Will be returning my Atlas bundle(with display and lightning detector) to Amazon for refund after trialing it for about 10 days. I had it mounted alongside my old 5/1 so both were operating from essentially the same location, to the same Access hub that had been working well with the 5/1 for some months now.
1. The UV detector never went above 2, and that was only for blips, even in hours of prolonged direct bright light. I had the chance to watch this yesterday, and in around 5 hours of direct sun the UV did not budge off of 1 on myacurite, and I’m giving up on it. FWIW the light lux measurement, on the display, seems to work. At least it changes considerably, depending on how long the sun shines on it, and varies between cloudy and cloudless days.
2. The 5/1 was never able to compensate for temperature in sunlight, showing anywhere from 6-9 degrees higher than an acurite tower I have in the shade, which in the afternoon shows temps very close to “official” temps at a nearby airport. The Atlas will often exceed the 5/1’s sunlight temps by another 2 or 3 degrees. I was hoping the Atlas would work better than the 5/1 for this, but it is worse. This flaw alone is enough for me to justify the return. At night or in the shade, their temp readings are almost identical.
3. Finally, the 5/1 and Access always worked well together and fading/dropouts were not a problem, even if the range was barely extended at all compared to the 5/1 and the old smart hub (I was able to move the Access hub about 10 feet farther away from the window compared to the smart hub, but that’s it). After a few days of Atlas and 5/1 working together through the same Access, there was an annoying habit developing of the signal from one sensor or the other degrading in strength, and then one or both sensors going offline. I’d see an email first thing in the morning about how one or both sensors had gone offline sometime overnight, and then get up to look at my acurite to see how maybe one of them had come back on by itself, or maybe not. If I disconnect all cables from Access and remove batteries, I can get both sensors to come back online with excellent strength, but within an hour or two one of them, usually the Atlas, will be weak again, then go offline, rinse, lather, repeat. The Atlas always seems to stay in contact with its HD display, BTW. I tried deleting Atlas from myacurite, then adding it again…now the lightning panel has not reappeared…
4. FWIW I haven’t had many storms with lightning in the recent period, but I can say I didn’t have the problem of strikes being detected on sunny days, so in that regard the lightning detection “worked”.
I really wanted this to work, but something tells me it was turning into
, so back it goes.
If you're having better luck, that's great, and more power to you!