With all of the news coming out about connected homes and systems that let you remotely control the temperature in your house, it is easy to forget that there are plenty of homes that don’t central heating and cooling systems that are compatible with smart thermostats like Nest.

In my hometown, most apartments, and even a lot of older homes, don’t even have central heating and air conditioning. We all prop portable air conditioners in our windows instead. Using a smartphone to control the temperature is a luxury that’s not available to most of us… or at least it wasn’t until recently.

Tado’s Smart AC Control is a new smart hub that supports any air conditioner that works with a remote control. It lets you use your phone as a remote for your window unit… and much more.

Tado Smart AC Control 1

The Smart AC Control is compatible with any air conditioner, wall, portable, or centralized, that uses a remote control with infrared beams.

With it, you can set up your AC unit to switch on or off based on your location. Using geofencing, you can make sure you don’t accidentally leave with your air conditioner running when you leave the house. Plus, it will switch on when you are close to home so your room will start cooling before you even walk through the front door.

You can also monitor and adjust the temperature of your room using the compatible app for Android or iOS. You can remotely change the mode, fan speed, and more, right from the app while at work or even on vacation (maybe you are worried about your cat getting too hot).

The hub itself also has touch capacitive controls. So, you don’t have to track down your smartphone it you just want to turn down the air.

The Smart AC Control is available now at the company’s website for $199.

Via: TechCrunch

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14 replies on “Tado’s Smart AC Control turns Window AC units into smart home devices”

  1. interesting.. but there are likely some IFTTT recipie and smart outlets, and sensors which can effectively give you some control of your stand alone AC/units at a cheaper price point.. just a thought

    1. Hi Michael,

      You are probably right in that the rules would likely look something like IF temperature is greater than 23c THEN turn on AC. However, like most ‘cheaper’ solutions that would have some hidden costs. For example: If you have a variety of temperatures in your rules, but can only turn on the AC, it means the AC would always have to be set to the lowest desired temperature. This would cause the compressor to come on every time, even if not required. That increases power usage, and also wear on your AC (two hidden costs). This also assumes your AC comes back on in the identical state after a power removal, which is not always true. Additionally, depending on the hysteresis you build into your rules, you might have rapid on/off sequences for your AC, leading to additional wear. Overall, it is much better to simply send the desired setpoint to the AC, and let it decide the best way to get there.

  2. I can’t believe they want $200 for an IR blaster connected to a wifi chip. I guess the ‘touch capacitive controls’ could be cool but, i personally am gonna wait for the item thats functionally identical but costs $30.

    The ‘Hook’ project on kickstarter is on a similar track but, they’re focusing on basically everything with a remote except air conditioners at the moment, only $45 though. There was also ‘Ambi-climate’ on kickstarter that will supposedly do exactly what this device does.

    1. Hi Aquifel, our command database is aware of the fact that some A/C units do not have discreet power on/power off commands. This is also a reason why we cannot just charge the price of an IR blaster. The cool thing about tado° is that it automatically adjusts the AC to your needs without you having to lift a finger. The hardware is also packed with sensors, such as: temperature, humidity, light, noise, motion and BLE. Not all of them are being used right now. The beauty of connected devices is that they will get better with every update and all existing users will benefit in the same way as new customers. And there are lots of new features already on our agenda. Best Regards, Your tado° team

      1. I think you may have mixed up your comment replies, i didn’t ask anything about the power on/power off commands, you also didn’t actually make any statements beyond being aware of them so, i guess we’re both confused. I also have no idea what you mean by ‘command database’, is that your management team, i guess?

        In fact, the only information of use you’ve provided in this comment is that your sensor contains temperature, humidity, light, noise, and motion sensors and i assume BLE is bluetooth low energy. The rest is all useless marketing speak that should be discarded. Most of your sentences don’t even make proper sense. “This is also a reason why we cannot just charge the price of an IR blaster”, you never indicated what ‘this’ refers to. It seems like either we’re missing half of a statement or that it was never meant to make sense in the first place.

        Lets go back to the original problem, other products, like the ambi-climate i mentioned in my original comment and the ‘sensibo’ i found just now have the same abilities (and more) for a good bit less, although they are still way too much considering the parts required. People have built their own similar systems with arduinos and ir blasters for under $40, we’d just like a little bit more to justify the 500% markup. Specifically, limiting it entirely to the consumer solutions available, what useful features does your product have that the cheaper ambi-climate and sensibo don’t already have?
        https://www.ambiclimate.com/
        https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/sensibo-make-any-air-conditioner-smart#/story

        1. Hi Aquifel,

          Sorry for the lack of clarity in our response, I’ll try to be more direct. Ambi Climate and Sensibo are not yet on the market and both are in the same price category as our Smart AC Control. The difference with tado° is that the Smart AC Control uses your phone’s location to automatically pre-cool when it senses you approaching home and to switch off when you leave. It’s designed to do all the work for you and take away the hassle. It also has an advanced scheduling system where you can set times throughout the day of when you want the AC on or off, what temperature you would like the room and more. Furthermore, it doesn’t require batteries and comes with a capacitive LED matrix display so you can easily change settings directly on the device.

          Regarding building your own system for cheaper, of course anyone can try and build something themselves, whether it’s some kind of gadget or building your own car. But it will be a much better product with a talented team of international developers who each specialize in their field. This team will also deliver multiple new features through free app updates which of course takes a lot of time to develop and is free for the customer. Moreover, if you want a customer support team to be available to help you 365 days a year this of course has an effect on price.

          The Hook system you refer to as far as I can tell is similar to WeMo, in that it is simply a device that acts as a relay connection to a power source, not an IR remote control. This means that it only has the ability to switch the AC on and off. The savings you can make through ensuring your AC is used to its optimum efficiency will ensure that the Smart AC Control pays for itself.

    1. True, but it’s still a lot cheaper than installing an HVAC system… especially if you’re not a homeowner and don’t even have that option.

    2. Pricey indeed. Plus, most A/C units don’t have discreet power on/power off commands, so this unit will end up toggling the power state of the A/C, which may produce undesired results

      1. Hi Scott, our command database is well aware of the fact that some A/C units do not have discreet power on/power off commands. This is also a reason why we cannot just charge the price of an IR blaster. Best your tado° team

      2. Hi Scott, our command database is well aware of the fact that some A/C units do not have discreet power on/power off commands. This is also a reason why we cannot just charge the price of an IR blaster. Best Regards, your tado° team

      3. Hi Scott, just to clarify, our device has an in-built microphone for exactly this reason; in that it can infer whether or not the AC is on or off even if it only has a single power command. This ensures the tado° device gets the AC to it’s desired state.

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