Hi,
I’ve been wanting to switch to a smart thermostat for quite some time now. I disabled due to a rare genetic disorder and this includes a medical condition where my body can’t regulates it’s temperature properly. So, the ability to have routines where a thermostat automatically changes temperature, plus the ability to change the temp when I need to from a smartphone will both be really helpful. I finally found out that our apartment heating system is 24v & will work with most smart thermostats. But I don’t want to go to the trouble of l installing only find out that the thermostat I chose won’t do what I need it to. So this isn’t the usual “which thermostat is best” comparison, I need help from folks who have actually used a thermostat with SmartThings because some interactive features just aren’t listed anywhere.
One thing I really want to be able to do is to change the temperature by voice for a short time and then have the thermostat return to previous “program”. For instance, I suddenly get too cold & I want to be able to tell Google Home to turn up the heat 4 degrees for 30 minutes. It goes from 67 to 71 for 30 minutes before return back to 67. I realize that may not be possible directly but might need a SmartThings routine or something similar that could be triggered by voice. Is this something that either (or both) Nest or Ecobee can do?
Secondly, we live in a smallish 2br apartment. The thermostat is right smack in the middle of the apartment. How important would separate sensors be for this situation? Will they make a huge difference? With me having no experience with a smart thermostat I can’t even make an educated guess. Can Ecobee be told to ignore sensors if needed? I’m concerned that if I were to want to make our bedroom cooler in the evening (we often leave a window cracked open all winter so I can sleep at night) it could be weird if we use the extra sensors - it might work against us. Conversely, from what I’ve read, it appears that Nest can integrate with ST via NST community interface. It also looks like Nest can use existing sensors as remote temp sensors via the integration. However it also appears that this uses Rule Machine but when I went to the thread discussing Rule Machine to learn more, it said that it was pulled and no longer available at all. So, I’m wondering, is it still possible to use remote sensors with Nest via NST and if so, is there a workaround for the now defunct Rule Machine?
I’m really having trouble deciding on which thermostat will work best for us. I have no interest at all in the Alexa integration (in fact, I’d want to turn it to privacy mode as we switched from Amazon Echos/Alexa to Google Home last year and haven’t looked back… And I don’t really need both companies listening in ). Having said that, I can easily keep it in privacy mode of it the better thermostat. I also like the AI learned feature of Nest, which might make easier to setup for more complex schedules. However, I also wonder if having to boost or drop the temps for short times periodically might be hard for the AI algorithm & have it end up always wanting to do that in trying to learn my needs (now, if it found it actually finds a pattern and I’m always for hot at 3pm, I guess that would be great but I don’t necessarily want it to just start bumping up the temp daily at that time). I equally like & worry about the temp sensors on Ecobee & don’t know if they would help me be more comfortable or make things worse if they can’t be ignored (if I find it’s problematic). I suppose I could also find they help given there are no heaters near the thermostat & that could cause overheating in winter. I’m also curious as to how the Nests can integrate with sensors via ST and how complex it is to setup for Nest to use them as I’m hoping to. I have two Aeon sensors for motion/temp/humidity, plus two multi-purpose ST sensors that also give temperature. I’ll probably be adding more fairly soon too, so that’s already quite a few of potential temp sensors that I have now. I did some additional & it appears that Ecobee can also use these sensors.
Do both Nest & Ecobee use “predictive” controls factoring in coming weather? I thought I read that one or both of them did this.
I’m also open to any other smart thermostat if these won’t do what I need. Overall user reviews strongly favor Nest rather than Ecobee, which kind of surprises me given how much “pro reviews” love the Ecobee4. Nest runs at 4.6 out of 16.5k reviews on Amazon and 4.8 out of 5k reviews on Best Buy vs Ecobee4 at 4.5 out of less than 300 reviews on Best Buy and 4.1 out of 500 reviews on Amazon. IF the Ecobee3 package is still available at Costco B&M that may also be an option sinces the built in Alexa integration the primary difference in Ecobee4 vs 3 (at least, that’s what my research has shown with all of the connections and HA protocols being the same). If anyone could offer their thoughts and experiences on how these integrate with ST and which one could most easily do what I want it to, I would really be grateful. As I said, it’s very difficult to get real info on how these work with ST without actually asking users.
Thanks so much in advance! looking forward to hearing your thoughts.