Problems at Nest?

[Oakey]

So Internet of st just tweeted this:



which may be of concern to Nest owners given this:

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/226020-nest-t...

Just a thought.

[Jonesy23]

Sounds about right. It's all about the hype and aiming for buyout or IPO while hoping no-one realises you're shipping a noddy £20 product with minimal features and mediocre engineering for a huge markup, and where the lifespan due to lack of support/obsolescence/hardware fault/unpatchable security flaw is so low it won't even see out the warranty.

Not sure how they have such large teams of engineers working on this stuff or burn so much cash doing it.

The only certainty is one or two people will be making some big money while it lasts.

[Tonsko]

2 reddit gold as well!

[Alucidnation]

From what i understand, is that Nest bought Revolve and are now shutting it down.

Nothing to do with Nest products?

[Mosman]

Jonesy23 said:

Sounds about right. It's all about the hype and aiming for buyout or IPO while hoping no-one realises you're shipping a noddy £20 product with minimal features and mediocre engineering for a huge markup, and where the lifespan due to lack of support/obsolescence/hardware fault/unpatchable security flaw is so low it won't even see out the warranty.

Not sure how they have such large teams of engineers working on this stuff or burn so much cash doing it.

The only certainty is one or two people will be making some big money while it lasts.

They were bought by Google in 2014 for $3.2b.

Alucidnation said:

From what i understand, is that Nest bought Revolve and are now shutting it down.

Nothing to do with Nest products?

Yes, this is a side issue.

The post from the Nest employee is referring to issues within the Nest engineering teams for their core products (thermostats/smoke alarms). He is suggesting that they are getting more revenue from their connected security camera (which they didn't develop themselves as they bought Dropcam for $500m) than from the in-house developed products.

Edited by Mosman on Thursday 7th April 08:55

[onlynik]

I wouldn't touch Nest, I'm sad that I did.

I have a Thermostat, Protect (Smoke Alarms) and I had a NestCam.

There are constant issues with the back end. Frequently I cannot connect to the Thermostat. I returned the NestCam after about 5 months as the back end went down constantly, my wife phone couldn't connect to the camera just kep coming up with the error that the camera was unavailable, yet it worked on my phone. If the Nest servers are not available, then you can't view the camera.

We are currently planning an extension, but when that happens the Nest will be replaced with a Honeywell system.

I like the Nest Protects and have not had any issues with them, I do like that they can turn the boiler off (when combined with a Nest thermostat) if they detect CO.

[Oakey]

I really like the look of the Honeywell system, You can control each radiator individually as I understand it? It's a bit pricey at about £600 but the level of control seems like it'd make it worth it

[onlynik]

Oakey said:

I really like the look of the Honeywell system, You can control each radiator individually as I understand it? It's a bit pricey at about £600 but the level of control seems like it'd make it worth it

Yeah, that's what I want. I have an old Victorian house, I need the thermostat turned up to 24 to make sure the bedrooms are at 18 degrees. Unless you live in a small flat, I couldn't recommend a Nest Thermostat, that coupled with the outages to their back end system (3 weeks in a row it was down on a Sunday, with no information and the support site still saying there were no issues, despite many people moaning on Reddit.) Compare that to my Samsung SmartThings system, it is pretty broken and the UK is essentially being used as a beta test, however, issues are logged, you can be notified via email or text, there is a better visibility of issues, it actually looks like there is some sort of change management.

So the Honeywell EVOhome will be the next investment.

[robbieduncan]

onlynik said:

Yeah, that's what I want. I have an old Victorian house, I need the thermostat turned up to 24 to make sure the bedrooms are at 18 degrees. Unless you live in a small flat, I couldn't recommend a Nest Thermostat, that coupled with the outages to their back end system (3 weeks in a row it was down on a Sunday, with no information and the support site still saying there were no issues, despite many people moaning on Reddit.) Compare that to my Samsung SmartThings system, it is pretty broken and the UK is essentially being used as a beta test, however, issues are logged, you can be notified via email or text, there is a better visibility of issues, it actually looks like there is some sort of change management.

So the Honeywell EVOhome will be the next investment.

We have a HeatMiser system in an old Victorian house. It's excellent. Requires a full re-plumb but we were having that done anyway

[Jonesy23]

Mosman said:

They were bought by Google in 2014.

So Nest got to the buyout stage. Which may be why the wheels are coming off now as they try to turn a unicorn into an actual business. Google paid some really mad money for a company without much IP, a relatively small market and an easily duplicated product line. Can you imagine if Nest had pitched on Dragons Den?

