CES 2017: Carrier to Launch HomeKit-Enabled 'Cor' Thermostat

I was going to jump on board with the Nest, but then I learned it was not HomeKit compatible. Kept me from purchasing.

I have a Nest thermostat and absolutely love it. For something as basic as a thermostat, I haven't seen a real use case yet where HomeKit would be beneficial to me (and that has nothing to do with having already invested in a non-HomeKit option). I can understand lighting and other products with instantaneous needs at varying times, but my thermostat is scheduled to do things when I typically need them done. If I'm coming home early or from vacation or something, tapping the app and turning the A/C back on or something isn't a big deal. Particularly when it takes some time for it to reach a given temp anyway. The fact that I can't say "Hey Siri, turn the air down to 72 degrees" and have her tell me she didn't quite get that 3 times before I remember the exact wording I have to use isn't really something I feel I'm lacking. Takes me the same or less time to tap it down in the Nest app.

If I understand my situation correctly, I have a Carrier HVAC and have been told that it is a proprietary system and I'm essentually stuck with Carrier thermostats. Am I incorrect? I'm still a little bit excited for this, but your experience is certainly a bummer.

The answer is, it depends; but more than likely you could change. I have a fairly high end multi stage Bryant (aka Carrier; The Bryant/Carrier are basically 100% the same) which I got a few years ago after I received a settlement rebate for my old broken unit (and took advantage of the tax credits) which came with one of their awful proprietary touchscreen controllers. After seeing the cost of their wifi connected thermostat I ended up going with the Ecobee 3, however I did have to rewire the connection from the thermostat to the furnace as the Carrier system uses a special 4 wire setup and with the dual stages (on AC and Heat) plus humidifier I needed the full 8 wires. In addition I had to change the air conditioner setup from the proprietary wire connection to the standard HVAC setup (however this didn't require any new wires to be run, just rearranging them). So long as you have a single zone system there shouldn't be any reason you couldn't change thermostats fairly easily (though you do need one that supports multiple stages). As far as multiple zones go, I believe that carrier does have a zone controller that uses the standard thermostat controller connections (and would work with the Ecobee or any controller) however I believe that this is an option though, and that their proprietary system comes standard; I've also heard (though I can't confirm) that as a cost cutting method (and to be the worlds biggest dicks) Carrier is/has eliminated the "old fashioned" generic HVAC interface on some models requiring you to replace the controller board to an "upgraded" model to use a generic thermostat.

The easiest thing to do in order to know if you could change yours would just be to pop the cover off your furnace and see if you have the standard W/W2/Y/Y2/G/R/Comm connectors on your control board or just the 4 pins of the custom interface. If you have a newer Carrier system then it will 100% be connected using their custom 4 wire connector, but you still may very well have the other connectors. If you have the connectors then you, at worst, would just have to pull a new, multi-strand wire. In the end, with mine, I was able to move to the Ecobee without loosing any functionality apart from the diagnostics codes (which does nothing for me) and the manual fan only mode speed control (however there is still a way to set it manually). The Ecobee does a much better job then their awful controller ever did and is much more energy efficient with things like away mode and changing to the different sensors depending upon where I am in the house.

Cor sucks...at least there last version did. I have it and dislike it. Sure it's a wifi thermostat and it works decent but it has no smart features and the smartphone app is literally just the thermostat GUI put on your smartphone. Two weeks ago I get a update to the Cor app (First one since I got the thermostat over a year ago) and it's promising HomeKit support and Siri support with no mention new models. I am thrilled. I download the update and absolutely none of the features seem to be working. Look at the reviews for the app. It has one star. The thing is garbage and I don't have much faith for new one. I really hope they make the HomeKit stuff work on the first gen one. I strongly advise people to skip Cor.

If I understand my situation correctly, I have a Carrier HVAC and have been told that it is a proprietary system and I'm essentually stuck with Carrier thermostats. Am I incorrect? I'm still a little bit excited for this, but your experience is certainly a bummer.

Thermostats work best when they are on a wall in the middle of rooms, not hidden away.

Exactly, and the only one to fix that is Ecobee with their wireless sensors. One thermostat can never cover the whole house no matter how well it's placed. At some point the thermostat will always be in the wrong place. When the thermostat is supposed to detect if I'm at home this is a major problem. Installing a new thermostat in the same place is difficult enough for most people, are you seriously suggesting they need to make sure it's in the optimal location as well?

As far as design goes, I won't argue that the Nest looks slightly better, but because of that and its small size it's harder to operate and requires the wall it's installed on to be either in perfect shape under the old thermostat or else fixed and well painted/blended with the old paint. This means that for the vast majority of installations the Nest will look much WORSE not better then the competition since the larger size of the Ecobee makes it more likely to cover problem/holes which would be exposed otherwise.

On top of that, I know it's subjective, but I would hardly say the Ecobee3 (or even for the most part, this Carrier one) is ugly. It's a black slab with rounded corners and a white back...

If I understand my situation correctly, I have a Carrier HVAC and have been told that it is a proprietary system and I'm essentually stuck with Carrier thermostats. Am I incorrect? I'm still a little bit excited for this, but your experience is certainly a bummer.

i have a carrier havoc with 4 zones and it is not compatible with Nest or many other systems, even the hackers have not gotten it working. so I'm in the same boat as you and will look forward to this coming out and streaming my complicated home heating