Is there ANY reason to favour a HR91 over an HR92 other than price?

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  • MrBoy
    Automated Home Guru
    • May 2017
    • 165

    Is there ANY reason to favour a HR91 over an HR92 other than price?

    If you can get both units for the same price, or didn't care about price one iota, are there any advantages to the HR91? It seems it's a newer unit but they left loads of features (mostly ones I don't understand or with slightly rude names) out, and shaved a few quid off the price. I could imagine battery life might be slightly better but is there anything it does better?

    I'm about to order 8 units and at least 4 are going onto new Valencia bodies, so those could be either type as easily from what I've been reading.
  • DBMandrake
    Automated Home Legend
    • Sep 2014
    • 2361

    #2
    It's clearly designed to be a cheaper unit, probably targeted at systems with a lot of radiators to keep the costs down, or perhaps "public" systems like a community hall, office space etc, where you don't necessarily want the people in the building playing around with it, (less things to fiddle with with only two buttons and no display) so you can't really compare it ignoring the price as the price difference is the whole point of it.

    After testing one the only positive thing I would say about it over the HR92 (aside from the obvious one - price) is that it does seem a bit quieter. But in every other way I feel it's a step backwards, including build quality.

    It's definitely not the successor to the HR92 - it's designed to sit below it at a lower price point, and I think you get what you pay for. I'm sure its fine for many applications, but its not for me.
    Last edited by DBMandrake; 11 January 2018, 07:41 PM.

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    • Dan_Robinson
      Automated Home Ninja
      • Jun 2012
      • 347

      #3
      Originally posted by DBMandrake View Post
      It's clearly designed to be a cheaper unit, probably targeted at systems with a lot of radiators to keep the costs down, or perhaps "public" systems like a community hall, office space etc, where you don't necessarily want the people in the building playing around with it, (less things to fiddle with with only two buttons and no display) so you can't really compare it ignoring the price as the price difference is the whole point of it.

      After testing one the only positive thing I would say about it over the HR92 (aside from the obvious one - price) is that it does seem a bit quieter. But in every other way I feel it's a step backwards, including build quality.

      It's definitely not the successor to the HR92 - it's designed to sit below it at a lower price point, and I think you get what you pay for. I'm sure its fine for many applications, but its not for me.


      Intersting you say that. The houses I've just installed a load into are worth several millions each and HR91's were chosen over the HR92 because they were more appealing. Price was not an issue.
      Kind Regards - Dan Robinson (Jennings Heating Ltd)

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      • mtmcgavock
        Automated Home Legend
        • Mar 2017
        • 507

        #4
        From the prices I’ve seen the HR91s aren’t any cheaper to warrant purchasing them? I think there’s £10 in it on theevohomeshop. However I suspect that if I asked my supplier they’d be the same price.

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        • paulockenden
          Automated Home Legend
          • Apr 2015
          • 1719

          #5
          Simon, when you talk about build quality remember that the early devices we had were prototypes. For all we know the outer bodies might even have been 3D printed (proper 3D printing mind, not those noddy kits you see for a couple of hundred quid).

          I suspect that the main production run will be more polished.

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          • paulockenden
            Automated Home Legend
            • Apr 2015
            • 1719

            #6
            Originally posted by mtmcgavock View Post
            From the prices I’ve seen the HR91s aren’t any cheaper to warrant purchasing them? I think there’s £10 in it on theevohomeshop. However I suspect that if I asked my supplier they’d be the same price.
            You could always get MrBoy to haggle for you....

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            • mtmcgavock
              Automated Home Legend
              • Mar 2017
              • 507

              #7
              Originally posted by paulockenden View Post
              You could always get MrBoy to haggle for you....
              I'm getting my HR92s cheap enough

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              • dty
                Automated Home Ninja
                • Aug 2016
                • 489

                #8
                Originally posted by mtmcgavock View Post
                From the prices I’ve seen the HR91s aren’t any cheaper to warrant purchasing them? I think there’s £10 in it on theevohomeshop. However I suspect that if I asked my supplier they’d be the same price.
                I have 24 rads. £10 a head is a big difference!

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                • mtmcgavock
                  Automated Home Legend
                  • Mar 2017
                  • 507

                  #9
                  Originally posted by dty View Post
                  I have 24 rads. £10 a head is a big difference!
                  £10 was on a pack of 4, not each.

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                  • MrBoy
                    Automated Home Guru
                    • May 2017
                    • 165

                    #10
                    On EHS it's £40 difference on a pack of 4. However if you buy a 16 pack of HR92 and 4x4 packs of HR91 the unit price is the same at £50. I've not seen anywhere really tout the 91, maybe they just haven't taken off.

