FlairPuck Wireless Thermostat Companion Product to Flair Smart Vents or a standalone Mini Split Controller

My original review is below below the line break. But I wanted to update this since buying a second one and using the first one now for a few months. I still haven't tried to connect to my Google home system. Just being able to use the app alone is enough for me. I really hate "talking" to my google home speaker more times than I have to. Every light switch and outlet in my home now is practically google home enabled. So it gets tiresome and most times I'd rather just use the app to push a digital button and know what I chose for an option is going to be executed.As I said, the first one I installed works great. Setup should NOT be done through the app. Go to their website to do it. Sign up for your account there, log in, and add the device via your web browser. (Use a laptop or desktop THAT HAS WIRELESS - if you don't have one, borrow one from a friend just to get the setup done. After that, the app works great). This was no different with my 2nd puck being added. I used my laptop and set it up without a problem. I created a new room, and I created a new mini-split, then added that mini-split to the newly created room. Tested and verified the new puck controls the mini-split without issue.I did notice one small flaw, and it's not likely to ever be corrected regardless of firmware updates and such. While my first Flair puck responds within 3-5 seconds of choosing settings on the app (or in the browser), the 2nd Flair puck I installed takes nearly 30-40 full seconds to respond. Having a background in both computers and RF I think I know why this is happening. Your first puck is set up as the "gateway." (Unless you purchase the specific gateway device from them that's not a puck - which isn't needed.) Every subsequent puck you add after that is just a "puck" device and it's only way to get the commands sent to it is from the 1st puck acting as the gateway. This adds quite a bit of delay to 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc. pucks added when you make changes to the settings. 30+ seconds for your mini-split to get the command you put in the app is pretty lengthy. I wonder if adding the 2nd puck as yet another gateway would fix this - though that might not work, or even create issues having more than one Flair gateway running at a time. Either way it does work and if there's some more seconds between remotely turning it on/off I don't care as long as it actually does it. So long as it doesn't become 5-10 minutes! As I said in my original review I planned on buying more of these. I have 5 mini-split head units total. I have 3 more to go and they will all get one eventually. I just hope the company doesn't go under because all communication requires their backend system remain up and running, and WITHOUT charging you. If they do go belly up, I ask that they please release an API so that people can still use their very expensive equipment with "Home Assistant" which is a self-hosted smart home software that's free and can run on even just a cheap raspberry pi. I had a "wink" branded system years ago that was sold through Home Depot. I bought light switches, outlets, even 3 deadbolt door locks all on their system that promised "NO FEES - EVER." Well, they reneged on that 2 years into my using it. Wanted to start collecting $15 a month subscription. I ripped every single outlet and switch out of my wall and torched the equipment on my driveway with a blow torch I was so angry they pulled that carp.And again, if you cannot get it connected... it's NOT the equipment. It's you.#1 - DO NOT USE THE APP for setup, regardless of included instructions.#2 - Use their website for setup (see my original review text below for it, or google it)#3 - Stop looking at the strangely low rating here on this, and the negative Nancy's who say it's garbage, it most certainly is not!_____________________________________________________________________________________________I'm no rookie when it comes to RF or Wi-Fi networks. I have been involved in this technology for 25 years for work. No matter what I did I could not get this Puck to connect to my Wi-Fi. bottom line is the app sucks for setting it up. Skip the entire setup process within the app. set up via the web instead. first, make yourself a flair account. afterwards go to my.flair.co (NOT .com) And log in there. do this on either a laptop or a computer with Wi-Fi. The device must have Wi-Fi as you will need to temporarily connect to a temporary Network that the flair puck creates for the purposes of setup. once you get to the point where it wants you to search for the flare puck, it will instruct you to make your computer Wi-Fi connect directly to the flair Puck temporary Network. once you do this, a pop-up window will come up and search for wireless networks. here you pick the wireless network you want to connect to and enter the password. once you are done, it will direct you to reconnect your computer to your normal Wi-Fi and continue the setup process. again, do not use the app on your mobile device to do the setup. You're asking for frustration and failure. If you don't have a laptop, borrow somebody's! I am happily sitting under my Mitsubishi mini split which I can control now from the app. I have not yet tested Google home speaker integration. however, my son likes to make his bedroom like a bear cave with full blast fans speed and the lowest temperature. now I can simply open an app after he's fallen asleep and lower The fan speed and put the temperature at a more reasonable 67 or 68°. once the puck is set up. it works flawlessly. I have five mini splits all by Mitsubishi. I absolutely will be buying at least two more of these. I'm just waiting to make sure it works well for a week first. eventually I will have one puck per mini split. Mitsubishi makes a direct control module that plugs into a daughter board inside each mini split, but it has terrible reviews and does not work very well. Thank you flair .

