What smart Z-wave or Zigbee thermostat do you have and do you recommend it? We were gifted a 3rd Gen Nest Thermostat a few years ago but out of the box, it won’t hold a charge. I bought a replacement battery, but if this doesn’t work, we will have to get something else. I feel terrible that the people working at our home are working without AC on so I’d like to have plan B ready.
Assuming you’d want to use Hubitat (or any other multiprotocol hub like it), the dumber the “smart” thermostat, the better, IMHO.
I have several Centralite Pearl thermostats, which use zigbee.
They’re nothing special with respect to thermostat stuff. As smart thermostats go, they’re inexpensive.
But because I can control them with the hub, they’re being used pretty creatively to control my steam boiler (for heat in the winter), as well as a bunch of mini-split A/Cs (for cooling and some heat in shoulder seasons).
Nest or other super smart thermostats like Ecobee can do pretty fancy stuff, but can open you up to the cloud, which is a double edged sword.
Any zigbee or z-wave thermostat you can find at a reasonable price and you can stand the look of (the Pearl is kinda chunky and plain looking), should get the job done for you if you use Hubitat to control it.
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Ecobee may have 100% local control (no clouds at all) but this requires HomeKit controller. The easiest way to integrate it with HE is to use Home Assistant plus Home Assistant Device Bridge.
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If you were looking for an electric baseboard or floor heater, I would recommend Sinopé. I’ve had them for a while now and really like them.
Looks like you have some good recommendations for central heating (low voltage) options.
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How do people feel about the Honeywell T6 Pro Z-Wave?
OK sure, but what’s the advantage of using an Ecobee for you?
Setting up home assistant, then integrating home assistant with Hubitat is possible. But it’s a chore and it adds complexity. What makes Ecobee worth it?
@rlithgow1 likes his.
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Honestly, all I really need is auto fan & auto mode and the ability to set 2 set points and have it work with temp sensors. I will likely have weekday vs weekend rules. On workdays, we spend time mostly in the basement, which keeps pretty cool even in the summer, so I'll probably have the rule look at the basement temp sensor on those days between 8:30 AM and 5 PM, then look at its own internal temp sensor (it will be located upstairs in our living room) during the other hours. Can the Centralite Pearl thermostats do this? Kinda loving the $30 price tag on these.
Also, I'm curious how you're doing this btw. We are planning on just having several mini-splits at our guest house and wasn't sure how to do this.
Admittedly it was a PITA to setup, but I have Fujitsu units and they make an add-on adapter device that can connect to standard thermostat wiring terminals.
Not sure if other major brands have a similar adapter device. But a more common way others control mini-splits is to use an IR blaster like Broadlink, which integrates with Hubitat.
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Oh sweet! I have an extra Bond Bridge that I may be able to use. Thanks for the tip!
My AC is a fancoil system with 3 speeds fan motor. Ecobee is a perfect fit for this system.
Thanks to Home Assistant I was able to get rid of many cloud based integration. The result is near 100% local control. The HA plus HADB is used to bring many devices to HE otherwise not directly compatible with HE.
Like @marktheknife I use a module to bring in standard thermostats for my mini splits. I have LG though on my 3rd floor. Regular forced air for 1 & 2
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I believe the only plus for ecobee is the ability to have a "native" wireless remote sensor. IMHO the benefit of a natively connected remote sensor is in how the thermostat acts dynamically. The old mechanical thermostats used a mechanical "anticipator" that turned off the heat before the thermostat was satisfied, expecting the lag from (in my case) the baseboard heat. Digital thermostats use a cycle per hour type of controlled. Basically this is a very slow PWM. I've not convinced myself simply controlling the thermostat remotely will accomplish the same.
As for Nest, I have no idea why anyone would pay for such a system. There is no way in hell this thermostat can "learn" your routine better than a simple Hubitat rule. And any potential "savings" by "smart" control, if it actually exists would be pennies a month. But from what I've read, you do get a host of recurring issues.
Currently I have Honeywell T6 Pro. I like them because there are not WiFi (Z-Wave or Zigbee are the best, the T6 is Z-Wave) . I have a lot of respect for the Honeywell control capability, garnered of many years of Honeywell controllers, stating a the old round mechanical thermostats.
I’m not 100% sure. With Hubitat you can setup a thermostat controller app that can make it possible to use remote temp sensors with a thermostat not designed to make use of them.
But I’m not sure about enabling and disabling that based on time of day, reverting to the thermostat’s built-in thermometer at times the controller app is disabled.
In my case the Thermostat itself is located in a worst imaginable place. Yes, I am using 5 Ecobee temp sensors placed in a strategic places. Thermostat itself is out of equation. By observing how Ecobee works it looks like some sort of PID loop is in place.
I think the Nest is a decent option for someone who doesn’t want to do any of the work in creating rules or even knows what a Hubitat is. It’s more for the average consumer, who has no interest in doing what we do here and just wants a “plug-n-play”. My FIL that gave it to us is this way. His intentions were good 
So, I’d like to make use of it if I can although I know I could get more flexibility with a Honeywell or Centralite.
While I won't recommend the Nest thermostats since the Google subsumption of them, In my pre Hubitat days the Nests were awesome. Like them or loathe them today, when they were introduced, they and Ecobee were really the only "Smart" thermostats on the market. While Ecobee certainly deserves credit for being "first" IMO Nest really "popularized" them.
Today...well Ecobee is certainly truer to its original principles.
And Nest...well.
That aside, my Nest Thermostats have been uber reliable. They "Just Work".
Having said that, the HVAC companies have managed to make Nest (and Ecobee) near useless with multi-stage, variable speed, sysrems with humidifiers and other add-ons. So when seeking a Smart Thermostat, do your research, and make Certain your selection will work with your system.
American Standard/Trane sells a Zwave Thermostat, Platinum 850i or something, and its near useless.
Good luck!
S
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What driver do you use for the Centralite? I could play around with a virtual device using that driver and know if it can be done.
