Nest 1st gen and 2nd gen thermostats no longer supported from Oct 25

While I agree with the message, I think honesty is important. The Nest gen 3 was released in 2015[1]. People got a 10-14 years out of these devices.

Also, that posts says the thermostat will still work locally so the failure state of the "smart" device here is that it became a "dumb" device after a decade+.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Nest#Nest_Learning_Ther...

Not quite logical.

Release years aren’t purchase years.

Everyone didn’t have the same purchase year.

And, it’s just a thermostat. When they first came out it was a little novel. Not anymore.

Temperature is a solved problem and algorithm.

There’s no real reason to discontinue them - they do the same thing they always have, connected to the same shared infrastructure.

I highly doubt the cost of cloud, tech increased or decreased since then.

It feels like a form of forced planned obsolescence. Maybe some growth or product folks not hitting their bonus lol.

Gen 1 and Gen 2 were unique also don’t have microphones in them. I know Gen 2 handled microbursting well not sure about other gens.

The truth is the cloud is someone else’s computer and the cloud always costs someone else, if not the customer.

Maybe nests aren’t being replaced fast enough or new nest purchases aren’t growing like before due to other options.

I won’t trust or buy any more Nest devices again or trust the brand. I buy newer Nest devices and cycle them out.

Gen 1 and Gen 2 folks were early adopters and they can find more elsewhere.

There are lots of other better options.

It’s easy to go early adopt the next thing. Home automation has come a long way and those who are trying to earn in the past risk being left in the past.

The device will work locally but api is being removed so the mobile app won’t work and neither will any home automation integrations.

The least they could do is just let people control it directly. We’ll see if it gets unlocked now.

We don't have to be exact or pedantic. Whatever the original purchase date for individual purchases, I guarantee they are closer to a decade ago than a year ago.

EDIT: That comment was heavily expanded after I replied. It was originally only about the distinction of purchase date. I won't debate the rest of the comment because as I said at the start, "While I agree with the message...". I just don't think this specific case is a particularly good example of what is being argued and therefore arguing it is probably counterproductive.

Less about exact dates a few years apart can not be a decade.

I know this because I’ve bought a few, not sure about yourself.

Hope that helps.

And if they still work mechanically after a decade, they shouldn't stop working because the company wants you to do another purchase. My Pi 3 is 9 years old and there's no reason it shouldn't continue to work until it mechanically doesn't.

>I think honesty is important

Lol

As an entity looking to replace your existing, working devices you have a social contract to not break things and force me to do yet another round of research to replace your device.

One device is a pain. When you have a smart fridge, dishwasher, sonos, doorbell, smart lock, etc: the mean time to corporate abandonment gets very short.

I have an Ecobee, and for sure I’m looking to get off of that ecosystem once I’m forced to.

It also feels like Ecobee is an abandoned project at this stage: I get a 500 error trying to get a dev token, and portions of the app have been broken the entire time I’ve had one (9 years, 2 devices).

Still 1,000 times better than a dumb device if I can change the temp from my phone without getting out of bed and walking down the stairs and set a schedule on it from my phone rather than navigating the ridiculous UI every dumb thermostat with a schedule function has.

> People got a 10-14 years out of these devices.

Thermostats generally last a lot longer than that.

Most of these Nest units continue to work perfectly well and could continue operating with a simple cloud service for many years.

(Or a local connection! No need for cloud.)

Sure. If you need a device that does x, a device that does x for 1 month is better than one that doesn’t do x forever.

That’s no excuse for Google arbitrarily disabling functionality.

As someone who bought 3 of these for $300 a pop I vehemently disagree. This is complete bullshit and anti-consumer behavior that should be illegal.

in what world is a mere 10-14 years anywhere nesr acceptable? Mx parents home that was bzild in the 80s still has the original thermostats and I expect they will not replace them in theor lifetime. And this is not an exception, its the rule and should stay like that

It’s still unacceptable. We should all be demanding legislation that requires code and/or hardware specs be open-sourced when they reach end of life. Otherwise, we’re simply continuing to be irresponsible by creating fast fashion in technology, enabling products to be designed for a short life and destined for the landfill simply because companies only care about quarterly profits and have no accountability.

Future generations deserve better.

How often are you changing the temp or schedule? That seems like a once every few months type thing.

How much functionality does that original thermostat have?

Top level said 25-50 years. 14 sounds like a lot if you fixate on the bottom end of the scale.

I’ve seen house thermostats that were so old they were starting to embrittle from ozone and UV damage. That’s more like 40+ years.

Also as someone else pointed out, the Nests are typically at least 2-3 times the cost of a normal thermostat. True, they eventually pay for themselves, but that money still went to Nest instead of PG&E.

Now do how much they cost compared to the $250 + tax Nest charged.

My current thermostat is older than Nest, Google, and all of the founders of each of those companies. I can still get repair parts for it. It has the schematics printed on the inside of the case in case I can't get repair parts for it one day. A bad investment is a bad investment, even if there are mitigating factors.

Soon, the same (or more?) than 1sr/2nd gen Nests.

Are you willing to pay for the true cost of maintaining these devices for ~50 years? The original price might have been 600 USD. I think the answer is regulation. Another idea: Sell the IP to a separate company who will support the legacy product for a fee. The original product will tell you how many years support is included (not lifetime). Later, there may be monthly charges. I doubt you will like that idea, but it is more honest. Germany has similar rules about car parts. Car manufs are required to make replacement parts available for X years after a car is manuf'd.

> Are you willing to pay for the true cost of maintaining these devices for ~50 years?

Sounds like Nest/Google didn’t think about that when they priced their products. That’s not the consumer’s fault. I’ve been de-Google-ing myself over the past couple of years and this is the final nail in the coffin. They could have given a partial refund, instead they insult customers with a “discount”.

Looks like Nest owners are figuring out what they might do with their equipment that they own.

https://www.reddit.com/r/hacking/comments/1k97rv0/hack_a_nes...

> the true cost

How much do you think a server for config files costs? The true cost is very little here. You can make a server host a million thermostat connections for less than a thousand dollars per year. But let's 10x that to be safe, and have a sysadmin dedicate an overkill 1 day per week to keeping the servers happy. And we'll say the sysadmin makes well over median salary and costs $200k to employ.

For 2 million devices, that's $20k a year in server costs and $40k a year in sysadmin. For 50 years, that's 3 million dollars. So it would take a whole... dollar and a half per purchase to fund 50 years of servers.

Making this subscription-based would be fine, as long as I have my choice of providers. Because then I can run it myself on a raspberry pi or pay a big host a few dollars a year to handle my entire household of devices.