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The Nest thermostat is a dream compared to the smoke detector. The smoke detector goes off all the time -- without rhyme or reason. With a normal detector, yo

The Nest thermostat is a dream compared to the smoke detector. The smoke detector goes off all the time -- without rhyme or reason. With a normal detector, you can just pull the battery if it refuses to shut off. With Nest, you actually need a screw driver to open the battery compartment to turn it off. So, when it decides to wake up the entire house at 3am (yes, the entire house, since they all go off in unison) you'll need to go find a screw driver to get it to shut up. The one flippin' reason I bought a Nest Protect was so I could "wave to silence" an alarm. Well, every time it goes off, it tells me that "this alarm cannot be silenced" - even by pushing the power button. Not once have I been able to turn off an alarm without removing the batteries. The worst feeling is when you get an alert on your iPhone while nobody (but your pet) is home. "Alert: your house is on fire." Then you rush home and realize it's a false alarm. After our fourth or fifth false alarm we returned them all and replaced them with the old-fashioned alarms. Watch this hilarious video if you're considering buying a Nest Protect: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpsMkLaEiOY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpsMkLaEiOY (warning: loud alarms in video)

Eiriksmal 11y ago
That's a horrible experience. But, to be fair, many newer structures have all their smoke detectors wired together so when one goes off, they all go off. I experienced that in my house, built in '97, which was extremely disorienting and stressful when it first happened. Growing up in a house built in the 80s, only the kitchen's smoke detector would go off if you burned something. I understand the perceived safety enhancement, but waking up the sleeping baby because dumb ol' dad smoked too much oil when stir frying something... Ugh. Edit: formatting.
- IgorPartola 11y ago
  This is why I like the FirstAlert wireless detectors: mesh network so they all go off, but you program each one to announce with a voice which room the trouble is in. They even announce which one has the low battery instead of chirping in the middle of the night.
  - Klathmon 11y ago
    Well much of that was the "dream" of the nest protects... It announces where the "alert" is, you can wave to dismiss it, it has the app for your phone to alert you if you are away from home, and they all link together (without needing any wiring in the house, making it easy to retrofit). Sadly in practice it's a mess, nothing works, so much so that I've lost all confidence in the product to do it's minimal function, detect smoke...
    - phil21 11y ago
      It's a bit ridiculous when you could have basically taken any old mass produced el-cheapo smoke detector circuit, and instead of tripping an alarm have it just feed into gpio pins on some wifi/whatever controller that has the "smarts". Literally all that was needed to get 100% of the reliability of the billions of detectors out on the market, while working out all the kinks on the "cloudy" sort of stuff. I have to admit I re-invent the wheel more than I should, but man. This one seems simple :)
- Animats 11y ago
  Yet industrial/commercial grade hard wired smoke detectors work just fine. I've worked in industrial facilities where there were thousands of smoke and fire detectors, and a zero false alarm rate. Yet, one day, when a HVAC unit overheated and smoked, all the right stuff happened. The local alarms went off, and the duct dampers slammed shut to contain the smoke. But because there wasn't confirmation from a second detector, or water flow in the sprinklers, the full emergency power off and building evacuation sequence didn't trip. We got to the HVAC unit and pulled its main switch before things escalated. So why can't Nest meet that standard of performance?
  - jordache 11y ago
    the team consists of a bunch of industrial designers and *hitty electronic engineers?
  - a3n 11y ago
    Because they're disrupting thermostats.
    - derrida 11y ago
      Success.
- cowsandmilk 11y ago
  Here is what I think is a sane timeline: (1) smoke detector in kitchen goes off, only sets off in kitchen (2) after 1 minute, other rooms start saying "smoke in kitchen" (3) after 2 minutes, alarm goes off in other rooms Timeline could be shortened if necessary for safety, but this doesn't seem like it would be difficult to implement.
magicalist 11y ago
> The one flippin' reason I bought a Nest Protect was so I could "wave to silence" an alarm. Well, every time it goes off, it tells me that "this alarm cannot be silenced." Not once have I been able to turn off an alarm without removing the batteries. I'm surprised you were a protect owner and didn't hear about wave to silence being disabled completely: https://nest.com/support/article/Nest-Protect-Safety https://nest.com/support/article/Nest-Protect-Safety
- Mtinie 11y ago
  Many of us bought ours before the patch...unfortunately.
atonse 11y ago
When I see that video, I now understand why there exists a Twitter account called Internet of Shit. https://twitter.com/internetofshit https://twitter.com/internetofshit
aledalgrande 11y ago
Never understood why in US the smoke detectors are such a nightmare. I never had a problem in Europe.
- oscardelben 11y ago
  I also never had one in Europe outside of the UK.
  - aledalgrande 11y ago
    True. Although you have to count that in US most buildings are made of wood and drywall, and not with Austrian or Swiss fire-proofing standards.
  - brohee 11y ago
    Mandatory in France nowadays..
realusername 11y ago
Is there really a voice like that in the nest fire alarm ?! It really looks like a bad joke, reminds me of playing Portal. This is exactly what a fire alarm in Portal would look like !
quietplatypus 11y ago
I guess I never will understand the reason for buying any tech gadget when the current solution is operating within parameters.
vatotemking 11y ago
> The worst feeling is when you get an alert on your iPhone while nobody (but your pet) is home. "Alert: your house is on fire." Then you rush home and realize it's a false alarm. This is both hilarious and horrible from my point of view reading this
remento 11y ago
They will replace them if you ask. I had a similar issue with our Gen 1 Nest Protects and false alarms. After talking to tech support, they replaced all of them with Gen 2 units. They actually replaced them twice as the first set of replacements were stolen from my doorstep.

