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Ecobee today announced a new thermostat called the Ecobee SmartThermostat with Voice Control. Similar to previous versions of the product, the updated Ecobee can help reduce energy consumption through automated temperature control, as well as provide easier thermostat adjustments thanks to HomeKit support.

new-ecobee.jpg

The fifth-generation Ecobee SmartThermostat includes a glass finish with LCD touchscreen, and inside it has a quad-core processor to enable advanced machine learning. This revamp improves the device's natural language processing and speech detection, according to the company. In terms of wireless connectivity, it has 2.4GHz and 5GHz dual-band Wi-Fi.
"We see the smart home emerging as an oasis where great technology can fade into the background and free you from the chaos of everyday life." said ecobee President and CEO, Stuart Lombard.

"We've designed the new ecobee SmartThermostat with voice control to be the foundation of that vision. It's packed with more power than ever before to deliver a best-in-class user experience and effortlessly connect you to the solutions and services you love, but also work quietly in the background so you can focus on the things - and people - that matter most."
Additionally, there's a new speaker in the device with "twice the intensity" of its predecessor for richer sound and a wider dynamic range. This lets you listen to podcasts, music, or news directly from the SmartThermostat, which is compatible with Amazon Music, iHeartRadio, Pandora, TuneIn, and Spotify, but no mention of Apple Music was given.

The new SmartThermostat is compatible with HomeKit, Alexa, Google Assistant, SmartThings, and IFTTT. There's also an updated Ecobee SmartSensor that has a new design and enhanced wide-angle detection range. This device senses motion and temperature, detecting how warm or cool it is in separate rooms and adjusting the main SmartThermostat accordingly.

The new Ecobee SmartThermostat with Voice Control is priced at $249 and is available to purchase today on the company's website, and at Amazon, Lowes, The Home Depot, and Best Buy. The device comes with the updated Ecobee SmartSensor in the box, and additional sensors are available to buy in packs of two for $79.

Article Link: Ecobee Launches New HomeKit-Compatible SmartThermostat With Updated Internals
 
Niiiice. I was planning to buy one in a few weeks and then heard a 5th gen might be coming. So glad this just launched.
 
I'd like to move from Nest to a Homekit enabled thermostat. can all the Alexa stuff be disabled? Can you set a range of temperatures like you can with Nest?
 
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I am fine with my original Ecobee's. What I would like to see however are updated remote sensors with humidity. The main unit is the only one that can detect humidity and the remote sensors are too slow to be used in Homekit triggers. Not only that the remotes will show motion for a half hour after being detected, I guess to save battery they only check at long intervals. My Hue sensors last forever and respond right away, wish these did as well.
 
I am fine with my original Ecobee's. What I would like to see however are updated remote sensors with humidity. The main unit is the only one that can detect humidity and the remote sensors are too slow to be used in Homekit triggers. Not only that the remotes will show motion for a half hour after being detected, I guess to save battery they only check at long intervals. My Hue sensors last forever and respond right away, wish these did as well.
These are brand new remote sensors that specifically improve upon the previous weaknesses.
 
These are brand new remote sensors that specifically improve upon the previous weaknesses.

"Improved sensor technology - Now with better range and accuracy, and up to five years of battery life."

Unfortunately, they still don't detect humidity. I hope that the "better ... accuracy" means that the new sensors will not say "occupied" after 30 minutes like the old ones. That might be enough to get me to upgrade my 2nd gen.

Interestingly enough, the new sensors are backwards compatible all the way back to the ecobee3.
 
"Improved sensor technology - Now with better range and accuracy, and up to five years of battery life."

Unfortunately, they still don't detect humidity. I hope that the "better ... accuracy" means that the new sensors will not say "occupied" after 30 minutes like the old ones. That might be enough to get me to upgrade my 2nd gen.

Interestingly enough, the new sensors are backwards compatible all the way back to the ecobee3.
Um....

Sensor Facts
The sensors include a motion detector to tell the ecobee3 which parts of your house are active. They also include a temperature sensor so it can figure out the best way to keep you comfortable. The remote sensors do not include a humidity sensor, but the ecobee3 does.
 
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Does this company respect our privacy? Or, do they shamelessly sell our private information?

I’m interested in smart thermostats for my home, but will not buy spyware.
 
The speaker is overkill. It's a thermostat. I would never listen to music...or anything, from my thermostat. o_O
There are so many smart speakers on the market, and so many ways to use voice control for smart devices. Frankly, the microphone is unnecessary. Especially, since it only works with Alexa. If you could use it with Siri, maybe I would change my mind about the microphone.
 
I’ve been happy with my Ecobee 3 as far as it being a smart, programmable thermostat. The HomeKit integration was always flaky for me and not well implemented. I gave up on that. The Ecobee remote app works well enough, most of the time. I’ve been satisfied as it does basically what I want. I really like the extra sensors because my thermostat doesn’t provide the most useful temperature data due to its location.

I'd like to move from Nest to a Homekit enabled thermostat. can all the Alexa stuff be disabled? Can you set a range of temperatures like you can with Nest?

