Black & Decker EM100B Energy Saver Series Power Monitor
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List Price: Our Price: $38.90 You Save: $61.09 (61%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $28.99 (click here) Category: Tools See more product details |
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Tools and Hardware Reviews of Black & Decker EM100B Energy Saver Series Power Monitor
Customer Review: Gets the job done
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a simple, but effective solution for educating households about the energy use.
Pros
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- Simple to install (but make sure your electric meter is among the supported models).
- Good range on wireless connectivity. Depends on the construction material, but I had no problems at my home even behind 3 walls and 30 ft away.
- Added bonus of displaying outside temperature.
- Low cost solution that works. Sure other 'fancy' products from companies like TED let you track your usage on Google and what not, but I am not going to spend $200 to find out how much energy I am consuming.
- Standard AA batteries on both the sensor and the display. For cold temperatures, lithium batteries are recommended for the sensor.
Cons
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- The display resolution is in increments of 100 watts (and min. power measurement is 300 watts), so if you are measuring an appliance drawing less power, you won't see the difference.
- Margin of error in power measurement is high (reported to be < 2% for electromechanical meters).
- Display is updated every 30 seconds.
- I don't think the 'tare' function works reliably.
Customer Review: Good but not 100% compatible with all meters
Summary: 3 Stars
Although the EM100B is a nice compact gadget that should help users monitor their energy bills, the fact that is not compatible with dual optical meters as well as mechanical dial readers makes it somewhat limited to users in many municipalities. B&D should invest in R&D to create a reading mechanism that works with any meter.Customer Review: Good for basic energy monitoring
Summary: 2 Stars
I bought this for $40 which is a rebranded version of Blueline energy monitor ($100). Not sure why such a price difference. I wanted to try this first and then buy the wifi module.
This monitor is good for basic energy monitoring and to know how much energy consumed by individual appliance without having to connect the appliance. That's very good feature. With Killawatt, we need to connect the appliance to get the power consumption.
Pro: Easy to install and set up. Tare feature to get appliance level power consumption
cons: Display loses connection often, reading fluctuates for no reason, battery drains fast. power resolution is only 100w; lowest is 300w. since it depends on the meter, we cant really check if the meter works fine. no way to get the data out of the device unless you buy the blueline wifi module.
I am statistics person and had to return this and ordered TED 5000G.
Customer Review: Good for basic info...overpriced on Amazon
Summary: 3 Stars
Overall a pretty useful tool for keeping tabs on your electrical consumption. Haven't had much time to tinker with it. Will update after I do. I found it at Lowes for $79 so I'm not sure why Amazon has it at $95+. They're usually very good pricewise. Good luck.Customer Review: Good idea, poorly made
Summary: 2 Stars
I like the idea, but the build quality is poor. Every time it rains, I lose my placement on the meter. The arm does not stay in the exact spot needed to read the meter. What is worse, is that it doesn't have any indication that I lost my reading. I sometimes don't know for several days. Also, the wireless signal has a short range.