Which nest to get?

[markstanco 12642]

Heat pump/ac unit. There are some choices it seems, suggestions? 3rd gen?

 

I dont care about learning, I want to be able to set a temp with my phone and multiple people to do the same(lake property).

[texasjacket 289]

Just get the learning one and stop being a poor

[Gene Parmesan 4016]

Interested in the nest thermostats as well.  We have two units though, so I suppose I'd have to get two and that makes me hesitant.  We have a $200 gift card to Nebraska Furniture Mart so that would help.  I basically just set my thermostats to a hold temp and don't touch them until seasons change, so I am not sure how much they'd learn from my temp habits.

[dcbc 14566]

Honeywell with Automatic Change Over. Cheap. Easy to use. Works with Google Home.

[William_Cannon 86]

Ecobee 4 with additional room sensors FTW

[Captain Ron 12936]

As a former Nest owner - don't get one. It's crap. It's pretty, but it's crap.

I've had the Ecobee 3 for a few months now and been super happy with it. The backend data that Ecobee provides blows away what the Nest gives you.

[Gene Parmesan 4016]

Crap because it doesn't do as advertised, or crap because Ecobee is superior?

[Captain Ron 12936]

Crap because the Ecobee is superior.

However, here is a quick & dirty review comparing the two.

What do they both do? Both are pretty spot on when it comes to being smart. They figure out your schedule and can do that really well.

Where is Nest better? Looks and UI. It's just easier to navigate and just looks so nice on your wall.

Where is Ecobee better? Just about everything else. The 3 big ones for me are
1) The Ecobee has a hold feature, Nest doesn't. This is just about inexcusable in the Nest case. You want your temp at 72? Set it at 72, the Ecobee will hold it until you disable it (there is a setting for how this behaves), Nest will hold it until the next time period, then turn off. It's a pretty basic feature, Nest should have it.
2) Room sensors. The Ecobee ones are 100x better. The reviews of the new Nest ones I have read all agree, they are very gimpy. The Ecobee ones can do a follow me setting making the rooms you are in the temp you want.
3) The data you get back from Ecobee. All Nest tells you is the run time for the day and gives you "leaves". Ecobee shows you temp profiles of your house.
(Images spoilered for space)

Spoiler

Nest:

 

 

Ecobee:

 

I mean getting to see when your heating or AC are on is great. You get a real feel for how long your house takes to warm up (I live in Boston, it's kind of cold here right now). Quick key on this: Blue Line - desired AC temp, Orange Line - desired heater temp, White Line - Temp of house, Green Line - Temp outside.
So when my heater kicks on for a 7:30 "wakeup", it takes almost 3 hours to get there. That 2nd bump is when the sensors noticed I was home and kicked on a little while longer. 3rd bump is being home at night. I just think this data is a hell of a lot more useful than 7 1/4 run time - LEAF!

Maybe this is above and beyond what you want, but for me, this is exactly what I want. When I had the Nest (before I moved) I was planning on implementing this to get the data. Now I don't have to.

And this doesn't even get me started on how Nest was owned by Google for so many years and release no new products until their "security system" (everything they put out was an acquisition or a new version of something they already made).

Edited January 18, 2019 by Captain Ron

[Noah Fence 480]

I have the ecobee 4, and love it.  My AC guy told me the Nests are pieces of shit and that he is constantly hearing complaints about them disconnecting from wifi, which pretty much negates its usefulness.

[luke duke 6420]

Ecobee also plays nicely with Griddy and IFTTT.

I can shut down the A/C for a period of time during electricity price spikes. I get an alert when one of the kids or the cleaning lady manually overrides the program.

[Soldierhorn 206]

29 minutes ago, luke duke said:

 the cleaning lady manually overrides the program.

"the cleaning lady" is what I use to call my ex-wife as well (and I emphasize EX-)

[HouTex 1900]

I just installed a Sensi (Emerson) wifi thermostat and it works great.  Only took about 20 minutes to install and it works perfectly through the iPhone app as well as through Alexa.  It was only $90 on Amazon.  I like the physical up and down buttons on the right of unit that allow you to override the program schedule until the next scheduled temp.

[YChang 3472]

On 1/18/2019 at 1:58 PM, Noah Fence said:

I have the ecobee 4, and love it.  My AC guy told me the Nests are pieces of shit and that he is constantly hearing complaints about them disconnecting from wifi, which pretty much negates its usefulness.

I wonder if it's because people are installing Nests incorrectly. My AC guy went off on a rant too about Nests failing because of faulty installations.  I really like my Ecobee 4 as well. 

[Updawg 2295]

Another vote for the ecobee. Had to get a new as ac and chose the ecobee over a nestI added two sensors as well.

[Chewbacca 7789]

On 1/17/2019 at 8:58 PM, William_Cannon said:

Ecobee 4 with additional room sensors FTW

I'm a big fan of my Ecobee.

[milkman 428]

Just buy an Ecobee and be done. I can’t count how many Nests I’ve had to replace over the past few years.

[Prepuce of Doom 21112]

Our new house had a Nest installed. We hate it (probably partly us, probably partly because it's a device that thinks it's a lot smarter than it is) and are replacing it with an average Honeywell as soon as I get around to it. 

[Buzzrock 15023]

Gotta say I wasn’t thrilled with my Nests either. I disabled the learning because they seemed to lose their minds.

Check with your power company, mine offers discounts on all the major brands. I may out Ecobee in the new house.