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                    • bruce_miranda
                      Automated Home Legend
                      • Jul 2014
                      • 2307

                      #11
                      wouldnt the batteries last longer because there is no screen to drive? Also on the topic of the screen the HR92 has too many delicate parts that make up the screen.

                      Comment

                      • DBMandrake
                        Automated Home Legend
                        • Sep 2014
                        • 2361

                        #12
                        Originally posted by paulockenden View Post
                        Simon, when you talk about build quality remember that the early devices we had were prototypes. For all we know the outer bodies might even have been 3D printed (proper 3D printing mind, not those noddy kits you see for a couple of hundred quid).

                        I suspect that the main production run will be more polished.
                        Fair point, but I'm not about to buy a retail one to satisfy my curiosity when I've already established that they don't play nice with my valve bodies. (Or at least the prototype didn't) I also already have HR92's on all my radiators now, except for one radiator that has been removed a year ago and not replaced - but when I replace that radiator I'll just get one more HR92, it wouldn't make sense to put something different there for the sake of a tenner.

                        As I said in my previous post I'm sure they work fine for many people and many applications, but I wanted to make sure people were aware that a number of significant features of the HR92 are missing like the stroke setting that some may rely on for their valve bodies to work properly, and that was certainly the case for my valves.

                        They're not just an HR92 with the screen removed, they're a completely different design with different strengths (mainly quietness and cost IMO) and weaknesses.

                        I try to be as impartial as possible especially when giving an opinion about something - if I like something I will say so and praise it but I'm not afraid to say I don't like something or point out any shortcomings I perceive with it either.
                        Last edited by DBMandrake; 12 January 2018, 10:21 AM.

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                        • DBMandrake
                          Automated Home Legend
                          • Sep 2014
                          • 2361

                          #13
                          Originally posted by bruce_miranda View Post
                          wouldnt the batteries last longer because there is no screen to drive? Also on the topic of the screen the HR92 has too many delicate parts that make up the screen.
                          The screen will use next to no power - it's a standard backlit LCD screen which spends 99.99% of its time not backlit.

                          LCD watches last so long on tiny button cells (years) precisely because LCD screens use such little power. You can keep a static image on a segment LCD screen like this with basically zero power consumption because it is just an electrostatic charge that maintains a symbol in the on or off state.

                          From a power saving perspective you don't even need the main CPU to be running to maintain a static display on an LCD, nor do you need the LCD controller/multiplexer to be active. You can simply have an extremely low power latch driving the LCD display to hold the last decoded display when the device goes into its sleep mode, so keeping the display showing a static image is basically "for free".

                          My bet is the entire device, cpu, radio receiver etc powers down during the sleep period with the only things remaining active being a hardware timer on the SoC to wake everything up at the right time for the next broadcast from the controller, the LCD display latch to keep a static image on the screen, and the IO controller for the button and knob. (Since using those also wakes it up) Power drain in this state is probably in the tens of microamps range.

                          You've actually got me interested to measure how much current it draws in different states especially idle, so I might have a play with that this weekend.

                          So the removal of the screen on the HR91 will have no real effect on overall power drain. It could be less, similar or more than an HR92 based entirely on other factors like the motor, which surely must be the single biggest contributor as it will be drawing hundreds of milliamps to push that pin down...

                          I agree about the HR92 screen being fragile though - our toddler has broken the screen on the one in the living room which is now hanging on by only one of its pivot pins... Sigh. I had already repaired the pivot pins on the screen from a previous furniture related knock some time ago (which had also pulled the ribbon cable right out of the insides, so a full disassembly was required to fix it that time) which broke it despite the angle brace being fitted, but there isn't enough left of the pin to repair this time. So one advantage of the HR91 is that it has no fold out screen to break off!
                          Last edited by DBMandrake; 12 January 2018, 10:25 AM.

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                          • MrBoy
                            Automated Home Guru
                            • May 2017
                            • 165

                            #14
                            I saw on one site a tamper-proof case for the HR92, which I suppose is aimed at this sort of case. Bit ugly though.

                            Comment

                            • DBMandrake
                              Automated Home Legend
                              • Sep 2014
                              • 2361

                              #15
                              Originally posted by MrBoy View Post
                              I saw on one site a tamper-proof case for the HR92, which I suppose is aimed at this sort of case. Bit ugly though.
                              Expensive, quite ugly, and in this case I can't use it as the HR92 is too close to the skirting on the wall as it is right on the edge of a bay window alcove so there is less than 10mm of clearance between the HR92 and the skirting without the big chunky tamper-proof case over it.

                              Besides, if I protected that one he'd just break one of the others.

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