Smart Home- what to package? What talks to each other?

CasterTroy said:
Nope...but any good hacker can see yours if you go that route and they choose to pursue it.

Anything YOU can see from your phone can be seen by anyone with the fortitude to attempt it. Remember, "the cloud" is simply someone ELSE'S computer/server
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I already assume Anonymous is watching me though my TV and laptop camera.
 
ManglerYJ said:
Reminds me.... a buddy of mine does IT for a large car dealership network. They installed programmable thermostats in all of the buildings so that he could monitor them remotely. He set them to the exact temperature that they buildings were prior on the Honeywell manual thermostats. All the sudden he gets a bunch of service tickets from women that say it's too cold or too hot. He checks and verifies that the digital therms are working properly and auxiliary temp sensors verify. He keeps getting service tickets from the same women day after day. He finally goes back to those offices, pulls the Honeywell manual therms out of his scrap drawer and sticks up them to the wall with double faced tape. The women just walk over to the thermostat and adjust them. No more service tickets now that they have a dummy thermostat to adjust when they feel cold or hot.
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We did this a couple of times at my last gig...lady sales people. Worked everytime...
 
REDLYNER said:
I am assuming it will be a byproduct of the equipment being installed
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That's why I mentioned it. it's not the "savings" that it advertises. K.I.S.S.

I've watched many a building systems run right into the ground because owners and/or maint departments thought they knew more than they actually did.


rockcity said:
Me neither. But I am usually the one they call to figure out the things the engineers can't. ;)
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There are a whole bunch of arrogant engineers that are simply educated idiots. I'm not ashamed to admit I was one of them for a long time. I actually left the engineering field and went into contracting 10 years after college because I was tired of being told at job meetings "that won't work" and being lumped into the "dumbass engineer's" pile. After 4 years of digging ditches, bending sheetmetal, and sweating piping, I gained a whole new perspective/respect. Came back and looked at design in a whole new light.

Still, I don't claim to know everything, but in my 22 years I've seen what works and what does not. Like with anything, knowledge and wisdom are gained moreso by figuring out what DOESN'T work.
 
braxton357 said:
but the logic of leaving the heat on all day in even a moderately well insulated house is the same logic used by people that spout the "leaving florescent bulbs on uses less energy than turning them on and off". It's been disproven time and again.
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The fluorescent bulb thing is nothing like the same logic, as that's just a myth that was propagated by people who have no idea how electricity (or math?) actually works. The temperature setpoint argument is really not nearly as clearcut.

Here's an example: We have identical houses, next door from each other. They're both at 70 degF, all day long. I decide I want to save energy, so I lower the indoor temp to 65 degF, and keep it there continuously. You decide you want to save energy also, so you keep it at 70degF but lower the indoor temp to 60 degF for 8 hours each day.

Who saves more energy? I do, and I'm doing it without even using a temperature setback. I left the heat on all day.
My energy bill is lower than yours and I'm not using the logically superior method; I just made the conditions different at my house. You don't automatically get better energy savings than me just because you used a setback and I didn't.

I'm just trying to point something out about logic and blanket assumptions related to things like this.

Yes, the studies seem to prove that setbacks work at least partially, provided you have a normal house with a standard type of HVAC system that is normally sized, a thermostat that has a PID ramp if you have a heat pump (so emergency heat is not engaged to raise the temp fast), climate zone, etc. Once you do non-standard things like making a well insulated house, use mini splits, different types of heating, have time of use utility billing, etc., any/all of those things can make savings get chipped away at or disappear completely. Yes, there are situations where setbacks aren't better. You're just sliding around the conditions where energy loss and energy consumption costs balance each other out (or not).
 
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Well I suppose the temp argument would vary case by case, being some homes are better insulated and have more efficient hvac systems than others. Deciding factor is the temperature Delta and energy required to make that change happen compared to maintaining a constant temp. It does definitely without a doubt stress the system more to let it swing more temperature.. if you're leaving for a week, yeah you'll save some money/energy but for 8 hours, I don't think there would be enough energy conserved to be worth it. In heat pump/ac systems not using it lets the seals dry out and oil settle out of suspension, which would promote wear and leaks..
 
awheelterd said:
I had a German Electrical Engineer on site today as a matter of fact. He was a cheeky fukker
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Lol.

I ran in to some last week when it snowed. We were in the grocery store stocking up in essentials (beer). I was buying PBR, Stella and some IPA, they were buying Colt 45 40's and speaking German talking about getting drunk and laughing at how stupid Americans can't work when it snows more than 1/2".

