Omnistat

[cobra]

Yeah, think ano means the humidity/temp models.  Their are different models of the OmniStat2, the cheaper ones don't do humidity control, as I recall.  But if you get the higher end ones, then they do all that.  Both humidity sensing and control.

 

[pete_c]

Thank you cobra.
 
How would you connect the dehumidifier?  I mean I have a stand alone dehumidifier with a control on it.  Would you tap into the controller wires to use it with the thermostat (well like the humdifier)?
 

 
From the manual:
 
 
Humidity Options

The Humidity Options are used to configure the dehum
idifier and/or humidifier output on the thermostat.
1 - Not Used:
Dehumidifier/Humidifier output is disabled.      

2 - Fan Speed Control:
This option uses the dehumidifier output to control the fan speed on an HVAC system with
a variable speed fan.   When energized, the fan speed is reduced to augment the dehumidification process.  

3 - Dehumidifier:
This option uses the dehumidifier output to control a stand alone dehumidifier.
Humidifier:  This option uses the humidifier output to control a standalone humidifier.

 

[ano]

Personally the only modern feature I can think of is a cloud connection which I wouldn't use if I had anyways.  I can still get to the thermostat via my cell phone or OmniTouch screen or 3rd party software touchscreen.

As a stand-alone device, yes, but the OmniStat2 is designed to talk to an Omni panel, which can have that, so it would be a bit redundant.  Yes only the better of the two Omnistat2's have humidity control,  and it has outputs for dehumidifier and humidifier so in theory you can control both.

 

[ano]

Thank you cobra.
 
How would you connect the dehumidifier?  I mean I have a stand alone dehumidifier with a control on it.  Would you tap into the controller wires to use it with the thermostat (well like the humdifier)?

Your dehumidifier would need to be controlled by 24V.  You could use a 24VAC relay where it shows, and have that control the 120V leads. Or if your dehumidifier has a humidity control,  use that relay to control that. 
 
The Omnistat2 was more designed for HVAC units that have a humidifier or dehumidifier built in. 
 
You also could wire the dehumidifier to the Cool connection, so if your house gets humid but not hot, the AC would turn on to dehumidfy it. Lots of flexibility here.

 

[pete_c]

Thanks Ano.
 
Not sure what the Humidity controller is; guessing it is not 120VAC but rather some low voltage.

 

[StarTrekDoors]

As thermostats go, I wouldn't exactly say "it doesn't offer much in the way of modern features"
 
Lets see, you can change the display color, and it can be activated by motion. Supports 2 stage air, 3 stage heat, Zigbee, serial, and an Omni connection. It can control both a humidifier and dehumidifier. Can cycle the fan, can support external temp sensors, and even supports an external control unit w built-in temp sensor, actually I think it can support multiple of these. 
 
So what "modern features" does it not support, and what other thermostat supports all these plus these other "modern" features?  I think for a non-proprietary thermostat, it holds up pretty well.

 
I actually dislike having to change the omnistat 2 during season changes as heat and cool in my own home runs on a different schedule depending on the time year, which means with omnistat I would have to reprogram schedules as I switch between heat and cool.  Many generic brands of digital thermostat have no problem handling different time/day schedule separate for heat and cool through their touch screens or button interfaces.  Many generic brands offer humidity and random fan cycling.  I recently had a customer complain the omnistat didn't have different colors on the screen or color display button for the various controls (they had a Rite Temp 6080 previously) and I did agree that the omnistat 2 looks rather dated and feels not so glamorous. Of course I imagine many of us do agree that the default single green color is very dated. While most thermostats don't have the ability to randomly change color like some omnistats, many brands offer advanced features including graphical displays with weather reports, graphics indicating weather conditions, etc.... Sadly I was in Home Depot the other day and when I saw the new thermostats they had on display I was very saddened when I thought about installing the omnistat next to one of those. There are also RS232/RS485 models that support multiple temperature/humidity sensors that support humidifier/dehimidifier, heat/cool. Even many inexpensive models track filter changes and many include the ability to track UV Air Purifier usage (UV-Bulb timer), which omnistat does not. The Rite Temp I mentioned before, which is actually a rather old model (but looks modern) also include a hand held remote which many other brands do as well.  Of course with the omnistat one can keep a cell phone handy and purchase Snap Link Mobile to change the temp but fumbling in the middle of the night from the bed, opening the app, selecting the app, pressing the right button can be more of a task than pressing an up button in the dark with no need to add 20 extra minutes to going back to sleep.. Of course, a handy OT7 by the bed could also do the job, but at more cost than a cell phone and Snap Link software, but still the delayed sleeping (ref: Sleep Study Electronics Before Bedtime). 
 
