Fifth-gen ecobee thermostat with HomeKit promises better Wi-Fi, added Alexa & Spotify feat...
ecobee's fifth-generation thermostat, compatible with Apple HomeKit, should be mostly an evolutionary device but include important upgrades in wireless, Spotify, and Amazon Alexa connectivity, according to a product leak.
The thermostat will have a quad-core processor and include dual-band Wi-Fi and Bluetooth support for the first time, big-box chain Lowe's said in a product listing spotted by Zatz Not Funny. ecobee is simultaneously planning a new remote "SmartSensor" with better pairing range and battery life, plus faster occupancy detection.
That detection can potentially improve heating and cooling efficiency, but ecobee's existing remote sensors have been criticized as too slow, often taking many minutes before they realize someone has left a room.
People enabling the thermostat's built-in Alexa speaker will finally be able to take advantage of calling, drop-in, and messaging features, something normally reserved for Amazon Echo devices. Spotify subscribers will meanwhile be able to push music and podcasts to the speaker via Spotify Connect.
U.S. pricing and a release date have yet to be revealed, though Lowe's claims the product will cost $329 Canadian, about $243 U.S.
The ecobee4 is one of the most popular smart thermostats on the market, competing mainly with Google's Nest. The Nest doesn't yet support HomeKit, although it does connect with iPhones and iPads in other ways.
The thermostat will have a quad-core processor and include dual-band Wi-Fi and Bluetooth support for the first time, big-box chain Lowe's said in a product listing spotted by Zatz Not Funny. ecobee is simultaneously planning a new remote "SmartSensor" with better pairing range and battery life, plus faster occupancy detection.
That detection can potentially improve heating and cooling efficiency, but ecobee's existing remote sensors have been criticized as too slow, often taking many minutes before they realize someone has left a room.
People enabling the thermostat's built-in Alexa speaker will finally be able to take advantage of calling, drop-in, and messaging features, something normally reserved for Amazon Echo devices. Spotify subscribers will meanwhile be able to push music and podcasts to the speaker via Spotify Connect.
U.S. pricing and a release date have yet to be revealed, though Lowe's claims the product will cost $329 Canadian, about $243 U.S.
The ecobee4 is one of the most popular smart thermostats on the market, competing mainly with Google's Nest. The Nest doesn't yet support HomeKit, although it does connect with iPhones and iPads in other ways.
Comments
(which is bad for me personally, as I have Ecobee 3's in my home)
They have a program where you give them permission to monitor your power consumption after coming in and analyzing your system and home for efficiency. They also have permission to override your settings remotely during peak load events and you do have the ability to opt out. Last summer they ran programmed dial-backs maybe a half dozen times for a few afternoon hours. My normal setting is 73 in the summer and they pushed it back to 76. Every time the dial-back ended at 4 PM so your house would be back to normal by the time most come home from work or school.
If they get hacked, they can switch your thermostat to heat in summer and bring the temps to over 100F inside. What if you have pets? What if you have elderly living with you?
I was offered such a deal, and I refused. I also wrote ecobee to tell them what a horrible idea that is.
Having Alexa that sends audio to Amazon from your hose is bad enough, but having the electric company control the temps in your house is straight from the Big Brother playbook.
FWIW I replaced a Nest with the Ecobee (by way of a Honeywell Lyric Round 2.0 in between) as Nest does not support HomeKit and I don’t really want Google involved in my house.
The Speaker on the Ecobee 4 is not very good. You would never want to play Music on it from Spotify or anyone else. This does seem like they have nothing else. It is a Thermostat after all. What else do you really need one to do that they don't already do? No they're just throwing crap onto them and hoping people will upgrade to bring in more money.
On Amazon, I see right now you can get a Ecobee 3 Lite which means no remote sensors for $134.99. Which is just fine for many people. You can get a 2 pack of the remote sensors for about $70. I do see the Ecobee 4 for $199 which comes with 1 sensor. They are both Homekit compatible.
Customers opt in to these programs in exchange for surprisingly large discounts on summer electric bills (even if a cool summer means the electric company doesn't end up reducing the cooling at all). You also get a certain number of overrides.
Writing ecobee to whine about them supporting these features is crazy. It's opt-in, and if ecobee DIDN'T support it, they'd have users of these savings programs writing them and asking (justifiably) why they don't support this. It's not like you HAVE to use it, and it doesn't harm you for this to be available!
As for your claim that if the electric company can control temps, they can see occupancy... what? That makes no sense at all.
https://www.smartgridobserver.com/industry-news/florida-psc-gives-teco-customers-opt-out-option-on-smart-meters