what can an insteon thermostat do?

[someguy]

I've done quite a bit of research and I haven't been able to find the answer to what an insteon thermostat will do for me. Here is what I'm looking for: a thermostat that will run a program that sets the thermostat to a certain temperature in the morning, daytime, evening and night-time. I'd like to have this schedule change depending upon occupancy. The occupancy could be indicated to the thermostat by a motion sensor or a light switch.

 

Here is what I mean: Would I be able to set the thermostat to 65 degrees during the daytime, but if someone came into the area, and tripped the motion sensor or turned on a light in the area, it would go to 70 degrees for a couple of hours, then return to 65 degrees. It should also go to the next scheduled temperature per the programming and then during that period of time, it might be set to 68 degrees and the motion sensor turns it up to 72 degrees.

 

I'd also like to be able to have someone walk up to the thermostat and change the temperature setting and it stay there instead of having it switch to some other setting when someone turns on a lightswitch or walk past the motion sensor in the area.

 

At night, I wouldn't want the motion sensors or the lightswitches to affect the settings. I'm sure the isy can handle this part easily.

 

Will it work like this?

 

Are there any other things that I can do with it that I might want to do?

 

These are the two thermostats that I found, are they any good?

 

 

http://www.smarthome.com/30412A/7-Day-P ... 900/p.aspx

 

http://www.smarthome.com/2491T7/Venstar ... ble/p.aspx

[MikeB]

This is what I do with my office thermostat:

 

http://forum.universal-devices.com/view ... thermostat

[ulrick65]

With some creative programming in ISY you can do all of those things with the Venstar. However, you don't need the 7 day programmable one...since you will be doing all the programming with ISY anyway...unless you need the other features of it for some reason.

 

I got this one:

 

http://www.smarthome.com/2491T1/Venstar-Thermostat-INSTEON-Remote-Control-Thermostat-1-Day-Programmable/p.aspx

 

It works perfectly and controls the AC and heat. Unless you need duel fuel, this one should work fine.

[smileyw]

Here is a question, can the ISY keep track of the temp in the house and log it? I used to do this with Homeseer and the old RCS X10 Tstats.

I seem to recall that the Venstar/Insteon will not report back changes on its own, is that still the case?

[ulrick65]

Here is a question, can the ISY keep track of the temp in the house and log it? I used to do this with Homeseer and the old RCS X10 Tstats.

I seem to recall that the Venstar/Insteon will not report back changes on its own, is that still the case?

 

That is still the case, you must query the stat to get updated temp readings, etc. There is no good way to log the info...you could do it with the event viewer...but not very pretty and certainly not a robust process.

[smileyw]

Is it crazy to poll it every few minutes to keep the status going? Also, if someone makes changes on the stat manually, will it notify the ISY?

[ulrick65]

Is it crazy to poll it every few minutes to keep the status going? Also, if someone makes changes on the stat manually, will it notify the ISY?

 

I don't think it is that bad for me. I was polling every 15 minutes, but didn't really need it that often. After all, do I really care if the temp changes 1 degree?

 

It does not send status updates...ever. So if someone changes it, you will not know it until the next poll. I think it works pretty good, at least for my needs.