9 ms·

We all recognize the importance of fire safety, but there is no excuse for the design of smoke and CO detectors to be so painfully obnoxious. If it motivates h

by ds9 13y ago

We all recognize the importance of fire safety, but there is no excuse for the design of smoke and CO detectors to be so painfully obnoxious. If it motivates homeowners to disable them, it is a bad design, isn't this obvious? When one of these things has a low battery, it chirps intolerably - but only every 30 minutes!! So when this happens at night, and there are several of them in the residence, you are literally kept awake half the night, waiting by one after another, just to figure out which one needs a battery. I could go on, but all this is familiar. All they need is some thoughtful UI, and the Nest model looks excellent in this respect. It does not compromise safety - it will still go off if a human doesn't interact with it right away. It has other flaws (wifi required? no thanks; and probably expense) but this is an improvement over the "dumb" models.

DanBC 13y ago
> When one of these things has a low battery, it chirps intolerably - but only every 30 minutes!! So when this happens at night, and there are several of them in the residence, you are literally kept awake half the night, waiting by one after another, just to figure out which one needs a battery. Change all the batteries and go back to sleep.
- JoeAltmaier 13y ago
  Or, more likely, disable the device and forget about it. Which is what the OP says the fire department blames for deaths in home fires. The problem is real, and this device addresses it. It goes much further, and the wisdom of that is debatable, but some change is certainly needed.
  - DanBC 13y ago
    Do you think "soft" reminders of battery age are enough to make people check or change their smoke detector batteries? You've been reading this thread. Have you replaced the batteries because of this thread? or decided to check the batteries because of this thread?
    - JoeAltmaier 13y ago
      I don't think this device or this thread will affect me after I stand up and leave the room.
    - ebiester 13y ago
      Only if it connects to the internet and orders them off Amazon for me.
- nemothekid 13y ago
  What if I have no batteries and its 11PM? Will the user 1.) Drive to the nearest 24/7 convenience store or 2.) disable the device and forget about it?
brudgers 13y ago
Ambulances don't play cello sonatas. Minefields aren't marked with rainbows and kittens. The user interface for current smoke detectors is very thoughtful. It is based upon experience. When alarms don't alarm, people often die. When alarms are ignored, people often die. Making obnoxious sounds is a feature not a bug. The inconvenience of being kept awake by a smoke alarm battery tends to pale in comparison to the inconvenience of being kept dead.
- secabeen 13y ago
  I still don't understand your objection. What feature are you specifically objecting to?
- nemothekid 13y ago
  If my smoke detector makes an obnoxious sound during a controlled fire (like cooking) the product is defective. You are ignoring the real problem here. The problem is "people who are inconvenienced by their smoke detectors such as an alarm going off when toast is burnt, tend to disable them - leading to death. How do we solve this?" Its quite obvious the solution isn't "Don't disable them" because if it was I'm sure nest's product wouldn't exist. As a product designer, its very hard to change human behavior. If humans are disabling smoke detectors because they are inconvenienced, either the product is wrong, or user education is wrong. I'm hard pressed to believe you are going to educate people to not disable their smoke detectors while cooking, when people still by and large drive without seatbelts.
  - ubercore 13y ago
    I think you missed the "A smoke alarm in or near the kitchen is incorrectly placed if it is producing frequent false alarms" part of the original statement.
    - macNchz 13y ago
      Often placing it sufficiently far away from the kitchen isn't possible. I have a fairly large—by NYC standards—apartment. Our smoke alarm is around 3 corners and 20 feet down the hallway, but it goes off LIKE CRAZY. Basically if the stove gets hot, it's going to go off. We have 11' ceilings, and nothing I can stand on in the apartment is tall enough for me to reach it. After waving towels at it and poking at the silence button with a broom handle ad nauseam, I borrowed a ladder and took it down before cooking a big dinner for guests. I know I should reinstall it, but the silence has been fantastic. So yes, I think the Nest smoke alarm does have a major upside: people in my situation would actually use it.
incision 13y ago
>"We all recognize the importance of fire safety, but there is no excuse for the design of smoke and CO detectors to be so painfully obnoxious. If it motivates homeowners to disable them, it is a bad design, isn't this obvious?" If you're being woken up by low batteries or disabling your smoke alarms - no, you don't recognize the important of fire safety. >"When one of these things has a low battery, it chirps intolerably - but only every 30 minutes!! So when this happens at night, and there are several of them in the residence, you are literally kept awake half the night, waiting by one after another, just to figure out which one needs a battery." The battery backup in a typical residential fire alarm can last several years. Spend a few minutes and few bucks replacing the batteries once a year and it's unlikely you will ever have this problem. I certainly expect a $130 alarm to offer something over the typical $20-30 counterparts and it appears this one does, but I certainly don't consider support for handwaving or delayed alarms to be among the benefits.
rschmitty 13y ago
If you have an alarm that warns you only every 30 minutes, spend a little and get new alarms A 30 minute interval is bad design, mine are like 30 seconds to 1 minute (been a while) plus they have a yellow LED when battery is low, red when dead or removed, and green when all systems go

