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Ecobee - Newbie Questions

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    Ecobee - Newbie Questions

    Greetings, everyone
    I have been a z-wave thermostat user for years, going back to HS2 and Wi-Fi Thermostat (the first one!) prior to z-wave ones. I currently have two RCS TZ45 thermostats. Very expensive, minimal features, and they constantly drop off my network, which drives me crazy! Deleting them from HS3 and adding again solves the problem, but you have to be home to do that!

    Anyway, in researching alternatives, I found out that no progress has been made on the z-wave thermostat front over the last few years. I mean, none at all. Same companies, same products, same issues.

    This is where I came across Ecobee. I am naturally very biased against Wi-Fi thermostats. The one I mentioned, used several years ago, relied exclusively on cloud connectivity. One fine day, when I was in Europe, that connectivity had a glitch that lasted several days. I had a blown frozen water pipe, as a result of an idiotic plumbing (too close to outer wall) and of my automation choices.

    So, I am trying very carefully to stay away from devices that can not be remotely controlled via HomeSeer's HS3 Touch. That is, those that must have cloud connectivity to be controlled. With HS, even if myhomeseer.com is down, I can connect directly to my house and still control the system.

    Is Ecobee one of those thermostats that must be connected to the cloud to be controlled remotely? What are your BAD experiences and lessons learned? What do you recommend to a hardcore z-wave user, who has an entire house filled with z-wave and z-wave plus devices (over 150 or more?)

    Does this plugin work with Ecobee 4?

    Thank you, in advance.

    #2
    I too am disappointed with the state of thermostats. The Z-Wave stats I tried were terrible and unreliable. The WiFi (Radio Thermostat) were even worse, such that I abandoned them. I have Honeywell WiFi thermostats now in the Florida house, which I bought because they were relatively inexpensive and I just needed a solution for a year or so until I sold the house.

    In my new house in Texas I put an Ecobee 3, simply because I couldn't find anything at all that I liked. The Ecobee has to be cloud connected in order to remotely control it, and that's a real drawback. I do like the occupancy sensing and the touch control though. Ultimately I will probably end up with something else, but for the time being I'm okay with my compromise solution. It does still have local home/away and auto setpoints, so if it disconnects from the cloud it will still run its program locally.
    HS Pro 3.0 | Linux Ubuntu 16.04 x64 virtualized under Proxmox (KVM)
    Hardware: Z-NET - W800 Serial - Digi PortServer TS/8 and TS/16 serial to Ethernet - Insteon PLM - RFXCOM - X10 Wireless
    Plugins: HSTouch iOS and Android, RFXCOM, BlueIris, BLLock, BLDSC, BLRF, Insteon PLM (MNSandler), Device History, Ecobee, BLRing, Kodi, UltraWeatherWU3
    Second home: Zee S2 with Z-Wave, CT101 Z-Wave Thermostat, Aeotec Z-Wave microswitches, HSM200 occupancy sensor, Ecolink Z-Wave door sensors, STI Driveway Monitor interfaced to Zee S2 GPIO pins.

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      #3
      I guess I must have been lucky with my thermostat choices. I started in HS2 with a RCS TXB16 X-10 thermostat which worked very well with Jim Doolittle's plugin. Then a month before upgrading to HS3, I switched to a Trane XL624 Z-wave which worked on HS2 without issue. Today, running with the same stat on HS3. It's 100% reliable.. I have an issue with using cloud based devices. I also considered the Ecobee as well as the Nest, but wanted to keep things local and therefore went with Z-wave.

      Robert
      HS3PRO 3.0.0.500 as a Fire Daemon service, Windows 2016 Server Std Intel Core i5 PC HTPC Slim SFF 4GB, 120GB SSD drive, WLG800, RFXCom, TI103,NetCam, UltraNetcam3, BLBackup, CurrentCost 3P Rain8Net, MCsSprinker, HSTouch, Ademco Security plugin/AD2USB, JowiHue, various Oregon Scientific temp/humidity sensors, Z-Net, Zsmoke, Aeron Labs micro switches, Amazon Echo Dots, WS+, WD+ ... on and on.

      Comment


        #4
        Guys,
        Thank you both for fast replies. My experience with the RadsioThermostat, as previously described, has been horrible. Moreover, I have yet to encounter a cloud that is more reliable and has a better uptime than my direct connection to my house via my own domain. As such, Ecobee is immediately out of the question. I must be able to control the stat remotely, via HS3, even if the cloud is down. So, with absolutely every connection down, including my own domain, i can remote into my HomeSeer PC and set change things there. But not via the cloud-only solution.

        Comment


          #5
          https://www.sinopetech.com/en/boutiq...-programmable/

          They can be controlled from the cloud using the Nevieweb interface, and they can be controlled with a local connection via Homeseer using the Sinope plugin which use their local API.

          Comment


            #6
            Originally posted by spud View Post
            https://www.sinopetech.com/en/boutiq...-programmable/

            They can be controlled from the cloud using the Nevieweb interface, and they can be controlled with a local connection via Homeseer using the Sinope plugin which use their local API.
            Unfortunately, this thermostat by Sinope technology only works for heating. No AC support

            Comment


              #7
              Originally posted by VirtualPanther View Post
              Guys,
              Thank you both for fast replies. My experience with the RadsioThermostat, as previously described, has been horrible. Moreover, I have yet to encounter a cloud that is more reliable and has a better uptime than my direct connection to my house via my own domain. As such, Ecobee is immediately out of the question. I must be able to control the stat remotely, via HS3, even if the cloud is down. So, with absolutely every connection down, including my own domain, i can remote into my HomeSeer PC and set change things there. But not via the cloud-only solution.
              I am a noob looking at thermostat options as well. I was considering the GoControl in the HS store here. I may be missing something, but this does not seem to involve a cloud service at all and is zwave. I was thinking about the Ecobee too, but I have plenty of motion sensors and would only need to supplement a simple zwave thermostat with temperature sensors and logic. As I mentioned I'm most likely missing something obvious that would rule out a device like this, just not sure what it is.

              Comment


                #8
                Originally posted by Tyborg View Post
                I am a noob looking at thermostat options as well. I was considering the GoControl in the HS store here. I may be missing something, but this does not seem to involve a cloud service at all and is zwave. I was thinking about the Ecobee too, but I have plenty of motion sensors and would only need to supplement a simple zwave thermostat with temperature sensors and logic. As I mentioned I'm most likely missing something obvious that would rule out a device like this, just not sure what it is.

                Comment


                  #9
                  The Ecobee is the first cloud thermostat I've used, as I've had good luck with the Zwave thermostats in my home. However, the ability to have multiple temperature sensors outweighed my cloud skepticism. I've had a good experience with Ecobee and this plug-in, and I would recommend both. And the Ecobee continues to run its program setup without connectivity in case WiFi is out.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Originally posted by spud View Post
                    https://www.sinopetech.com/en/boutiq...-programmable/

                    They can be controlled from the cloud using the Nevieweb interface, and they can be controlled with a local connection via Homeseer using the Sinope plugin which use their local API.
                    Venstar has a local API - but I haven't found anyone taking advantage of it. The Venstar app requires cloud connection and there's no local interface other than the API. So close and yet....

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