Canadian Money Forum banner

Wireless Web Programmable Thermostats and Switches

14K views 37 replies 12 participants last post by  m3s 
#1 ·
I've been waiting for a decent wireless system for thermostats and switches, and there is now a Canadian product Sinopé that looks pretty slick. You can demo the simple web interface from their site. I think it looks great for a small Canadian company while the larger companies seem to be fumbling with this technology.





Some reasons why I've been waiting for this:

In Quebec, most houses have individual thermostats in each room. This makes it a pain to adjust the heat every time you leave the house. Previously I installed programmable thermostats, however they are still annoying when you want to deviate from your regular schedule. A few times, I've missed 1 or 2 thermostats when leaving for extended periods and with this web control I could have turned them off from the airport.

My house also has exterior lights on timers. This is also a pain because the daylight is always changing. I also like to program inside lights to make it look like I'm home when I'm not. This year I ended up extending a work trip past Halloween so my lights were programmed to come on while I was away, but if I could control them online I could have turned them off to avoid kids knocking on my door for candy..

It's not cheap: $85 server + $65/thermostat. I figure it would take 2 or 3 winters before it even pays for itself..
 
See less See more
4
#3 ·
For forced air there are already good options from Nest or Honeywell. Those are for systems where you only have 1 thermostat. The system I have is where you have a line voltage thermostat in every room, for which there hasn't been many wireless options. This would let me control all the thermostats at once from a web interface

I found a thread about these on a "smarthome" forum. Lots of Americans are buying them and lots of good comments (except that they get stung by UPS brokerage fees.. like we always do buying from USA!)

Some interesting tidbits:
It uses your postal code to get the local time and the outside temp
If a thermostat is far away, the signals are relayed through other thermostats to extend the range
RF and web data is all encrypted
Settings are maintained after a power outage

Concerns:
If the company failed, what happens to the web server that you need to control there?..

The price is not bad compared to decent programmable thermostats, and much simpler and cheaper than Honeywell's solution. I think I will order a starter pack direct from the company (free shipping in Canada and cheaper than Rona)
 
#5 ·
Did you look at Nest? It's $250 on their site. That's not bad considering Sinopé will cost that much for a gateway and 2 thermostats, but most houses will need more thermostats for a baseboard setup.. My concern was that is Sinopé goes bankrupt in the future, what happens to that external server and web interface?

The other side of it is remote monitoring. With Sinopé you get the historical temp, usage/cost of each thermostat. That helps you recognize a poorly insulated room or if one heater is carrying all the load

The 2 things I wanted to control online was actually the heaters and some light switches so I'm liking the simplicity of this system. What else would you want? I can see there being smart doors, appliances, cameras, smoke/CO detectors. It would make sense for them all to work together: lock door = heat off + alarm/cameras on
 
#6 ·
They really need to put up more info on their website, its very lean with no help in the manuals. Is there an external server being used or is it just the web interface module you access?

Not sure what I'd hook up other than the furnace and some lights ... maybe garage door open/close.

Nest is a no go for me, any system that you have to access their servers to use your devices, no thanks.
 
#7 · (Edited)
It's not cheap: $85 server + $65/thermostat. I figure it would take 2 or 3 winters before it even pays for itself..
At Quebec electricity prices that seems optimistic to me -- I looked into the Nest and figured they'd take about 30 years to pay for themselves. We have eight thermostats in our house, so the Sinope system would be an outlay of $605, and I'd be surprised if the savings amounted to more than $20/year in our case, mainly because we rarely forget to turn down the heat when we leave, and some of the thermostats are kept permanently low (those in the basement for example).

My main concern with networked home controls are that they're great when they work, but when things go wrong it can be really frustrating. I bought a set of Philips Hue LED lights because you can set them on timers without having to buy physical timers: you control the lights entirely from a smart phone or tablet (or your computer). You can set up vacation schedules so the lights come on and off at specific times, and you can even randomize it so someone watching the home from the street each night would see the lights come on at different times. But there have been enough software glitches, failed updates and patches, etc., that I'm at the point of wanting to go back to a simple mechanical timer. We don't usually set the timers on the Hue until a few minutes before we're ready to leave the home, and there's little more frustrating than encountering bugs (inability to see or control lights on the network, etc.) when you're rushing to get out the door.
 
#8 ·
At Quebec electricity prices that seems optimistic to me -- I looked into the Nest and figured they'd take about 30 years to pay for themselves. We have eight thermostats in our house, so the Sinope system would be an outlay of $605, and I'd be surprised if the savings amounted to more than $20/year in our case, mainly because we rarely forget to turn down the heat when we leave, and some of the thermostats are kept permanently low (those in the basement for example).

My main concern with networked home controls are that they're great when they work, but when things go wrong it can be really frustrating.
I totally agree! There's little chance these things are going to pay for themselves before they break down. And even my regular programmable thermostats piss me off because they have a bug and sometimes reboot when I want to adjust them. There's no way I'd risk anything "smarter".

If saving is the goal, the returns are much better on sealing air leaks in a typical house. It's boring and sometimes difficult work but you can do a lot yourself and make a real difference.
 
#10 ·
I'm not sure where the frugality comes in with this product. Why does it need to be web-enabled? Why does it need to check the weather outside? Either the room is too hot or it is too cold. A thermostat will control that. A programmable thermostat (one for each room if you wish) costs 40-50$.

And it's very easy to wire in a photosensor in to your exterior light circuit. Or buy a lightbulb with a build in light sensor. Or a socket add on that has the light sensor built in.

Technology is cool, no doubt. It's very star trek-esque to be able to control your house from a touch screen. But is it necessary? Nest is a slick looking package, but is it necessary? Could you not do the same thing with a programmable t-stat and a bit of testing to figure out the response time of your system?

I'm always leery of all these tech connections. Being able to control things from anywhere in the world means there is the possibility that someone else can.

One thing I've seen that has potential value is an irrigation controler that connects to the internet and checks the forecast for you. Going to rain tomorrow? Maybe we can skip watering the lawn today then. There's other ones that measure the ground moisture in each zone and use that as the controlling parameter.
 
#15 ·
Not sure why more municipalities aren't doing that.
Because it's a waste of taxpayer money? :)

About them being hacked: I wouldn't be too worried. Not because they'll be secure but rather because there's not much "fun" out of hacking a thermostat. Unlike cars (imagine getting all the cars in the parking lot to honk a tune in sync) or cameras (you can spy around the globe).
 
#20 ·
The Sinopé system is encrypted like secure WiFi and online banking. If some teenage hacker can crack SSL they might as well rob banks instead. This is a real concern for some other systems though.. Anyone can trigger a typical garage door with a simple transmitter yet many Canadians leave valuables in their garage and don't lock the front door. Doesn't seem to be a major problem?

Because it's a waste of taxpayer money? :)
Hydro Québec used to offer rebates on the purchase of energy efficient appliances and programmable thermostats. As I understand they export electricity to Ontario and the US at a much higher rates, so the less they sell to the Québecois the more they can export for a higher profit?

I don't understand why programmable thermostats would save money. When I was a kid and we just had the plain old thermostat, my parents would always turn the heat down before we went to bed and turn it up again in the morning, and whenever we would leave the house for more than a few hours we would turn the heat down.
Did your parents have 8 thermostats though? If I had a single thermostat by the door I could probably manage this.. but 8? The good thing about individual thermostats is I can close doors and heat individual bedrooms at night and vice versa, and keep the heat down in rooms I seldom use. The trouble is if you forget to turn down 1 thermostat it will burn more energy trying to heat a larger space.

My girlfriend is a bit obsessive-compulsive, and in 8 years of living here we have never once forgotten to turn down the heat at night or when we leave the house, she checks every thermostat, sometimes twice. So it's not an issue for us. But it is an issue for most people. Have a few glasses of wine with supper and slip off to bed without remembering to turn down the heat, etc., it happens.
Brad, from your posts over the years I seem to remember you work at home? That would probably make it reasonable with the 8 manual thermostats. I'm a bit OCD about these things myself but I've chosen not to fight the thermostat battle because my schedule is too unpredictable. I leave on a short trip in the summer and come back months later to find half the heaters running etc.

I set up the house so I can leave at a moments notice, unplug and few things and flip a few circuit breakers, and the neighbours teenager takes care of the rest. The more things I can control online the better. I like that the Sinopé system can send email alerts, and I can remotely monitor usage and turn the heat back up on the way home.
 
#17 ·
I don't understand why programmable thermostats would save money. When I was a kid and we just had the plain old thermostat, my parents would always turn the heat down before we went to bed and turn it up again in the morning, and whenever we would leave the house for more than a few hours we would turn the heat down. Do other people without programmable thermostats not do this? So a programmable thermostat wouldn't save you money, it would just make it more convenient because you wouldn't have to manually change the temp. A wifi one takes the convenience factor one step further by allowing you to change it remotely before you get home so the house is nice and warm when you walk in.

