GE Cync Smart Thermostat - Energy Star Certified WiFi Thermostat for Home Automation, Compatible with Alexa & Google Home, Digital Touch Screen (Black) | Perfect for Smart Home Temperature Control & Energy Savings

I'm experienced at wiring things, but following the manual that came with this only served in getting me to wire it every which way but the right way. It wasn't until I visited the Cync web page that I finally got the right diagram for a 5 wire thermostat cable. I didn't need the included wiring converter, I only have heating, no AC. The wiring shown on the website made a whole lot more sense than what was included in the manual. I wasted over an hour before I relented and looked up more info in the site. Once I found the proper diagram, I had the thing working in under 15 minutes. I would have saved a whole lot of my evening had I just done this in the first place instead of trusting the manual. You have to bluetooth your phone into it to get the wifi turned on and password entered, once the wifi is enabled and logged in, then you are prompted to use the full phone app to set up your schedule. Your schedule consists of four run periods during the course of the day for each day of the week, So you can set up the threshold times when you want it to start cooling down or heating up and just how long to run before changing modes or temps. You must go through the four periods of each day, setting up the temps. If you want them to stay the same all day, then you'll have to set up the next period in the Cync to run at the same temperature for the remaining time in that period until the next one. The times can start and stop whenever you want, but there must be four run periods throughout the day. For the first couple of days the temp seemed to feel cooler than the old thermostat did, and my room thermometers confirmed this, so I went back into the program and bumped up the temp by one degree on each of them to get closer to my old programmable thermostat behavior. My old one had a very hard to read display and no wifi ability or app. The Cync is easy to read, much better looking and I can change the temp temporarily by just picking up my phone and using the app to bump up the temp a pinch, or even turn it down if I overshoot. It will show me how long the new temperature will run to when the next program change is supposed to happen. It's very convenient, and it's super easy to edit your program for a different behavior, say weekends could be set for lower temps while you're away. If you change your mind, it's easy to edit the program, unlike my older menu driven unit. The Cync does all the scheduling from the app, no squinting or need for magnifiers to see what you are doing on a tiny LCD screen. The Cync app is big and easy to read and allows you to customize and name the zones of your house if you are using more than one. I recommend it for someone who has a hard time getting up out of their chair, has a bad knee, feet or arthritis. My understanding is other Cync GE products work similarly. So I may eventually try them out as I see a need. I'm now glad I made the purchase, it's been a couple of months and so far there's been no problem with the unit. If you have a basic understanding of how thermostats and signaling in furnace and AC systems works, you'll be able to get this running just like any other thermostat on the market, it's not tough once you have the right info from the website. The wiring diagrams inside the manual are tiny and aren't necessarily right for your wiring, so just save yourself some time and look up what you need to do on the website first.