The V1 hub, the most stable Iris system to date dies on June 30th.
If you haven’t already heard the news, Lowe’s today sent an e-mail to all users with an active Iris V1 hub. The news wasn’t good. The Iris V1 shutdown is scheduled to take place on June 30th. Like the Revolv hub, Iris V1, the original but more feature complete and stable of the Iris systems will die June 30th. As with the recent announcement related to cellular service, Lowe’s has generously announced that the last 2 months of V1 will be free. At least Revolv users got a year before their hubs turned into bricks.
The announcement also delivered more, albeit commonly known bad news. The Blue Line Meter Reader will not be supported in V2. This means customers who relied on whole-house energy monitoring (and cell service) in V1 are out of luck. Since V2 doesn’t support power usage tracking currently, support for this device wouldn’t have made a different.
So what next?
Now is a great time to see what the competition has to offer. Truthfully, Iris is far from the only system on the market. Is it is also far from the best. There are many alternatives out there. Take some time to research the competition. SmartThings, Insteon, Staples Connect, and even Wink are suitable alternatives. Find a system that works for you.
When researching, we recommend reading neutral and negative reviews first. They provide excellent insight into the sort of problems that you may face when changing to a new Home Automation system. But, don’t believe everything that you read. Many internet reviewers are showered with free devices and swag in exchange for being a user-advocate or for writing glowing reviews. This is true for sites like Amazon, Best Buy, and even administrators of a certain Iris discussion forum.
The shutdown of V1 is just the beginning, we will be making an announcement on the future of the IrisUsers blog very soon too. Stay tuned…
I am a reasonably satisfied 1st-Gen IRIS customer, and a subscriber to IRIS Premium Service.
I have just taken delivery of (but not yet installed) a 2nd Gen Hub.
The reason I have not installed the new hub is that I have done extensive online reviews of the 2nd-Gen hub and operating system and have yet to find an “upgraded” user or tech reviewer that was satisfied – most were infuriated at the new system.
Now, I realize that some people are frustrated by the mechanics of a roll of toilet paper, and play hell resetting their clocks to daylight saving time, but most IRIS users are tech-savvy, or else they wouldn’t have bought the IRIS system to start with.
Really, I do not want to hear a bunch of fluff about “enhanced capabilities” and “customer satisfaction” especially since all indications are that 2nd-Gen IRIS has LOST functionality, and customer complaints are being ignored.
Let me pose some reasons for this fiasco: (1) money — Lowe’s didn’t want to pay the renewal license fees for the current system. (2) See (1).
So, I suggest that Lowe’s pony up the license fee and back off the June 30 deadline until ALL the kinks are ironed-out of 2nd-Gen.