The list goes on and yes there are Cloud-based, local Wi-fi, Zigbee, and Z-Wave models out there as well that can do the same thing but I feel that the omnistat needs to be updated.  As mentioned, the luck of getting a multi-color, at glance, always on, with daily forecast, time and date display with room complimenting graphics, where the thermostat learns as you make adjustments to your ongoing living conditions, is something omnistat just does not do.
 
Of course, like a few others on this forum, I hide the omnistat and use temperature/humidity sensors but with limited programming lines and the extra complication, it would be nice if Leviton would release a new omnistat that keeps up with the current players or at least make the OT7 where it is possible to hold the thermostat screen full time without returning to home and since it is Android-based, with a few simple changes, the OT7 too could show more information at a glance including weather and other modern features and be a nice substitute for AC control using a simple temp sensor. Just a thought...

 

[ano]

I actually dislike having to change the omnistat 2 during season changes as heat and cool in my own home runs on a different schedule depending on the time year, which means with omnistat I would have to reprogram schedules as I switch between heat and cool. 

Strange because my Omni does that for me automatically. At sunrise it reads the outside temps to decide what schedule it applies for the next 24 hours. Works great. Often in winter it can be in the 80's here, so I don't want the AC running in the afternoons even if its slightly warm in the house. I only use winter and summer schedules but I could do many more if I found the need.
 
"Many generic brands offer humidity and random fan cycling."
The OmniStat2 can do both.  It doesn't have "random fan cycling" but it certainly does have fan cycling. Random fan cycling sounds like you might have a broken thermostat.
 
"I recently had a customer complain the omnistat didn't have different colors"
Your customers must not read the instructions either. The Omnistat2 can certainly change the color. There are 100 colors actually.
 
"Of course I imagine many of us do agree that the default single green color is very dated."
That is probably why they let you change it. I use dark blue to match my UPB switches.
 
"Even many inexpensive models track filter changes"
When you select "Settings" Setup" "Filter Reminder" what do you see?  Hmm looks like a filter reminder to me.  You really didn't know that?
 
"Of course with the omnistat one can keep a cell phone handy and purchase Snap Link Mobile to change the temp but fumbling in the middle of the night from the bed, opening the app, selecting the app, pressing the right button can be more of a task than pressing an up button in the dark with no need to add 20 extra minutes to going back to sleep."
 
So how again do you change the setting of your other thermostats when you are in bed?  So Snaplink, for example, open the app, press temp, select the thermostat and there you go. Three clicks. Does that actually take you 20 minutes. :rofl:
 
Awww and no weather forecast on your thermostat?  How did you live all those years when you had one of those round Honeywell thermostats?
 
I get my weather from any device connected to the Internet.  Why spend money to put that in a thermostat?  Can your thermostat view stock prices, news and porn?  My Internet can.

 

[ano]

Thanks Ano.
 
Not sure what the Humidity controller is; guessing it is not 120VAC but rather some low voltage.

Just like a home thermostat doesn't control 120V heaters or 120V AC units, the Omnistat2 humidity control can't directly control 120V humidifiers or 120V dehumidifiers. If yours requires 120V control, a 24V relay can solve that problem for you.

 

[pete_c]

Thanks folks.
 
Really more in to function here with the Omnistat2.  I do not pay attention to it.
 
Last winter here tweaked a bit the humidity levels as mostly kept the house around 34% RH while pushing a bit on the master bedroom to around 40% RH.  (WAF thing).
 
Mostly monitor temperature and humidity levels in the house with HAI and 1-wire temperature and humidity sensors.

 

[cobra]

Thank you cobra.
 
How would you connect the dehumidifier?  I mean I have a stand alone dehumidifier with a control on it.  Would you tap into the controller wires to use it with the thermostat (well like the humdifier)?
 

humidifer.jpg

 
Yes, I would expect something like that, depending on the humidifier/dehumidifier in use.  I haven't wired one yet, but thought we might want to install a whole house unit at some point, so put in the OmniStat that had humidity so we could see it.