I've had the puck for around 9 months, and I have a DIY Mr Cool Unit. The unit itself is trash; don't buy Mr Cool. The thermostat is useless. This is why I bought the Flair Puck.On to the Puck. The app is OK, but the UI is fairly ugly and feels dated. I have to search around for a few minutes to find things. It's useable though.The Puck's temperature reading is laughable. Sitting next to the puck are two thermometers, they both read 80 degrees. The puck is reporting 72 degrees... what? I'm told it has to "learn" but yeah, it hasn't learned.The Puck itself uses IR to communicate with your system. While this isn't really Puck's fault, making changes on the device itself will cause inconsistency.The Puck can't change the fan speed. My unit has "turbo" but it can't be used, and when Puck sends a command, it turns it off. The scheduling system in the Puck app is also really weak: I can only set the temperature. I can't adjust fan speed, can't set conditions (if it falls below X, do this), I can't even force it to turn the system off.When it's running, I can set the temperature of the room to 72. The Puck will keep lowering your unit's temperature until it reaches that temp, and it'll INCREASE the temperature. For instance:If the room temperature is 70f, it'll set the unit to 77f.If the room temperature is 80f, it'll set the unit to 65f.This is fine, but when the Puck itself can't determine the correct temperature, it becomes problematic. It doesn't slow down the fan speed and relies on the unit's built in "auto" instead. You also can't change this behavior. I personally would rather an option to control the thermostat with the current room temperature... but the puck doesn't allow for customizations like that.I don't recommend the Puck. Based on the fact that it's 8 degrees off alone makes me think this product will not last very long. It doesn't really offer enough customization, and the app doesn't really update very often. There are probably better solutions out there.

(This s a copy of my review for the Flair Smart Vents, as the Puck Thermostat is required to make them work, so they will have to be purchased together. Everything I said in that review applies to the full system)I was cautiously optimistic when I purchased these vents (and the first puck). I had read many of the reviews, especially the negative reviews, and had also read the online documentation from Flair about what smart thermostats were supported, but literally no one else makes a similar product, so I decided to roll the dice.My smart thermostat is a Honeywell model (RTH9585WF) and was a birthday gift from my kids. Now, according to what I had read online, this Honeywell model was not supported by Flair, so I was worried that if I were to make the smart vents work, I might have to ask my kids for the receipt and exchange it for a different model. So you can imagine how happily surprised I was when I connected my puck to my network, and the app immediately recognized my thermostat, and even gave me the option to let Flair control it (that didn't work out for my situation, but more on that later).I must say, I'm a bit surprised by some of the bad reviews, and am wondering if they just got a bad batch of products, because I found the set-up and installation to be quite simple and hassle-free. Each new device paired quickly and easily, and I had the whole system set up in about 30 minutes. I will agree with some of the comments that the puck dial and o/s are a little clunky and cheap feeling, but I don't deem this an issue of any real concern - they seem like a set-it-and-forget-it kind of tool to me. Once I got everything set up, I now control it all through the app on my phone, there's just no need to touch the pucks. I also have the luxury of only needing floor vents, so I didn't have to attach mine - just drop them in. I would also agree that the corded puck is not the most attractive feature in my house, but I guess I understand the need for the gateway puck to require power. My other puck is battery operated and sits attractively on a table in my den.As the title of my review says, this product is not perfect, but with some trial and error, I have the system doing exactly what I wanted it to do, and every room in my house is regularly within a degree or two of where I like it. Compared to the wild disparity that I used to experience in my multi-level townhouse and single-zone HVAC configuration, these results are a dream come true. I've lived here for 18 years, and have always struggled, year-round, to manage and equalize the temps in the house.However, it did take some effort and tweaking to find the right balance. I have both my thermostat and my Flair devices on a schedule, and have synced those schedules so that I have a very cool bedroom to sleep in every night and a comfortable 72° during the day. I've had to tweak the temperature settings on both halves of the system to find this balance. I did try letting Flair control my Honeywell thermostat, but it did not work well for me. The Honeywell has separate heating and cooling setpoints and requires a 3 degree gap between them, so the heat will not kick in until it gets colder in that room than a point effectively 4 degrees below the point where the A/C has stopped running. In contrast, the Flair pucks have a single setpoint, and with the thermostat set to auto heat/cool, it was immediately kicking the heat on when the temp dropped below its setpoint. I also found that the balance between the floors was more difficult to maintain with Flair in full control. And finally, one of the best features of my Honeywell thermostat was lost when I gave Flair control of it: the learning and auto-recovery function. It learns how long it takes to switch between the two halves on my schedule, and will begin a recovery cycle prior to the scheduled time, so when I go to bed, my room is already cold and when I wake up in the morning, my house is not freezing. Your setup and results may differ, and I do think it's cool that Flair gives the option to take full control (especially considering i didn't think it would even work with mine).Mine is a small home, so I only needed 4 vents and 2 pucks to achieve the desired results. I find the vents attractive (better than what I had), and the system easy to use and understand. At the writing of this review it is the start of summer and I've had them for just under a month. I will no doubt have another period of trial and error and a new set of schedules to set up come fall and winter, but I have to say that I am very happy with this purchase. Wish I could give 1/2 stars on these reviews, because it's almost a 5/5, but not quite. I hope this helps!

