Nest thermostat issues

bryanbdp

I have really grown to dislike the Nest thermostats. They sound great but didn't live up to expectations for me.

1st was a complete lack of technical support literature. Normally when you buy a thermostat you get a fairly comprehensive set of instructions covering most possible installations with additional online resources available. I was never able to find this type of detailed information, even when I signed up to be an authorized installer. Calling their tech line yielded a script reader who could only parrot what color wire to attach to which terminal & then ironically referred me to an authorized installer!

I never did find this type of technical literature despite what passed for onboarding process. Nor a trade help line.

2nd, I had two units fail. The latest was the learning thermostat, and the one previous to that. The learning thermostat stopped charging even though I had a three wire connection with transformer, relay & common wire. The previous one just stopped providing output signal.

3rd, several of the features were poor. The geofencing function where the unit would attempt to turn on and off due to proximity to a phone was only recommended for use with one phone. Ok if you live alone, I guess. Next, the unit can accommodate a remote wireless temperature sensor. This worked OK. But the times the thermostat would reference the remote thermostat were pre programmed and couldn't be changed! 😡

Lastly, we have a high efficiency combi boiler with cast iron baseboard. Very slow to heat up & cool down. Really doesn't work that well with trying to save energy by trying to adjust temperature frequently. This is not a fault of the thermostat but greatly reduced its usefulness.

I am curious as to what other people have experienced. I swore I was done with them at 2am when our heat was off due to thermostat & it was 19 degrees outside!

jesmed1

We have two boilers heating a 4 unit condo building with oil boilers. I upgraded to smart thermostats last January. I researched both Nest and Ecobee, and ultimately decided on two ecobee 3 lites because the Nest did not have some user-adjustable settings that I wanted.

The ecobees have been outstanding, even better than I hoped. Technical support is excellent, there's a good user forum, and the "beestat" app for data monitoring and anslysis is excellent.

We have both ecobees paired with remote sensors full-time for temperature averaging, and that works perfectly.

I'm sorry you had a bad experience with Nest. If you want to consider switching to an ecobee, I would highly recommend them.

Jamie Hall

Welcome to the club…