That's a shame. He probably misled quite a few people into buying the Honeywell by being the top review. He admittedly never owned a Nest, and that's obvious in his comparison, as not a single point in it is accurate; one must wonder where he came up with them having no first-hand experience.
* If Nest isn't on a schedule (whether it's a manually set schedule or the "auto-schedule"), it's holding temp. Like every other thermostat.
* It is more sensitive than the Honeywell, not less; it kicks on at +1 degrees on AC mode, but -0.7 degrees on heat. If you really want, you can set fractional target temperatures too.
* He thinks Nest shows nothing on its display but the temperature, when it's actually a fully interactive computer. All the settings can be changed at the wall, not just using the app/website.
At least the number of Amazon reviews suggests Nest is outselling all the Honeywell wifi panels over 20:1 anyway.
Who knows? Maybe it was written by a Honeywell shill. Worked on me apparently.
I will note one other difference which helped sway me to Honeywell is the fact that the Nest requires a battery, while the Honeywell requires "bus" power. I actually didn't have a "C wire" set up before I installed mine, but it was trivial to climb into the attic and re-purpose the fan control wire to instead provide constant (24VAC) power.
Granted, changing thermostat batteries wasn't really at the top of my pet peeve list, but I did read that the Nest has the potential to suck batteries dry too quickly. Any opinion on battery life?
Nest uses your HVAC's power wire like other thermostats. There are no batteries to replace.
It has a permanent internal battery, charged by the power wire, which allows it to stay active in a power failure and to use more power than some systems provide when you're interacting with its screen. So there's no real difference between the Nest and the Honeywell in terms of power or installation except that the Nest has a built-in rechargeable li-ion backup battery.
Nest does have an internal battery than can be charge via a USB port if you ever need to. I bought my Nest used off Craigslist (substantial savings) and have never had any low battery issues. It's bus powered, but the battery smooths over power disruptions.
* If Nest isn't on a schedule (whether it's a manually set schedule or the "auto-schedule"), it's holding temp. Like every other thermostat.
* It is more sensitive than the Honeywell, not less; it kicks on at +1 degrees on AC mode, but -0.7 degrees on heat. If you really want, you can set fractional target temperatures too.
* He thinks Nest shows nothing on its display but the temperature, when it's actually a fully interactive computer. All the settings can be changed at the wall, not just using the app/website.
At least the number of Amazon reviews suggests Nest is outselling all the Honeywell wifi panels over 20:1 anyway.