 

[StarTrekDoors]

Strange because my Omni does that for me automatically. At sunrise it reads the outside temps to decide what schedule it applies for the next 24 hours. Works great. Often in winter it can be in the 80's here, so I don't want the AC running in the afternoons even if its slightly warm in the house. I only use winter and summer schedules but I could do many more if I found the need.
 
"Many generic brands offer humidity and random fan cycling."
The OmniStat2 can do both.  It doesn't have "random fan cycling" but it certainly does have fan cycling. Random fan cycling sounds like you might have a broken thermostat.
 
"I recently had a customer complain the omnistat didn't have different colors"
Your customers must not read the instructions either. The Omnistat2 can certainly change the color. There are 100 colors actually.
 
"Of course I imagine many of us do agree that the default single green color is very dated."
That is probably why they let you change it. I use dark blue to match my UPB switches.
 
"Even many inexpensive models track filter changes"
When you select "Settings" Setup" "Filter Reminder" what do you see?  Hmm looks like a filter reminder to me.  You really didn't know that?
 
"Of course with the omnistat one can keep a cell phone handy and purchase Snap Link Mobile to change the temp but fumbling in the middle of the night from the bed, opening the app, selecting the app, pressing the right button can be more of a task than pressing an up button in the dark with no need to add 20 extra minutes to going back to sleep."
 
So how again do you change the setting of your other thermostats when you are in bed?  So Snaplink, for example, open the app, press temp, select the thermostat and there you go. Three clicks. Does that actually take you 20 minutes. :rofl:
 
Awww and no weather forecast on your thermostat?  How did you live all those years when you had one of those round Honeywell thermostats?
 
I get my weather from any device connected to the Internet.  Why spend money to put that in a thermostat?  Can your thermostat view stock prices, news and porn?  My Internet can.

 
Hello ano. I hope you are well and appreciate your reply.
 
My responses were to answer your question where you believed many thermostats could not do the same thing as the omnistat. Of course many devices can do more when you add a backend controller, but I was simply responding about the omnistat needing to function as other thermostats where different schedules were programmed on the thermostat without need of extra hardware. Sadly the omnistat doesn't support this older feature natively and does require an expensive controller.
 
Random fan cycling is common with most all the various digital thermostat brands, which by the way are not broken.
 
I see your play on words - whoops! I should have written "simultaneous" colors.   Single backlight color is not the same as a device that can show millions of colors on a display simultaneously. While cool that we can change the backlight to a single color, the customer's complaint was that her old Rite Temp 6080 had buttons of different color that helped her determine which was which at a glance and she liked how modern it looked in comparison to the dated looking omnistat with when she first saw it, the same old default HAI green backlight. Having to change the color out of the box immediately to try and make the omnistat look more modern is an extra step and should be default out of the box.  Too bad an Omni controller can't program omnistat color, as otherwise instead of you having to add the DIY power filter to resolve the unwanted backlight color change issue, your Omni could simply put it back whenever the backlight changes to an undesired color. I'm happy to say unwanted color change isn't a feature of modern thermostats.  Can you imagine the average Home Depot customer having to build a small electronic circuit because their thermostat couldn't maintain it's single color...
 
I was aware of the filter reminder, but simply mentioned the omnistat does not track UV Purifier bulb aging like some others do.  Of course not everyone has a UV purifier, or humidifier or dehumidifier, but many thermostats do offer those options.
 
You misunderstood about the 20 minutes which is why I mentioned the reference to many of the sleep studies about viewing "devices" before bed.  The 20 minutes is based on a study that found sleep disruption occurs when a person views a computer, electronic device, or phone at bedtime resulting in an additional 20 minutes to fall asleep.  Viewing your phone and walking through apps to raise the temp cool but not the same as pressing a single simple button in the dark on a handheld remote that is always by the bed or arm chair as example. 
 
About the weather on the thermostat, its just a modern feature the omnistat lacks and people want more modern features like that. No violins here and frankly, even if the omnistat showed weather information, single color still wouldn't look very modern which would be like going back to an old green backlit Honeywell.
 
