Much need features for W200 Thermostat

[jk1211]

I was lucky enough to be an early tester of this thermostat, and I really want to replace my old Ecobee 4 with it, but there are some things holding me back still.

First, it is missing a ton of fine settings that Ecobee offers. The basic settings allowed currently are compressor off time, an aux heating outdoor temperature setting, and a minimum compressor outdoor working temperature. There is a TON missing there.

We absolutely need a minimum on time for the compressor as well as off. That is what prevents a short cycle along with off time. Not everybody’s system is perfectly sized for their house, and we need to be able to run our system for the minimum on 10 minute recommended time (mine only gets to 5 min currently).

There are also basic things missing, like temperature differential. For example, if I have my thermostat set to 78 on AC most other smart thermostats allow you to choose if it turns the AC on after 1° degree warmer, 1.5°, 2° warmer, etc. (the same for heat).

There are other settings I personally dont care so much about like how long the fan stays on after the heating/cooling to blow that hot/cool air out the vents. These should all be mirrored though.

There is obviously a default setting for these, but it needs to be user configurable like Ecobee and the rest offer. Not everyone wants just the basic default settings. I know in the Slack it says will be updated later OTA, but these are really basic thermostat things needed ASAP.

The last thing really holding me back is not an Aqara issue, but currently Google home only reads matter devices in Celsius. They have fixed sensors, but thermostats are still borked. Aqara really needs to think about the other method, adding it to Google home using the old “connect your account” method rather than Matter so that we can still use it until Google fixes it at some unknown time. Especially with a US release in a week, allegedly. Going to have a lot of angry people who can’t use it in their Google home because it’s in Celsius only.

Another addition would be outside weather on the main standby screen. I don’t need the name of the thermostat there; that should be a configurable line (outside temp, sensor data like temp, etc. 2 data points could fit there).

[srl77411]

The W200 does offer these settings in the menu, are these any help?

[jk1211]

That is only compressor off time and the basic adjusting of the thermostat for correcting room temp/humidity to be accurate.

Those dont address any of the missing settings I mentioned or in the screenshots other thermostats have (min compressor on time not just off which prevents short cycles and wear on your AC equipment, differentials for cooling/heating when the system kicks on over/under the set temp, etc).

There are no advanced settings/adjustments really is the issue. Those are the most basic consumer-grade settings. Not my pic, from Reddit, but even Nest has it too. Have to have the basic settings the big players have. HVAC is not one size fits all as everyones is different or sightly over/undersized and needs tweaks.

I REALLY want to replace my old Ecobee, like so many others (or Nests), but need these settings.

[Caroline_Zzz]

Thanks for your feedback! We’ll forward this to the developers. You’re also welcome to share it in the W200 beta/early bird channel, since you mentioned you’re an early-stage tester.

[jk1211]

I did, but the Slack got nuked and restored, so I know things got lost. I was told before it got nuked that it was coming to a “future OTA versions,” but there are now numerous real-world comments/reviews online about this. This really needs addressing ASAP, these are critical settings to an HVAC system.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXAeZYabKnI&pp=ygUQYXFhcmEgdGhlcm1vc3RhdA%3D%3D from an AC installer with such comments missing these settings.

And the Aqara Reddit “For those of you who have ecobee, how important is the thermostat fine tuning setting (swing temperature, compressor shut off delay, etc)? If I’m not mistaken, Aqara does not have these settings user adjustable and I’m wondering if that’s a deal breaker or not?”

These are kind of urgent, and there are not enough user settings for a basic smart thermostat. Lack of proper settings can damage or cause excessive wear to AC/heating equipment in the longer term without being fine tuned.

Ie. without a minimum on time that the user can set, the system could turn on and off too much, causing a lot of wear; regardless of minimum off time (it could still run for 3-5 min, off for the 10 min maximum you can set, and over and over).

Nothing is forcing it to stay on that 10+ minutes most HVAC pros recommend. It takes about 8-10 minutes of running before a typical AC starts removing any significant amount of moisture/humidity from the air.

Related to the other threshold setting, I cant even say, “well only turn on when it hits 80 with the AC set at 77” instead of turn on at 78 to cool to 77 which only takes a few minutes (whatever the default threshold is, I assume 1 degree). With both sets of settings missing, there is no way around a minimum on time even.

Just setting the temp lower for the house also wont help (beyond skyrocket the electric bill) if the default threshold is 1 degree, it will keep kicking the AC back on after 1 degree warming up, just at a lower temp.

The defaults Aqara uses only prevent immediate catastrophic damage. We need these basics in the first update hopefully extremely soon, not months. (I know averaging sensors and a “follow me” feature are big ones and promised in an upcoming update, but not having those immediately wont cause system damage either).

[Caroline_Zzz]

Thanks for letting me know! The Slack workspace is back to normal now, and I’ve shared your feedback with our team.