I was quite skeptical based on reviews and what is very common connection/functionality issues with 3rd party controls with minisplits - but very happy with this purchase.Use: have two LG mini splits in two room in attic that functions as an office, so wanted to be able to control remotely and set schedule for heating/cooling the space without it being on all the time. Although top of the range LG models the built in scheduling was essentially non-existent and although the unit heads can connect by WiFi to the LG thinq app, the app is fairly useless and really just an external AC controller vs a proper thermostat.Flair pucks:Install: worked great. Easy, quick and app is intuitive and well designed so got through the gateway puck and sensor puck install without issues. The codes for IR remotes were already on the flair cloud and so was easy process (I would suggest emailing the flair customer service before buying to confirm they have codes already installed in the cloud for your unit)App: works well. Connects with both pucks without problems and so does what is promisedCustomer support: great and very snappy with responses.Downside: not much to mention here. The gateway puck needs to be connected to power, which is a bit annoying. Other sensor pucks can be battery powered. Was not a huge deal but it dictated where the gateway puck would be mounted. Also the puck needs to be within 10 feet of unit head to work well. Again this was fine for me, but you will want to think layout of room and where you want the puck within 10 feet of unit for it to work well. I found it would work further than 10 feet but only if exactly lined up.Overall: very good and happy. I looked at many other options and for not wanting a wired thermostat option, this was great option at a fair price.

I bought this puck to add thermostat functionality to my recently installed Mitsubishi minisplit heating & cooling system. I discovered (after installing) that minisplits are notoriously terrible at maintaining a consistent room temperature because their temperature sensors are located by the air intake vents. The hand-held remote controllers that come with the units don't have a built-in temperature sensor, which I believe is a significant deficiency. Mitsubishi solutions are complicated and expensive ($400+ per minisplit), and entail adding either a wired temperature sensor or installing a Wi-Fi adapter plus a smart thermostat,; both are jobs for a technician unless you are a confident DIYer.The puck replaces the handheld remote controller. It uses the same infrared (IR) technology as the original remote controller to send signals to the minisplit, but it has built-in temperature and humidity sensors, allowing it to work like a regular wall thermostat. .The puck also has Wi-Fi capability so you can control it from a computer or smartphone, and you must have a Wi-Fi network for the setup procedure. As others have said, the Puck setup is horrible and will cause hours of frustration. I have a lot of tech experience so I am used to dealing with glitches and details in using new smart tech, but the Flair software super user-UNfriendly, and the instructions and documentation are terrible. Using the website account is better for setup than trying to use the phone app, but you will still need to perform some setup actions on the app. The online documentation is very poorly organized and difficult to find answers.All tech support is by email only, and responses may take up to a week. All in all it took me about 6 weeks from receiving my 1st puck to trouble-free functioning, and the final kink was something I eventually figured out for myself after tech support kicked it up to the system engineers. Today I added two more pucks for the other two head units, and the process was much smoother, thanks to my previous experience, although still with some frustration. Now everything seems to be functioning as I had hoped, but it was a lot of aggravation and frustration for what seems like it should be fairly straightforward process.Bottom line is that the Flair Puck is a fairly inexpensive option for adding a remote thermostat to a minisplit, but only if you have a lot patience and high tolerance for delays and frustration. Sophisticated tech, but the user experience need a ton of improvement.