Eiriksmal 11y ago

That's a horrible experience. But, to be fair, many newer structures have all their smoke detectors wired together so when one goes off, they all go off. I experienced that in my house, built in '97, which was extremely disorienting and stressful when it first happened. Growing up in a house built in the 80s, only the kitchen's smoke detector would go off if you burned something. I understand the perceived safety enhancement, but waking up the sleeping baby because dumb ol' dad smoked too much oil when stir frying something... Ugh. Edit: formatting.

IgorPartola 11y ago
This is why I like the FirstAlert wireless detectors: mesh network so they all go off, but you program each one to announce with a voice which room the trouble is in. They even announce which one has the low battery instead of chirping in the middle of the night.
- Klathmon 11y ago
  Well much of that was the "dream" of the nest protects... It announces where the "alert" is, you can wave to dismiss it, it has the app for your phone to alert you if you are away from home, and they all link together (without needing any wiring in the house, making it easy to retrofit). Sadly in practice it's a mess, nothing works, so much so that I've lost all confidence in the product to do it's minimal function, detect smoke...
  - phil21 11y ago
    It's a bit ridiculous when you could have basically taken any old mass produced el-cheapo smoke detector circuit, and instead of tripping an alarm have it just feed into gpio pins on some wifi/whatever controller that has the "smarts". Literally all that was needed to get 100% of the reliability of the billions of detectors out on the market, while working out all the kinks on the "cloudy" sort of stuff. I have to admit I re-invent the wheel more than I should, but man. This one seems simple :)
Animats 11y ago
Yet industrial/commercial grade hard wired smoke detectors work just fine. I've worked in industrial facilities where there were thousands of smoke and fire detectors, and a zero false alarm rate. Yet, one day, when a HVAC unit overheated and smoked, all the right stuff happened. The local alarms went off, and the duct dampers slammed shut to contain the smoke. But because there wasn't confirmation from a second detector, or water flow in the sprinklers, the full emergency power off and building evacuation sequence didn't trip. We got to the HVAC unit and pulled its main switch before things escalated. So why can't Nest meet that standard of performance?
- jordache 11y ago
  the team consists of a bunch of industrial designers and *hitty electronic engineers?
- a3n 11y ago
  Because they're disrupting thermostats.
  - derrida 11y ago
    Success.
cowsandmilk 11y ago
Here is what I think is a sane timeline: (1) smoke detector in kitchen goes off, only sets off in kitchen (2) after 1 minute, other rooms start saying "smoke in kitchen" (3) after 2 minutes, alarm goes off in other rooms Timeline could be shortened if necessary for safety, but this doesn't seem like it would be difficult to implement.

magicalist 11y ago

> The one flippin' reason I bought a Nest Protect was so I could "wave to silence" an alarm. Well, every time it goes off, it tells me that "this alarm cannot be silenced." Not once have I been able to turn off an alarm without removing the batteries. I'm surprised you were a protect owner and didn't hear about wave to silence being disabled completely: https://nest.com/support/article/Nest-Protect-Safety https://nest.com/support/article/Nest-Protect-Safety

Mtinie 11y ago
Many of us bought ours before the patch...unfortunately.

atonse 11y ago

When I see that video, I now understand why there exists a Twitter account called Internet of Shit. https://twitter.com/internetofshit https://twitter.com/internetofshit

aledalgrande 11y ago

Never understood why in US the smoke detectors are such a nightmare. I never had a problem in Europe.

oscardelben 11y ago
I also never had one in Europe outside of the UK.
- aledalgrande 11y ago
  True. Although you have to count that in US most buildings are made of wood and drywall, and not with Austrian or Swiss fire-proofing standards.
- brohee 11y ago
  Mandatory in France nowadays..

realusername 11y ago

Is there really a voice like that in the nest fire alarm ?! It really looks like a bad joke, reminds me of playing Portal. This is exactly what a fire alarm in Portal would look like !

quietplatypus 11y ago

I guess I never will understand the reason for buying any tech gadget when the current solution is operating within parameters.

vatotemking 11y ago

> The worst feeling is when you get an alert on your iPhone while nobody (but your pet) is home. "Alert: your house is on fire." Then you rush home and realize it's a false alarm. This is both hilarious and horrible from my point of view reading this

remento 11y ago

They will replace them if you ask. I had a similar issue with our Gen 1 Nest Protects and false alarms. After talking to tech support, they replaced all of them with Gen 2 units. They actually replaced them twice as the first set of replacements were stolen from my doorstep.