The competition

Just a thought, where is your controller located? Mine is in a dark corner of the garage that I rarely pass by, I can look over and see the green light on my Iro and know that’s it’s on. Don’t think I would ever need the display.

Purchased one today on a whim. Glad I did. Took about 5 minutes to set it up. l Seems to work very well. Can’t wait for desktop/laptop version of the software.

I have a Cyber Rain and it works pretty well. It updates the schedule based on a user-defined Weather Underground stations. I’m going off a nearby nursery, but would love to eventually get my own personal weather station. The user specifies the slope, soil, sun/shade, and type of grass and it adjusts each zone. It also tracks the current (mA) sent to the valves and you can set thresholds to be alerted or shutoff the system automatically. Since I installed this with a newly installed system, I installed the optional flowmeter that is an inline propeller that tracks the flowrate and can email user or stop the system. It has cool gauges for the current and flowrate, as well as an odometer-style accumulated usage. The software, both desktop and mobile app, leaves much to be desired, with desktop still running on Silverlight. I’m told an update is coming, but I was told that over a year ago. It has a very detailed events log and usage tracking with bar and pie graphs and the data can be exported to Excel. I enjoy the system.

Cyber Rain and Rain Machine were the products I had initially found when looking for a smart controller. Cyber Rain was at the wrong price point ($800 for 16-zone pro residential bundle) and the Rain Machine is currently limited to 12 zones (I have 14). So, the Rachio (16-zone version) was an obvious winner and I’m glad to have stumbled across it a couple days after what had been a fruitless search.

Also preferred the potential of the cloud/app-connected Rachio over the Rain Machine, despite unknown long- term viability of the start-up. While I work in IT, gone are the days I want to tinker with things like port-forwarding on home router to get over-internet control when away (as with Rain Machine). Locations without wifi (and folks who desire a stand-alone over something that depends on cloud) may prefer the Rain Machine.

As a SmartThings user, Eden has piqued my interest with its Adam water sensors and native SmartThings integration. http://eden.plaidsystems.com/

Greenbox is very similar Rachio, both look and functionality. it can be connected by both Wifi and Bluetooth. it is cheaper $219, and is available in this Fall.

I like bluetooth option, in case your network is not working or down.

Came across this the other day.

http://www.fliwer.com/?lang=en#

Basically water/light/fertilizer/etc sensors that can be used for irrigation but also connect to an irrigation controller.

Nice idea on the sensors(upmarket parrot flower power), but, frankly, a horrifying price.

Wow, just checked out the ‘Eden’ link above (they’ve changed their name to Eve), and I am pretty excited about that. The water sensors sound like a great idea. http://www.eveirrigation.com

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At this point, Eve only accommodates 8 zones. Their recommended solution is to buy a second unit.

RainMachine and Rachio are the main competitors on the market that have the best features and capabilities. I’d recommend getting either of these two (I still prefer Rachio) to guarantee that you won’t be left disappointed.

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When I read wifi smart controller reviews, the top three are Rachio, Rain Machine and Orbit B-Hyve. Rachio usually gets a first place rating. Rain Machine is a classy looking product with a glass faceplate, but it is inferior to Rachio because it does not have customized zone setup. It seems every reviewer gives Rain Bird and Hunter low marks for their smart controllers because they are basically standard controllers with some weather integration along with wifi. I think the Orbit product has a great app. It won the Irrigation Association new product contest last year. But still, Rachio is much better than all. One thing to bear in mind it thay all of these products are better than standard controllers that continue to be installed. Those of us in the Rachio Community need to evangelize the millions of homeowners who don’t have a clue about irrigation.

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There are so many startup companies It makes my head spin.

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I found a social compare on the competition and made some updates on it… It is still heavily outdated but gives you an idea (and is publicly editable). eg. maybe prices and options of Rachio might also need an update in it.

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The Irrigation Association is working on a similar table, but with updated information on existing wifi controllers.

will it be public? (if not, it wont help us)

I presume “competition” is us orientated. For eu?

Yes, it will be public and include all wifi smart controllers whether or not they have the EPA WaterSense label. I actually worked on the committee at the IA who put together the first draft. Stuff like this moves slow since it needs to be vetted and then put in a format that looks good on the website.

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The Irrigation Association mainly focuses on the United States and Canada. I am sorry I do not know about the smart controller market in Europe.

Any news here? Online?

to all, the report is posted here. :slightly_smiling_face: