Update #6, Update #5, Update #4, Update #3, Update #2, Update #1, Install

I got my replacement Nest thermostat today via FedEx.

I was surprised to open the box and find a complete sealed package. Honestly, I expected they’d ship just the display and the base (as the support engineer hadn’t set any expectations, I apparently just made up my own!). But, I suppose at this point in the company, they just aren’t setup to ship just the two pieces. It has the unfortunate side effect of producing extra waste (as I can’t imagine that extra wall plates are going to come in handy anywhere). The little screw driver could be given away but the rest likely will end up in a landfill. I’ll ship them all of the unused parts back as I don’t want them – hopefully they don’t just trash them.

There’ve been some really awesome commenters in the past few days and I wanted to take a moment to highlight a few key comments.

From Curt:

I finally called Nest and spoke to a pleasant fellow. First off, it turns out the Nest does NOT anticipate a temperature set point. It will not turn on the furnace ahead of time. If you train it to go from the night setting of 60 to the daytime setting of 68 by turning it to 68 when you get up, it will always be 60 when you get up.

Wow, that’s a super disappointment. Honestly, I really thought it could do that.

Another from Curt:

It does not keep as steady a temperature as the primitive Honeywell round thermostat it replaced.

From Mark:

I’ve had my Nest for about 10 days. I would recommend waiting before buying one.

Kevin:

I’ve been considering replacing my Honeywell programmable t’stat with a Nest…but now I’m not so sure

David shares my disappointment regarding Nest Labs:

I would love to hear what NEST has to say about the variances…I would think they are monitoring these blogs…..If they are not…shame on them.

They seem to be way too quiet. They don’t seem to “get” social media.

And Matt provided a link to a very complete tear-down of the device:

Here is a good site that did a tear-down,lots of comments and people look like they really know what there talking about!

http://www.sparkfun.com/tutorials/334

GregN is still enthused about his Nest thermostat:

You guys are right in all the above posts. But to be honest, I’m happy with setting a schedule that warms the house before I get up in the morning, and saves energy overnight. Yes, I had that functionality at a lower price point before the Nest. But I didn’t have remote adjustments or the great looking hockey puck on my wall before.

Thanks again for all the comments! Keep them coming!

I won’t replace the poorly functioning Nest thermostat for a few days with the new unit (as it’s a nuisance to adjust all of the schedules, move the units around, etc.).

Today, the system had again auto activated the “away” mode apparently, and then did not activate the normal evening schedule. So, our house was cold when we returned from work, even though it should have been warming for about a half hour. I just don’t understand this feature. I don’t understand why “away” isn’t triggered at night.

I could turn off learning, auto-away … leaving me with remote scheduling.

Update: January 11, 2012 => Something triggered the “auto-away” feature two days in a row now. I don’t understand why it happens. The part that’s annoying is that the schedule doesn’t run when this happens apparently, so we came home to a cold house (and tonight I thought to check before leaving from work to see if it had happened again).