Multi-room thermostats: is Honeywell evohome the only system that works without internet?

VforViennetta

I'm in the market for a multi-room thermostat system.

The key requirement is that it should be able to work even when there is no internet connection.
App access from home is a nice-to-have but not important.
I don't care about geofencing artificial intelligence open window detection guessing our habits etc etc - I just want to be able to set different schedules for different rooms. I don't care about setting it when away from home, don't want to pay any cloud subscription and would like something that still works if the manufacturer goes bust / discontinues the kit / etc.

Is Honeywell EvoHome the only system that ticks this box? It comes with a tablet-like controller thingy that connects via radio to the thermostats on the valves. So, even with no internet, you can still set timers and fully control the system. The only drawback is that the radiator valves are really an eyesore: Honeywell evohome Radiator Multi Zone Kit HR924UK - The EVOHOME Shop

Tado's radiator valves look much nicer, but, if I understand correctly, the whole system becomes basically unusable without internet - you'd have to manually change the settings on each valve and wouldn't be able to set any timers.

Hive has radiator valves but lots of reviews online suggest they're still unreliable, and I don't quite know if the system would work without internet.

Valiant has ambisense and Drayton the wiser system but I couldn't find much information on them.

Thoughts?

Puntoboy

I’m pretty sure they all work without an internet connection. The internet connection just enables the “smart” features but they can all work just using the control on the wall.

VforViennetta

If you have only one zone, yes. But what if you have multiple zones, how does that work?

For example, do you install valves on each radiator, then one thermostat (the square thingy) in each room? Ie with no internet the thermostat in each room can still control the valves on the radiators of that room?

Do the thermostats rely on the internet to communicate, on a radio frequency, on wifi but no internet?

If there is no internet, is all I can do go to the valves of each radiator and change the temperature there, or can I also change a timer?

The Honeywell website is fairly clear, all the others are not clear at all.

Technically, there is no reason why you would need an internet connection to operate these things while you're home. Commercially, the business model of some of these companies is based on spying you... (One of the reasons why I chose Sonos, which can work over an internal network with no internet, over Google chromecast speakers, which can't).

Puntoboy

I have two zones and a wireless thermostat for each zone. I don't use radiator valves.

The thermostates communicate wireless with the control box in our cylinder cupboard. I beleive that then communicates using Zigbee (I could be wrong) with the hub connected to the router. But if the there is no internet connection or the hub is not powered on, the thermostats still work.

VforViennetta

I see, that's interesting. Which system do you have?
Do you have to set schedule etc on each thermostat separately, or is there one thing that can control everything (like there is on the EvoHome, which is one thing I like about it)?
Can you set some kind of temporary heat for the whole house, eg heat the whole house to 21 degrees for 1 hour?

If you don't have radiator valves, how are the radiators associated to the zone? I presume that's something the installer sets up?

What would be the pros and cons of radiator valves vs a thermostat for each zone?

Puntoboy

I use Hive currently.

The house already had two zones. One for upstairs and one for downstairs. This is part of the plumbing. the radiators in each zone are controlled through a valve that in the cylinder cupboard, so I have two valves in there, one for each zone. The thermostat controls each valve in it's zone.

Obviously if you don't have this setup, radiator TRVs are ideal to control each radiator. We have never bothered and just manually turn off radiators that aren't needed, like my office (computers keep it warm ). Otherwise you could speak to a plumber to add a second zone valve to your system but I would image that wouldn't be cheap. That's really the difference, retrofitting TRVs is cheap, easy and allows individual radiator control, whereas zone valves are more expensive to retrofit, but if you have them already you just need another thermostat.

Hive does have a feature called "Boost" that allows you to set a temporary temp for a zone for a specified time.

The two thermostats aren't linked in any way (other than within the app) so you can't control the both together. But that's fine for us as the requirements for each zone are different.

VforViennetta

I see, thanks.

So EvoHome is more expensive than Hive but has the advantage of letting you control everything from one tablet/thingy.

Puntoboy

In theory, with your setup, Hive would let you do the same I think. As you would have one thermostat and TRVs on each radiator. But I don't have TRVs so cannot confirm.

27neth

I have the Evohome. With one of there TRV’s on each radiator you can control the temperature on each radiator separately with the tablet.
you don’t need the internet, only if you want to mess about with your phone setting the temperatures.
I have each room set to different temperatures at different times of the day.

Jabes

I sent back Tado when I discovered how it worked.  The zone scheduling is all controlled server side via the internet.  It will maintain current settings without internet but not move any zone's temperature.

I have evohome now, and it works fine. It is old, and doesn't look the best - but it does work.

I believe that Wiser also works locally and has matured a lot recently - I understand that is also a locally run system.