by ds9 13y ago

DanBC 13y ago

> When one of these things has a low battery, it chirps intolerably - but only every 30 minutes!! So when this happens at night, and there are several of them in the residence, you are literally kept awake half the night, waiting by one after another, just to figure out which one needs a battery. Change all the batteries and go back to sleep.

JoeAltmaier 13y ago
Or, more likely, disable the device and forget about it. Which is what the OP says the fire department blames for deaths in home fires. The problem is real, and this device addresses it. It goes much further, and the wisdom of that is debatable, but some change is certainly needed.
- DanBC 13y ago
  Do you think "soft" reminders of battery age are enough to make people check or change their smoke detector batteries? You've been reading this thread. Have you replaced the batteries because of this thread? or decided to check the batteries because of this thread?
  - JoeAltmaier 13y ago
    I don't think this device or this thread will affect me after I stand up and leave the room.
  - ebiester 13y ago
    Only if it connects to the internet and orders them off Amazon for me.
nemothekid 13y ago
What if I have no batteries and its 11PM? Will the user 1.) Drive to the nearest 24/7 convenience store or 2.) disable the device and forget about it?

brudgers 13y ago

Ambulances don't play cello sonatas. Minefields aren't marked with rainbows and kittens. The user interface for current smoke detectors is very thoughtful. It is based upon experience. When alarms don't alarm, people often die. When alarms are ignored, people often die. Making obnoxious sounds is a feature not a bug. The inconvenience of being kept awake by a smoke alarm battery tends to pale in comparison to the inconvenience of being kept dead.

secabeen 13y ago
I still don't understand your objection. What feature are you specifically objecting to?
nemothekid 13y ago
If my smoke detector makes an obnoxious sound during a controlled fire (like cooking) the product is defective. You are ignoring the real problem here. The problem is "people who are inconvenienced by their smoke detectors such as an alarm going off when toast is burnt, tend to disable them - leading to death. How do we solve this?" Its quite obvious the solution isn't "Don't disable them" because if it was I'm sure nest's product wouldn't exist. As a product designer, its very hard to change human behavior. If humans are disabling smoke detectors because they are inconvenienced, either the product is wrong, or user education is wrong. I'm hard pressed to believe you are going to educate people to not disable their smoke detectors while cooking, when people still by and large drive without seatbelts.
- ubercore 13y ago
  I think you missed the "A smoke alarm in or near the kitchen is incorrectly placed if it is producing frequent false alarms" part of the original statement.
  - macNchz 13y ago
    Often placing it sufficiently far away from the kitchen isn't possible. I have a fairly large—by NYC standards—apartment. Our smoke alarm is around 3 corners and 20 feet down the hallway, but it goes off LIKE CRAZY. Basically if the stove gets hot, it's going to go off. We have 11' ceilings, and nothing I can stand on in the apartment is tall enough for me to reach it. After waving towels at it and poking at the silence button with a broom handle ad nauseam, I borrowed a ladder and took it down before cooking a big dinner for guests. I know I should reinstall it, but the silence has been fantastic. So yes, I think the Nest smoke alarm does have a major upside: people in my situation would actually use it.

incision 13y ago

>"We all recognize the importance of fire safety, but there is no excuse for the design of smoke and CO detectors to be so painfully obnoxious. If it motivates homeowners to disable them, it is a bad design, isn't this obvious?" If you're being woken up by low batteries or disabling your smoke alarms - no, you don't recognize the important of fire safety. >"When one of these things has a low battery, it chirps intolerably - but only every 30 minutes!! So when this happens at night, and there are several of them in the residence, you are literally kept awake half the night, waiting by one after another, just to figure out which one needs a battery." The battery backup in a typical residential fire alarm can last several years. Spend a few minutes and few bucks replacing the batteries once a year and it's unlikely you will ever have this problem. I certainly expect a $130 alarm to offer something over the typical $20-30 counterparts and it appears this one does, but I certainly don't consider support for handwaving or delayed alarms to be among the benefits.

rschmitty 13y ago

If you have an alarm that warns you only every 30 minutes, spend a little and get new alarms A 30 minute interval is bad design, mine are like 30 seconds to 1 minute (been a while) plus they have a yellow LED when battery is low, red when dead or removed, and green when all systems go