Yes, if by that you mean you can set it to keep your place cool below a certain high and warm above a certain low.
 
I'd like to move from Nest to a Homekit enabled thermostat. can all the Alexa stuff be disabled? Can you set a range of temperatures like you can with Nest?

Yes the Alexa stuff can be disabled. You don't have to use it. And yes you can set a range as well with the smallest increment being 2 or 3 degrees difference.
 
Um....

Sensor Facts
The sensors include a motion detector to tell the ecobee3 which parts of your house are active. They also include a temperature sensor so it can figure out the best way to keep you comfortable. The remote sensors do not include a humidity sensor, but the ecobee3 does.

I'm not sure what you're trying to correct. You're quoting information about the Ecobee "Room Sensor" (https://www.ecobee.com/room-sensors/) and not the new Ecobee "SmartSensor" (https://www.ecobee.com/en-us/smart-sensor/).

The current discussion is about the differences between the two. Humidity is still not detected in the newer model and the old suffered from not updating occupancy after detection for an extended period of time (i.e. sensor reports occupied for longer than they should in my opinion). Hopefully, the newer model updates with greater frequency.
 
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I'd like to move from Nest to a Homekit enabled thermostat. can all the Alexa stuff be disabled? Can you set a range of temperatures like you can with Nest?

I did not enable Alexa during the original setup and hope it's not listening anyway, you never know...
 
The Ecobee thermostats are by far the best on the market...easy to use, great app, and HomeKit works flawlessly
 
No thanks. None of these companies can be trusted with a microphone inside your home. Plus the app is horrible, and getting worse over time. What used to take an app open and button swipe to change temperature, now requires multiple taps to select a thermostat, even if like 99.9% of the planet you have just one thermostat.
 
Another worthless update. Now maybe apple will announce some new homekit features that it can take care of, but for now, my ecobee3 works just fine.
 
Um....

Sensor Facts
The sensors include a motion detector to tell the ecobee3 which parts of your house are active. They also include a temperature sensor so it can figure out the best way to keep you comfortable. The remote sensors do not include a humidity sensor, but the ecobee3 does.
Your quote is my issue spelled out by Ecobee themselves. The old or new sensors are still facing the same issue. No humidity and too long to deal with occupancy.
 
What and who drives the voice control? If it’s Alexa or Google Home based then I’m not interested at all. I’m not sure I want listening devices in my house no matter who controls them, Apple included.
 
I'm not sure what you're trying to correct. You're quoting information about the Ecobee "Room Sensor" (https://www.ecobee.com/room-sensors/) and not the new Ecobee "SmartSensor" (https://www.ecobee.com/en-us/smart-sensor/).

The current discussion is about the differences between the two. Humidity is still not detected in the newer model and the old suffered from not updating occupancy after detection for an extended period of time (i.e. sensor reports occupied for longer than they should in my opinion). Hopefully, the newer model updates with greater frequency.
"The remote sensors do not include a humidity sensor, but the ecobee3 does."

It clearly says the ecobee3 does.
 
"The remote sensors do not include a humidity sensor, but the ecobee3 does."

It clearly says the ecobee3 does.

The ecobee3 unit itself does, but the sensors do not. The discussion was pertaining to the new sensors ability to detect humidity.
 
The speaker is overkill. It's a thermostat. I would never listen to music...or anything, from my thermostat. o_O
There are so many smart speakers on the market, and so many ways to use voice control for smart devices. Frankly, the microphone is unnecessary. Especially, since it only works with Alexa. If you could use it with Siri, maybe I would change my mind about the microphone.
That makes absolutely no sense at all.
 
How have the Ecobee servers been lately? Going off the /r/ecobee subreddit, it seems they have outages all the time. Is that right, or are people on reddit being overly hyperbolic?
 
How have the Ecobee servers been lately? Going off the /r/ecobee subreddit, it seems they have outages all the time. Is that right, or are people on reddit being overly hyperbolic?

I've not noticed a lot of outages. However, they do provide a running Incident History:

https://status.ecobee.com/history
[doublepost=1559593858][/doublepost]
I am fine with my original Ecobee's. What I would like to see however are updated remote sensors with humidity. The main unit is the only one that can detect humidity and the remote sensors are too slow to be used in Homekit triggers. Not only that the remotes will show motion for a half hour after being detected, I guess to save battery they only check at long intervals. My Hue sensors last forever and respond right away, wish these did as well.

https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/3/1...eview-alexa-announcement-price-specs-features

"The new remote sensor is nicer to look at than the prior model, but I’m disappointed that it doesn’t add the ability to measure humidity; it still only measures temperature and detects motion. The system also still takes a long time to switch between home and away modes, even when it hasn’t detected any motion activity for over an hour on any of the sensors, which has been an ongoing frustration with the Ecobee for me."
 
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How have the Ecobee servers been lately? Going off the /r/ecobee subreddit, it seems they have outages all the time. Is that right, or are people on reddit being overly hyperbolic?

It was pretty bad a couple of weeks ago but their servers have been pretty stable recently.
 
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