Best Wifi enabled thermostat

[Harry Flashman]

guindilias said:

Bad batch of children, Harry?

Jury's still out, and will be for decades...

[Harry Flashman]

Jobbo said:

richatnort said:

What do people think to having one on a towel rad in a bathroom? I've done it but i'm thinking the moisture of accidental water splashing is going to ruin it.

I've had HR92s on the radiator in one bathroom and the towel rail rad in another for about 3 years and they've been exactly as reliable as the others in the house - that is, 100%. I think the only reason to avoid them is that they're a bit obtrusive against a nice sleek chrome towel rail.

Same here. They work just fine there, but look a bit gash.

[Watchman]

Jambo85 said:

Has anyone dabbled with the new-ish hardware from heatmiser? Eg. the window/door switches. Quite smart, my porch thermostat clicks on every time I open the door for more than about 30 seconds so ordered one to try out. Works pretty well! Don't know what the payback time will be though, possibly never!

I have Heatmiser thermostats - two zones with one of them right opposite the front door. What do you use the door switch for?

I also have electric UFH in the kitchen and dining room but we haven't switched it on for a couple of years because it was fantastically expensive to run (I told her it would be).

I also converted the HW to Heatmiser. Overall I'd say it's been a great success. We have more control and it's never let us down.

[33q]

What do people think to having one on a towel rad in a bathroom? I've done it but i'm thinking the moisture of accidental water splashing is going to ruin it.
[/quote]

I have Hive one's in the bathroom, ensuite and although they are not as neat as a chrome one I think they look OK. No problems with them working or splashes etc.

I did think of painting the tops with chrome paint.

[Mattt]

Are the towel rads on the CH circuit? Ours in the last 2 houses have been on HW circuit.

[Oakey]

Harry Flashman said:

Apart from mi child ripping the display off one, they've been fine. Bad batch?

I solved this by taping mine down

[Mr Pointy]

Oakey said:

Harry Flashman said:

Apart from mi child ripping the display off one, they've been fine. Bad batch?

I solved this by taping mine down

The child or the TRV?

[robbieduncan]

33q said:

What do people think to having one on a towel rad in a bathroom? I've done it but i'm thinking the moisture of accidental water splashing is going to ruin it.

I have Hive one's in the bathroom, ensuite and although they are not as neat as a chrome one I think they look OK. No problems with them working or splashes etc.

I did think of painting the tops with chrome paint.

We have a couple of EvoHome TRVs on towel rads (and a couple of towel rads that have no TRVs at all). They have been in place for at least a year with no issues from moisture.

[essayer]

Oakey said:

I solved this by taping mine down

All of mine face the walls!

[TimmyMallett]

essayer said:

All of mine face the walls!

Blair Witch?


I have a question and I have googled it honest, but if I get a Nest thermostat, will that replace both the boiler program unit as well?

In my current house I have a stat in the hall that takes the weekly on/off program from the unit on the boiler. When I looked at the latest Nest, it does clever stuff like learn your temperature model, but does it allow you to also program the heating on/off timings? Also, ref geofencing, I'm assuming it needs to connect to your wifi at home to enable it to tun off when you come home (does that work off you actually coming home or does the app allow you to geofence an area 30 ins from home for example?)

Edited by TimmyMallett on Thursday 1st October 11:16

[number2]

Re. NEST.

The app on the phone connects from anywhere with data, so any wifi or 3G, 4G etc. so yo ucan adjust programming from anywhere.

The wall thermostat was replaced with the NEST thermostat and the other NEST thing was put in the cupboard with the hot water cylinder. The timer next to the system boiler was removed.

I don't think it has geo-fencing, it just recognises when you haven't been passed the thermostat for x hours and goes into eco mode. Can be turned off.

Don't like the learning thing - before lockdown life was more variable so it didn't work for me, and now, what's the point.

I just use the timers and 'radiant heating' which turns the heating on so the rooms are up to temp by the time you set.

Thought about one of the systems posters above talk about but decided it wasn't worth the b*ll ache for us. I don't like the idea of wasting energy but I doubt it's much.

[paulrockliffe]

Don't understand why you would buy any of them if they don't have Geolocation. I've never looked at the alternatives as I bought Tado when it first came out, so I'm surprised Nest doesn't have geolocation, it's the difference between it being able to have the heat on when you need it and just pissing in the wind.

Though you're right with working from home, it's less important. Think I managed 2 hours in Away mode last month. It's not as big a waste of money as the burglar alarm though!

Does Nest really just guess when you'll be at home? That can't be right surely? If one company knew when you were at home or not it's Google!

[number2]

paulrockliffe said:

Don't understand why you would buy any of them if they don't have Geolocation. I've never looked at the alternatives as I bought Tado when it first came out, so I'm surprised Nest doesn't have geolocation, it's the difference between it being able to have the heat on when you need it and just pissing in the wind.