I secretly hoped they had a terrible hangover from that Colt 45. :lol: Damn arrogant Germans.


Maybe that's where I get my arrogance from. :lol: I am half German...
 
Y'all don't know the half of working with German engineers. I live it every day. They come up with more alternative facts than all of Washington. Mostly it ends up being done their way in our current design, and then magically the next design has American ingenuity integrated and patented in to it, by the Germans of course. But no worries, they overcomplicate it to the point that it's bound to fail and impossible to service.

What was this thread about? Oh yeah, don't buy a German thermostat. It will do really neat stuff until it breaks, at which point it will be impossible to fix.
 
I went all Amazon/Alexa. Seems like since JB is now the richest man in the world and Amazon will most likely rule our country down the road, it’s a safe bet.
 
shawn said:
Be prepared for a bunch of shit that doesn't work, then does, then doesn't, then gets a firmware update and does again, then gets discontinued by the manufacturer and quits completely, etc.

I mean, Nest bought competitors and then shut down their products.

I've been round and round on this stuff, and basically dropped a bunch of money on a bunch of gimmicky shit that doesn't do what it's supposed to do.
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This to me is the biggest thing to consider. I know for the OP, the train has probably left the station already if Wife is at the helm, but its the thing everybody overlooks on 90% of fancy "smart" things these days.
There are several things to consider here.
- Smart stuff is great until it fails and leaves you with no control and little way to diagnose or fix it. I have a freind wit ha Nest who came home from vacation to find his house at 90+ degrees and had been that way for days, all his plants were dying and every candle and soft thing in the house had melted. Why? Nest rebooted and freaked out. His energy bill was huge. Another buddy had his take an update in the middle of winter and his heat stop working, he couldn't get the thing to kick it on. He had to rip it out and put in a $30 stat to keep his family warm.
I'm not saying not to trust new technology, or "just use old proven stuff", but you have to consider the potential cost of failure and how difficult it might be to deal with. "Smart things" rarely have modes where you can manually override them.

- Maybe I'm the paranoid guy but you have to consider what the companies have to gain here. Why are these things so cheap? The big market now is information. Why is Google's parent company now running Nest? Why does Amazon want in your home so badly? Because they are tracking everything and selling anything they can about you and your habits to 3rd parties. Don't trust Google or Amazon? Fine, you can avoid them, there are other smart devices... but oh wait, almost all devices require operating through their company's cloud or at least calling "home" occasionally. What are they doing with that info? Any widget that you can check with your cell phone away from home, aside from the security concerns, means that information - whatever you're getting on your phone - is being routed through somebody's server. What happens to it? Who knows.

- any device that requires routing throu gha 3rd party to work (which is a lot of them), consider what happens if/when that company either goes belly up OR suddenly decides to change their rate for you to have access to this service? Will you be in a position where you have to completely replace a device or a whole system? Will they have you by the balls when they want more money? look at the recent Photobucket fiasco.

I've been looking into various smart gadgets for awhile. That dosn't make me an expert on the topic. But I do find myself coming back to teh same questions: What are the consequences if this thing fails? Can it be easily overridden/bypassed/troubleshot if it does? In what way coudl failure affect me? What is the critical pathway for the info?
 
REDLYNER said:
I already assume Anonymous is watching me though my TV and laptop camera.
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You know you can fix that with a piece of tape right
 
rockcity said:
Lol.

I ran in to some last week when it snowed. We were in the grocery store stocking up in essentials (beer). I was buying PBR, Stella and some IPA, they were buying Colt 45 40's and speaking German talking about getting drunk and laughing at how stupid Americans can't work when it snows more than 1/2".

I secretly hoped they had a terrible hangover from that Colt 45. :lol: Damn arrogant Germans.


Maybe that's where I get my arrogance from. :lol: I am half German...
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They may be arrogant but they're right on this point.
 
RatLabGuy said:
You know you can fix that with a piece of tape right
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I’m aware, but it seemed counterintuitive given my exhibitionisms.


I went with nest, ring, amcrest, nexx, and a few others for: Thermo, smoke/co2, outlets, Garage, doorbell, interior and exterior security, echo and echo dot.

I’ll try and post some reviews and key learnings as I let Amazon and the Gov get a fantastic look at how often I turn my living room lights on and off.
 
If you're anything like me, you'll quickly tire of Alexa interrupting your conversations or trying to talk to the TV.
 
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