: CTW218
https://mysmahome.com/product/3103/product-introduction-computime-ctw218-big-display-smart-energy-thermostat/

That makes sense @JDRoberts that if connected via zigbee that it can only be connected to one “network coordinator” which I assume is the hardware device used to talk to the thermostat I refer to as a “zigbee hub”?

The power company said it cannot be connected to Alexa but I am sure I can find a device handler or code and make it happen somehow.

Knowing now that it is zigbee does Smartthings hub even have zigbee support?

@WB70 thank you for pointing out that thread. Damn it looks like you are exact correct, since it is provided by them for free you must use their hub/gateway and it can only be paired with one at a time so this looks like a no-go.

Time to get a REAL smart thermostat fully compatible with Smartthings!

So here is my situation. I have an HVAC system with AC fan unit outside and gas powered furnace in attic. I have full access to both.

I only have ONE thermostat location and it is downstairs which I rarely go I spend most of my time upstairs for bedroom/sleep and in my home office.

However I do have sensors upstairs and downstairs that read temperature (contact sensors)/multi sensors.

My goal is to get a smart thermostat compatible with Smartthings hub that I can integrate. So that the real temperature reading would be upstairs where I am normally at.

What thermostat(s) do you guys recommend for this? I am pretty sure NEST does not have remote temperature modules but Echobee does. That is pretty much the extent I know of the compatible Smartthings thermostats any recommendations I am all ears!

Thank you!

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SmartThings does have zigbee home automation (ZHA) support as well as zwave, But the most popular thermostats that work with it are Wi-Fi: the Ecobee (Officially supported by smartthings) and nest ( no official support, but there is a community created integration which works well). (There is also a set of paid third-party code from Yves Racine that you can buy for the ecobee which give you all kinds of fancy feature options if you want to use that, some people do, some don’t.)

As it happens, nest is just introducing a new set of remote sensors that we’ve been talking about in the forum, but nobody has them yet we don’t know how well they’re going to work. The range is limited to about 40 feet, which seems short, but again we’ll just have to see.

We have the ecobee at our house and really like it, but different things will work for different people. :sunglasses:

The following is a good recent discussion on different thermostats (This is a clickable link)

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thanks for the great info! Are there any advantages to included remote temperature sensors vs just using a samsung contact/multipurpose sense that can be linked as part of the smarthome to control the thermostat>?

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You could still use the sensors and thermostat even if the ST cloud decided to take a dump, which has been happening kind of a lot lately.

Or if you ever decided to get rid of ST completely.

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how is that? Because the thermostat talks directly to the sensors via zigbee or zwave? Yea the cloud going down the other day sucked. Why cant there be both local processing and cloud processing in cases when cloud goes down?

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It’s technically possible, but it’s not how SmartThings chose to implement their platform. You can find forum discussions about it going back three or four years, but so far it hasn’t changed much.

how is that? Because the thermostat talks directly to the sensors via zigbee or zwave?

The thermostat talks directly to the same brand sensors, but not using zwave or zigbee.

Ecobee uses its own proprietary protocol:

https://support.ecobee.com/hc/en-us/articles/115006209868-How-does-the-wireless-remote-sensor-communicate-with-the-thermostat-

https://support.ecobee.com/hc/en-us/articles/115006257288-Can-I-pair-ecobee-room-sensors-with-non-ecobee-products-

The new nest sensors are going to use Bluetooth.

In both cases, the sensor is communicating directly to the thermostat.

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great points and great info thanks!

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