Though you're right with working from home, it's less important. Think I managed 2 hours in Away mode last month. It's not as big a waste of money as the burglar alarm though!

Does Nest really just guess when you'll be at home? That can't be right surely? If one company knew when you were at home or not it's Google!

Not sure geo-location is that important, for me at least. I know when I'm coming home so it's either set to come on or I turn it on/adjust settings from my phone. If there was geo-location, how would it know how long it was going to take you to get home, and pre-heat accordingly?

NEST will go into eco if it senses no movement for x hours so this saves heating being left on. It's smart enough for me .

[paralla]

number2 said:

Not sure geo-location is that important, for me at least. I know when I'm coming home so it's either set to come on or I turn it on/adjust settings from my phone. If there was geo-location, how would it know how long it was going to take you to get home, and pre-heat accordingly?

The Tado algorithm uses your location, the inside temperature, the outside temperature, the setpoint and the information it's learned from the rate of rise and decay of the temperature in your house to determine the heating capacity and insulation effectiveness to determine the most efficient heating strategy that has the temperature desired when you arrive home.

In my opinion it's a far better way to heat your home to your desired temperature using near to real time inputs rather than historical data of when you walked past a sensor on the front of your thermostat.

[number2]

paralla said:

number2 said:

Not sure geo-location is that important, for me at least. I know when I'm coming home so it's either set to come on or I turn it on/adjust settings from my phone. If there was geo-location, how would it know how long it was going to take you to get home, and pre-heat accordingly?

The Tado algorithm uses your location, the inside temperature, the outside temperature, the setpoint and the information it's learned from the rate of rise and decay of the temperature in your house to determine the heating capacity and insulation effectiveness to determine the most efficient heating strategy that has the temperature desired when you arrive home.

In my opinion it's a far better way to heat your home to your desired temperature using near to real time inputs rather than historical data of when you walked past a sensor on the front of your thermostat.

That's what NEST does. You need to tell it what time you want the temp to be at.

Does Tado know how long it's going to take you to get home from any given location, and then adjust the time it turns the heating on based on this information in addition to the rest?

edit: just looked it up and it doesn't - it sends a notification. The radiator thermostats look pretty cool though

Edited by number2 on Thursday 1st October 16:58

[paralla]

number2 said:

That's what NEST does. You need to tell it what time you want the temp to be at.

Does Tado know how long it's going to take you to get home from any given location, and then adjust the time it turns the heating on based on this information in addition to the rest?

Yes it does. Tado uses the location of all the smartpnones registered on the account to determine when you are at home. Nest uses a motion detector on the front of the thermostat.

Tado can see you are on your way home and turn the heat on earlier if it's a particularly cold day, if it was warmer but heat was still required to get your house to the set point it would come on when you were slightly nearer to home. Nest would do whatever it did yesterday or what it had "learned" that your heat requirements had historically been.

If everybody leaves our flat Tado see's that and will turn the heat off immediately. Systems that don't have geolocation don't do that.

Edited by paralla on Thursday 1st October 17:01

[number2]

paralla said:

number2 said:

That's what NEST does. You need to tell it what time you want the temp to be at.

Does Tado know how long it's going to take you to get home from any given location, and then adjust the time it turns the heating on based on this information in addition to the rest?

Yes it does. Tado uses the location of all the smartpnones registered on the account to determine when you are at home. Nest uses a motion detector on the front of the thermostat.

Tado can see you are on your way home and turn the heat on earlier if it's a particularly cold day, if it was warmer but heat was still required to get your house to the set point it would come on when you were slightly nearer to home. Nest would do whatever it did yesterday or what it had "learned" that your heat requirements had historically been.

I came on to answer a question about NEST. I'm sure Tado is a superior system, I'm not presenting a case that it isn't.

NEST doesn't geo locate and that doesn't impact me, notwithstanding the current situation .

I do have real wood floors though, so cut me some slack .

[paralla]

number2 said:

I do have real wood floors though, so cut me some slack .

Bravo on the real wood floors, I'm sure they are lovely.

[C2Red]

Quick Q.

I’m keen to do his and integrate into home assistant, or SmartThings, but one thing I’ve searched for and not been able to find a definitive answer to is.
The thermostat just controls the room temp, and then shuts off he boiler; now on my Vaillant boiler , there’s a Vsmart system that looks ok, but it’s only a stat, not a programmer, it’s supposed to do hot water as well, but how on earth does it swing the 3 port to change from rads to hot water cylinder heating.

Clueless would like some help please.

[33q]

Mattt said:

Are the towel rads on the CH circuit? Ours in the last 2 houses have been on HW circuit.

My bathroom rads come on with either hot water or central heating.