You asked about spending less money to get a thermostat that looks modern with modern day features or why I would pay the price of an omnistat2 but get something that looks beautiful, has more than a single backlit color, and shows weather....I would respond that many customers are about vanity, they are about getting top dollar when they sell their renovated home, or they simply want to be more connected, just like they are with many other devices in the home that provide such modern day features.   Why do phones do more than make calls today - why do thermostats offer weather, power usage estimates, and run time info? That's a facetious question - I already know the answer.
 
I'm not saying the omnistat is pretty or modern looking, I'm not saying it offers modern day features - I'm writing that you put in a lot of work just to fix the omnistat's failure to maintain its single programmed color that most people don't have the talent to do and that I admire your DIY skills in being able to resolve this shortcoming of the omnistat.  The omnistat design was modern back in the day when it was first created but doesn't seem like it has been updated with exception to replacement of the HAI logo for the Leviton logo.
 
Frankly I don't want an omnistat to be visible in my personal home and the same is true for many of my customers.  My house is techie looking and an omnistat in view would take away from the modern look - and I dislike that it can't natively support two different schedules for heat and cool without help from my OPII which has to burn a bunch of the limited programming lines that are available.  If the omnistat supported different schedules for heat and cool natively, hooray - I would have more programming lines available to do more cool stuff rather than basic programming that should already exist.
 
The counterpoint of course is a drawback to some modern thermostats, it is that they won't interface with the Omni for special programming, like turning off the heat when a window has been opened, or changing temp when arming away but as some modern thermostats and control systems do support RS232/RS485, those can interface to an Omni and offer the best of the modern world with a modern thermostat, which is not the omnistat. Of course some modern thermostats have their own backend controller which does provide some really nice functions and others have cloud-based controls which can be modernized with each update but staying out of the cloud to me represents less risk.
 
Anyway, I seriously admire your fix for the omnistat and that your solution may fix this issue for quite a lot of people. Maybe Leviton will incorporate that into the next version of the omnistat so we don't have to.

 

[ano]

I believe what is happening in the Omnistat2 is that some noise spike is resetting the color to green.   Interesting enough it wasn't happening when either the AC or heating turned on, but just at random times during the day.  Also I used the same thermostat at a different house with two HVAC systems and never had a problem.  One cause might be how the low-voltage thermostat wire is laid down. If it runs parallel to a noisy power wire, it could induce noise in the thermostat wire.
 
On the thermostat, don't lose sight of what the Omnistat2 was designed for and who buys it.  It was never designed to be sold at Home Depot as an "impulse" items, and honestly, at the low volume of them that Leviton likely sells, its probably not worth their time to redesign them.  They are designed to be functional but not to stand out and used with homes controlled by an Omni.  I'm guessing many Omni homes have many Omnistat2's, the Omni Pro II can control 64 of them, I believe. 
 
Having said that I can tell you the whole world of thermostats is a MESS.  I actually just replaced my HVAC about two weeks ago, and I replaced two HVAC units in a previous house about two years ago.  Todays HVAC units are multispeed and variable speed compressors with proprietary zoning technology, and NONE of the thermostats out these EXCEPT the proprietary ones from the company itself will work, and this includes the Omnistat2.  Then there are all the proprietary thermostats, and none of these can be controlled by third-party hardware.  In my last house i wanted zoning, and had to use a standard Honeywell zoning unit because all the company zoning systems used proprietary thermostats.  Of course you can connect to these proprietary thermostats remotely with your phone for a monthly service charge. 
 
In my last house this got me very depressed and I went with a two-stage Trane that can be controlled by the Omnistat2 and Honeywell zone controller.  It worked.
 
Then a very wise company gave me a quote for the system in my new house, and they told me this, "All that variable speed compressor, multispeed stuff is a complete waste of your money."  He showed me some figures how how much this stuff costs to buy and fix, and you would NEVER get a return on your money. Never. And note I live in AZ where AC is pretty important.  Even the rated 26 seer will rarely if ever achieve that.  Its marketing hype.
 
So i got a 16 seer single speed compressor with a coil perfectly matched to my blower and ducts, and the Omnistat2 controls it perfectly, and it works great.  If you don't believe that the multi-stage and multi-speed stuff is a waste, go on Youtube and there are several reputable contractors that will tell you just that.  I'm so happy I listened.  And while my Omnistat2 won't tell me the pollution levels in Shanghai, I can live with that too.