The Nest Thermostat is really a gorgeous bit of eco-friendly electronics. But much like your mother always stated, this is what s within that counts. Well, she ll be pleasantly very happy to discover that within the Nest is really as equally beautiful because the sleek exterior. The $249 thermostat may be pricey, but a teardown published on SparkFun shows the innards of the device worth this type of cost. It's not only well-built, however the Nest is rocking serious processing energy and connectivity options. Silly hyperbole alert: The Nest is a game title changer.
This is obvious while you scroll through SparkFun s photos the Nest was created and manufactured by having an eye for detail. There doesn t appear to become a wire or connector placed aimlessly. That s to become expected. This is creator, Tony Fadell, oversaw the ipod device design and production throughout the very first couple of many years of the merchandise s existence.
The Nest s primary PCB houses an unexpected variety of chips. The huge one out of the middle is really a Sitara AM37x ARM Cortex-A8 that may run Linux, Android, and Home windows Embedded CE and, because of a PowerVR core, OpenGL ES 2. can also be supported. There s additionally a ZigBee SoC that s apparently presently unused, lending to some theory that Nest has other products within the works and can use ZigBee for wireless connectivity.
As Fadell described to Sarah Lacy inside a TCTV interview, the Nest discovers from user behavior and finally changes the house s heating and cooling according to previous activity. This involves a far quantity of processing energy, however the Nest has enough CPU juice to energy a smartphone. The additional headroom without doubt boosts the thermostat s reliability whilst permitting the organization to grow on its set of features later on.
Nest Labs rapidly offered from the first run. Another batch will hit in 2012 for the similar $249 cost. I ll be the first one to admit the thermostat s high upfront cost likely negates any savings it makes by smartly modifying a house s cooling and heating system. But, and I only say this having a smile on my small face, I d happily throw money away simply to hang a thermostat on my small wall with sufficient processing energy to outgun many traditional computing products.
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