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Don't Pirate Or We'll Mess With Your Connected Thermostats, Warns East Coast ISP (engadget.com)
Internet service provider Armstrong Zoom has roughly a million subscribers in the Northeastern part of the U.S. and is keen to punish those it believes are using file-sharing services. According to Engadget, "the ISP's response to allegedly naughty customers is bandwidth throttling, which is when an ISP intentionally slows down your internet service based on what you're doing online. Armstrong Zoom's warning letter openly threatens its suspected file-sharing customers about its ability to use or control their webcams and connected thermostats." From the report: The East Coast company stated: "Please be advised that this may affect other services which you may have connected to your internet service, such as the ability to control your thermostat remotely or video monitoring services." All U.S. states served by Armstrong Zoom will be experiencing temperatures around or under freezing over the weekend and into the near future. Bandwidth throttling for customers in those areas who have connected thermostats could mean the difference between sickness and health, or even life and death. Seems like an extreme punishment for any allegedly downloaded Game of Thrones cam rips.
Hooray! I remember reading the exact same story on /. a few days ago.
Let me google it, "connected thermostat site:slashdot.org". Here we go:
https://yro.slashdot.org/story...
Maybe editor should do the same and Google it before posting dupes ;-)
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
They aren't touching the thermostat. They're throttling the internet speed in response to copyright infringement notices. Their terms of use and related documentation likely covers what can happen in regards to copyright infringement. If you don't like that practice, that is a different argument.. one that I would likely side with you on. However, it's up to the customer to understand the policies and what it entails. The ISP isn't targeting smart thermostats or the like, it's only warning the customer of possible issues if their connection is throttled.
SeaFox writes
> It's a pretty well known fact that it takes [i]more[/i] energy to change the temperature in a home than to maintain a set temperature.
Not according to Max Sherman, a "senior scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory overseeing research for residential energy efficiency." According to http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sc-cons-1113-karpspend-20141107-column.html:
"Another common refrain is that it's cheaper to keep your home at a constant temperature, even when you're not home. 'Almost never true,' Sherman said, noting again that homes with heat pumps can be an exception. 'If the system is running less, it means it's using less energy.'"
Fucking morons the isp should be regulated as a utility not a puppet for the mpaa and riaa and not writing the laws in this country by legally bribing the assholes in DC. My 83 old mother was harassed by Comcast on behalf of the mpaa for torrenting movies and tv shows. Impossible for her to do this she can't even use email it is too complicated for her. So how many others are wrongly accused by incompetent isp s what happens to the rights of citizens in this country we are headed to a corrupt government running a police / security state if we do not stand up soon.
Just don't trust ANY programmable thermostat, never mind the Internet-connected ones which are vulnerable to hacking and stuff like this.
Up here in Ottawa, Canada - which is damned cold at the moment, -25C but cools things as fast as if it was -40C with the wind chill - any heating system outage could do serious damage to your home.
You're not worried just about frozen pipes. I've personally seen the water in the bowl of a toilet freeze, split the bowl, and cause the tank to fall over. The fill valve in the toilet then helpfully tried to keep the tank full... tens of thousands of dollars in damage, and, to add insult to injury, a huge water bill.
It could be an asshole ISP, North Korean hackers, or it could be a pair of weak AA batteries while you're away on vacation, but the more complicated something is, the more prone it is to failure. Even a top-quality Honeywell Commercial can't turn on the heat if it's got dead batteries.
When you install a programmable thermostat, keep the old one!
Most central heating systems have thermostat terminals labeled R and W (or W1). When R is connected to W, the furnace will go through its startup rituals and produce heat. As soon as you disconnect them, the furnace will start its shutdown rituals.
Startup/shutdown may take a few seconds before the furnace appears to do anything. Any relatively modern (since 1990 or so) gas or oil furnace will do things like start the drafting fan (blows air up the chimney) and heat the igniters before it turns on the fuel, and once it has the fuel burning, it will wait until the heat exchanger is warm before it turns on the blower that moves the warm air into your home. Likewise, shutdown may take a few seconds, usually with the main blower running until the heat exchanger has given up all its heat.
Mount the old mechanical thermostat someplace where it will ensure the house never gets below about 15C. Connect its R and W (W1) terminals in parallel with the R and W terminals on your new thermostat, so that they work as an OR gate (two switches in parallel).
That way, even if the programmable - or those silly/dangerous Nest things - fails, the old-school mechanical thermostat will click the heat on.
Keep the old thermostat set to a lower temperature than the house should ever normally reach and it won't interfere with the energy-savings provided by the programmable thermostat.
When you're connecting the old thermostat as a failsafe, don't assume that the colors on the wiring mean anything - not all R terminals are connected to the red wire, and not all W terminals are connected to the white wire!
The G and the Y terminals control other functions in your furnace, no need to touch them.
R - transformer common, 24V AC
W - call for heat (W1, W2, etc. are for multistage furnaces - use W1)
Y - call for air conditioning - leave it alone
G - call for fan (the fan will start automatically when the furnace is heating or cooling, connecting R-G will cause the fan to run continuously for air flow)
Other terminals can be Googled.
Do the wiring carefully, using proper thermostat/doorbell wire. Put a sticker on your furnace to remind you of where you mounted the backup thermostat. If you're in the least bit unsure of what I'm describing, call a licensed HVAC contractor.
A final warning is that while this COULD be done with baseboards and other line-operated electric heat, it would require suitable thermostats and a licensed electrician to do it - burning your house down to save a flood is counterproductive.
This is a great way to recycle an old mercury-filled thermostat; you've changed it from hazardous waste into a safety device.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.