Now that I live in a 1 bedroom condo and my hydro bill is about $22-23 per month, I don't bother. :D
 
#18 ·
I don't understand why programmable thermostats would save money.
Because people are forgetful. See m3s's original post at the beginning of this thread.

My girlfriend is a bit obsessive-compulsive, and in 8 years of living here we have never once forgotten to turn down the heat at night or when we leave the house, she checks every thermostat, sometimes twice. So it's not an issue for us. But it is an issue for most people. Have a few glasses of wine with supper and slip off to bed without remembering to turn down the heat, etc., it happens.
 
#25 ·
This is more drastic than I expected. There are several things I can still toy around with, but this is an example of how a timer might not necessarily reduce much.



It was about -8 outside when the heat went off for the night. It looks like it took nearly as much power to stabilize again, 10% savings at best here for a 10 hour night.
 
#26 ·
I installed a Honeywell Wifi tstat at my winterized cabin so I can see the temperature when I'm not there, turn it up when we plan to go, and I get a notification if the temperature drops below a preset value. But a wifi one for the house - is just so I don't have to get up to turn it up or down because I'm lazy. (Both places use a Natural Gas furnace). I like the Honeywell and is pretty easy to set up I think.
 
#28 ·
8 thermostats in a house?

Can someone explain this? Are we talking 8 separate zones on your,furnace?

As for the outside lights, I have a levitron switch from Home Depot. 40 bucks I think. It goes on at sundown, and off at sunrise. It even adjusts for,day
Ightmsavings. You input your longitude and latitude and away you go
 
#33 ·
The numbers are in and my 4 Sinopé thermostats paid for themselves in the first winter



Sinopé Starter kit + 2 additional thermostats: $402

Total hydro cost Oct 15 - Apr 16: $1076

Total hydro cost Oct 14 - Apr 15: $1558

Difference: $482

There are many factors at play because every winter is different etc, but I think the biggest factor was my interest in reducing hydro costs. Before it was a chore to manage 8 thermostats individually and if I rushed out the door and forgot 1 there was no way to check or adjust them remotely. Now I enjoy turning the heat on from my phone on my way home with a single touch. Similar to web banking, the web is the only way I adjust my thermostats now. The best part is that the thermostat times are synced automatically based on your postal code and daylight savings time is automatically adjusted like on any smartphone/computer. I used the web interface all winter with no sign of glitches

They have some new products out that I'm really interested in such as the smart light switch that can simulate presence and be scheduled based on sunset/sunrise. I live up north so the sunset/sunrise varies drastically throughout the year such that if I leave for a month or so my scheduled lights are out of whack coming on way to early or late etc. You can demo the light interface now and there are some neat settings, such as double press in the master bedroom turns off/on all lights or syncing switches etc. I doubt these switches would pay for themselves in hydro savings, but they do add security and convenience if you are often away

https://demo.neviweb.com/
 
#37 ·
I love my Ecobee thermostat. The thing that I like the most is that it has remote sensors that detect both motion and temp. I generally set the temp lower (in the winter) during the weekdays. On days that I work from home, the sensors know that I'm home, and it will adjust the temp automatically. You can also use the sensors to determine when the furnace turns on/off. For example, in the summer, the upper floor is generally hotter, and if you like to be cool when you sleep, you can tell the Ecobee to use the remote sensor's temp reading instead of the temp reading on the thermostat itself for the night. It will cool the house until it reaches the desired temp in the bedroom(s). Your lower floor will be cold, but you get the desired temp for where you are. During the day, you set it back to normal. Call me lazy/forgetful, but some things in life are worth paying a few extra bucks.
 
#38 ·
Call me lazy/forgetful, but some things in life are worth paying a few extra bucks.
Yup

I'm still very happy with my Sinopé setup a year later. I like that they're a local Canadian company and the quality/price is very competitive

My outside lights are programmed to turn off/on with the sunset/sunrise. I no longer have to reprogram them every few weeks

Upstairs is heated during the day, room is only heated at night, and basement is manual on with an auto-off at midnight

My water heater is only on half the day now, and I find hot water is still available if needed even when it's off

A single tap and everything switches to vacation mode. Ask Siri to remind me to turn it back on when I get to X or at X time

Daylight savings time is adjusted automatically on all thermostats. Outside temps are also pulled from the web

Diminishing returns for the second winter:

 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top