Not too impressed by most of these products at the moment, they're expensive for what you get and to work they have dependencies they dont really need which then leads to the Resolv situation.

[Oakey]

Jonesy23 said:

So Nest got to the buyout stage. Which may be why the wheels are coming off now as they try to turn a unicorn into an actual business. Google paid some really mad money for a company without much IP, a relatively small market and an easily duplicated product line. Can you imagine if Nest had pitched on Dragons Den?

Not too impressed by most of these products at the moment, they're expensive for what you get and to work they have dependencies they dont really need which then leads to the Resolv situation.

It's pretty much par the course isn't it? If you've got a Smart TV that's a few years old, a Samsung for example, look how often you get notifications telling you one app or another is being pulled. The latest is Skype for TV which is being pulled by Microsoft meaning if you bought a camera for your TV (which is usually the cams only purpose) you're fked.

[Oakey]

page3 said:

Not true as control works just fine with no internet.

Because it's on a local connection, that goes without saying. What happens if Nest goes pop, can you still control your system away from home? Can you connect directly or do you need their servers to do the routing?

[TonyToniTone]

I haven't noticed any issue's with my Nest thermostat so far..

[page3]

Oakey said:

Because it's on a local connection, that goes without saying. What happens if Nest goes pop, can you still control your system away from home? Can you connect directly or do you need their servers to do the routing?

No idea, but why would I need to? Whole idea of nest is that it learns your patterns and adjusts accordingly.

[Murph7355]

page3 said:

Oakey said:

Because it's on a local connection, that goes without saying. What happens if Nest goes pop, can you still control your system away from home? Can you connect directly or do you need their servers to do the routing?

No idea, but why would I need to? Whole idea of nest is that it learns your patterns and adjusts accordingly.

What he's asking is where does all this stored knowledge get stored? If it's learning your patterns via Nest's own computer infrastructure then if they turned that infrastructure off you may have issues - I suspect the worst that would happen is that it wouldn't evolve your usage patterns from that point on or allow control outside of the home.

tbh I wouldn't want a third party hosted system "knowing" when I was out of the house, predicting when I'd be back etc etc. That sort of information might save you £1.73 a year on your bills but I can imagine it being significantly more valuable to the light fingered fraternity and wonder what home insurance providers might say if they knew this information was stored somewhere online.

I have a bunch of Nest Protects in the house. Yes they're expensive compared to a bog standard smoke/CO alarm. But they have more functionality. They work together in the event of an alarm and speak warnings/alarms as well as just beep which I'm pretty sure is a bonus when you have young kids if mine are anything to go by (my three year old's reaction to the "lady's" was far more measured to a std beeping unit) . And while ever Nest infrastructure is up I know remotely if there's a problem. They also look nicer than standard units IMO.

I don't really see much point in "smart" thermostats/rad valves unless you have all radiators plumbed separately which the vast majority of us don't. Std TRVs and a good quality programmable timer cover a good 90% of the same functionality IMO for significantly less outlay.

Cameras that hook up to the Nest Protects might be handy...but I'm not yet convinced by Nest's.

[page3]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

Because it just doesn't happen. Nest does a whole lot more besides - outside temperature, time to temp, heat loss time etc.

If it all goes pair shaped then I'll simple fit an alternative. For now, it's excellent.

[page3]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

I'm not moving goalposts, I'm simply explaining my usage. It sits there looking nice (which is more than the usual plastic stuff does). When cold switch it up. When warm switch it down. It leans and adapts based on a number of criteria. Simple and elegant. It's hardly expensive so I don't worry about what'll happen if they go under - I'll simple move on to something else.

[Tonsko]

Interesting article from internetofst:

https://medium.com/internet-of-st/the-internet-o...

and this:

http://www.argusinsights.com/connected-home-releas...

"CONSUMER DEMAND FOR CONNECTED HOME PRODUCTS SLOWS DRAMATICALLY IN FIRST HALF OF 2015 AND CONTINUES RAPID DROP OFF"

The fact that your home thermostat (and whatever) effectively relies on a bunch of servers not falling over (or, closer to home, your internet going bang), doesn't fill me with confidence.

Edited by Tonsko on Monday 11th April 10:18

[jammy_basturd]

Smart devices solves a problem that really wasn't there for the majority of people. I'm not sure why the manufacturers were expecting us all to go out and upgrade our fridges and toasters!

[onlynik]

Tonsko said:

The fact that your home thermostat (and whatever) effectively relies on a bunch of servers not falling over (or, closer to home, your internet going bang), doesn't fill me with confidence.

The thermostat still works like a normal thermostat when there is no connection to internet/backend servers.