Review of Acurite 5 in 1 wifi weather station After writing this my weather station stopped sending updates to weather underground. So there is no updates on the app. WU blames acurite and acurite blames WU..Is there a ZERO rating? The Bad: The easy setup on the box is a joke… 1) Connecting my laptop to the acurite display wifi took 3 tries. And my laptop was right next to the display unit. First try didn’t connect. Second try connected and timed out before I could enter everything. Third try worked. (FYI my router is only 2 feet away). NOTE this is a tricky setup. You first connect your PC to the wifi signal in the display unit, then when your pc is connected to the display WIFI, you go to 192.168.4.1 on the pc web browser to finish the setup by inputting your network sign on information. 2) Getting a reading from the sensor also took way too much effort. After waiting several minutes after inserting new batteries in the sensor, nothing happened so I replaced batteries the new batteries with another set of new batteries.. No luck… Still nothing on the display. I Moved the abc switch in sensor from a to c and back to a, no luck… Did the same thing then in display and it connected…WHAT.. 3) There are no instructions at all about what app to use. I registered my unit with the weather underground site per instructions, then tried to use the acurite app to connect and view my sensors. Spent two hours getting failed to connect messages (even after completely redoing the entire startup procedure) so texted support. They responded quickly the day after thanks giving, so kudo’s for that. However support told me my model wouldn’t connect to the accurate app, I had to use the weather underground app…total of 3 hours lost for nothing. 4) Downloaded the weather underground app, and there was nothing to select my unit on the app. I went to their website on my pc, and there it was, on line and showing data…After several hours trying to find my weather station I finally figured it out. When the app starts it wants a location. I entered my zip code and the local weather displayed. Then I tried not entering anything and a map of the US showed up. I zoomed in on my area, and little dots showed up of personal weather stations. I tapped on one near me, and presto I found my data… 5) The Documentation includes a sensor manual and a display manual. Neither manual details what should happen first second third etc. in the setup process. A separate QUICK SETUP document is needed to show what order to setup the devices and what to expect with each step. 6) Total time to get the unit working and the app working was 4 hours…Not easy setup…and the documentation could be much better with some pictures, and links to videos. 7) By Far the dumbest design of this unit is the base. NO ADJUSTMENT AT ALL. Works great in one position and can’t see it another just slightly lower. 8) Your inside temperature does not get transmitted to weather underground. This a big disappointment as we travel a lot and need to check inside temperature during the winter. 9) There is no Day with the date. I NEED to know what day it is every morning. True I can use my phone but why when the first thing I look at is my weather station. 10) There is no telephone support. I could find only 1 video on their web site and it was to show how to mount the sensor (the easiest part of the process). You must text or e-mail. Probably due to language barriers. 11) Wind Speed displays; now, avg., and peak. The only problem is you have to push the up arrow button to cycle thru them (not covered in the manual). My lacross shows current and peak all the time. The apps do show current and peak so it’s not a total terrible. 12) The size of the wind speed font is only readable up close. All the other fonts are like 10 and 12 but wind speed below 10mph are like 6. Above 9 MPH and it jumps to a readable 8.. 13) After a month I had to reset my wifi for a camera issue I was having, and the weather station lost connection with wunderground .com. Reset it, not go. Went through the entire start up process again, no go.. The good and sorta good: 1) The display is very well organized and the colors make it easy to find and separate the readings. 2) The batteries in the display keep your settings saved for moving the display and power outages. 3) There is a procedure (had to contact support to get it I will post it at the bottom) for adjusting all the temperature and humidity readings. My in house temperature was 4 degrees off from everything else in my house. 4) As mentioned above, chat support was very quick to respond but would have preferred phone support. 5) Having manual entry (one time) of date and times is much preferred to having it provided from wifi. My lacross station stopped communicating with wifi after only 2 years, so it stopped displaying a valid date and time. 6) The apps: PWSmoniter was the easiest to setup and shows everything on a single page, both current and historical readings. Historical is displayed as charts.. After getting a device ID and KEY from weather underground, all you need to enter is the device ID. Nothing else…very simple. The weather underground app was more difficult to install and read. I Had to enter both values and finding my device after setup was quite difficult. myPWS app was impossible. You need a third entry; an API key, and getting it required me to use the PC on the weather underground site. Not a real obvious procedure either.. In the myPWS app, it’s a 32 digit entry, and even though I triple checked it, and could not get it to work.. PWSmoniter has it hand down over lacross view app. There is nothing good about their app 7) The three levels of brightness and a fourth option of automatic change are really a good idea. Finding the adjustment button was a stroke of luck though.
