Lux Products TX500E: A Review no comments
The great thing about the Lux Products TX500E Smart Temp Programmable Thermostat is that it is cheap but has a good range of functions. Moreover, it is a thermostat that has the Energy Star seal of approval and that is capable of saving the home owner $500 a year on heating and cooling bills. That is amazing considering it only costs $28.
The Lux Products TX500E is a 5+2 thermostat. This means it allows the user to set up 2 separate programs – one for weekdays and one for the weekend. However, it also has a programmable vacation mode that can be used for another day of the week such as Saturday when people are likely to get up later and go to bed later. If the residents of a home keep fairly regular hours this thermostat is powerful enough to meet the needs of energy efficiency.
The thermostat is quick to install and easy to program. It has a speed dial system to quickly set up programs. The default settings on the thermostat are designed to provide optimum savings and act as a useful guideline for people new to programmable thermostats.
The Lux TX500E Smart Temp features a display that can show the temperature in either Fahrenheit or Celsius. It also tells the user when it is time to change the batteries or the filters. The only drawback of the Lux TX500E display is that it doesn’t have a back light.
For under $30 consumers would not normally expect many functions on a programmable thermostat. However, the Lux Products TX500E has swing control, temporary hold, vacation mode and keyboard lockout. Swing control is particularly useful as it lets the user set up a range of up to 5 degrees within which the thermostat doesn’t activate the heating or cooling. This is a good function to stop damage caused by short cycling.
Notable functions not on the Lux Products TX500E Smart Temp are auto change-over (to automatically switch between heating and cooling) and adaptive intelligent recovery. This is a pity but with a bit of forethought the user can manually change the thermostat with the seasons and also can program the heating/cooling to come on a few minutes early.
If the reader is looking for a good programmable thermostat that doesn’t cost much but that is reliable and capable of delivering reductions in bills then the Lux Products TX500E is worth finding out more about.