Weather Station Hardware > Ambient Weather and Ecowitt and other Fine Offset clones
WS-2000 vs WS-2902A - List of differences
galfert:
Updated: July 25, 2019
After owning both the WS-2000 and the WS-2902A for a few months and running them side by side I thought I could round up all the information learned and list most if not all of the differences in one post. I'm not sure I'll remember all of them but I'll give it a shot. Please feel free to add things I may have missed and I'll update this post for reference. As we get new firmware releases I'm sure there will be more differences. The point of this thread is only to point out differences. Things that they both do equally like they both report to WeatherCloud aren't the focus of this thread. It is worth noting for newbies that the outdoor sensor array is identical. You can get either display separately no matter which model you start with. You can even start with neither display like with the WS-1550-IP and add one or both of these displays. For some reason Ambient calls the WS-2000 display a display tablet....it is not portable like a tablet and it isn't touchscreen ...it requires AC power...so realistically they are both display consoles. I'm not really sure why it had to be called a tablet. I still call them both display consoles.
To be fair though the biggest immediately noticeable difference between these two is the display technology. The WS-2902A is a static LCD display with sections that can be lit up to create numbers, like an old digital clock. The different sections are colored by a film and thus the colors don't change. The WS-2000 on the other hand is a fully bit mapped Full Color TFT LCD display where every pixel can change color and the screen layout can be changed by firmware and is more adaptable to be customized. That is why it is capable of displaying full tables of data and full screen graphs. It is like your computer monitor or mobile device screen. Perhaps that is why the WS-2000 display console is called a tablet.
Some of these differences I also learned before owning the WS-2000 and can be found by reading the following thread that started around the time the WS-2000 launched:
https://www.wxforum.net/index.php?topic=34962.0
There is also lots of good information in other places. So here is my attempt to consolidate all the information learned:
The point of this thread is to realize that even though the WS-2000 is the more premium product, the WS-2902A still has some advantages that may appeal to some people. So the WS-2000 is not better in every way (but it almost is). The good news is you can have both displays running at the same time as I am doing.
WS-2902A Advantages (things the WS-2000 can't do or is inferior at)
* Larger numbers that can be read from across the room, although viewing angle is limited. On the WS-2000 you can see from more angles but many numbers are too small to read unless up close.
* doesn't require separate WH32B (or WS-1000-BTH) sensor as it is built in for temperature, humidity, barometer. Something less to have to deal with and not have to replace batteries in.
* has a DST indicator on top of the time to indicate if you are currently in observance of Daylight Saving Time or not.
* will keep receiving sensor data from outdoor array even when not powered on AC (screen turns off though but you can manually turn it on for a few secs on battery)....BUT it will not upload this data as the WiFi will be disabled, and since it doesn't have a built in log the only benefit is to see rain totals and min/max of other data. So this is pretty pointless...you'd be better off with a battery backup on the WS-2000 so that it continues to log internally and use WiFi if Internet is also working on battery backup. You could also run battery backup on the WS-2902A so that it keeps Internet connection.
* retains daily min/max on power outage because of battery. But the WS-2000 retains all historical records and settings without a battery, the WS-2000 just looses daily on power outage. A UPS is always a solution though.
* Has temperature & pressure trend indicators (rising, falling, stable)
* it cost less
WS-2000 Advantages (things the WS-2902A doesn't have or is inferior at)
* has ability to add more sensors; temperature, humidity, soil, PM2.5 (and lightning said to be coming in the future)
* has nicer looking display that is able to be viewed at all angles (even though many numbers are smaller and unable to be read from distance)
* all the live data is able to be viewed on the screen without need to press any buttons (at the sacrifice that numbers are smaller)
* has indicator for WU and AmbientWeather.net reporting working and connected
* has potential lighting indicator that turns on when dew point is 70F or higher.
* has color changing rings for temperature and humidity changes
* displays solar radiation down to tenths when below 1000 w/m2, where the WS-2902A only shows and rounds to whole numbers.
* has built in graphs
* has built in data tables
* saves data to micro SD card
* easier to connect to WiFi directly as it doesn't need a mobile device to set up
* displays current time with seconds.
* daily sunrise and sunset times
* has sun location over horizon indicator
* has more accurate moon phase indicator with more levels
* more accurate barometric trend indicator
* has yearly min/max (also has daily min/max), but only yearly min/max is retained on power outage.
* Retains barometer calibration and other settings after power outage. The WS-2902A unfortunately forgets its barometric calibration and all Min Max records when you remove power and batteries as you would need to do when servicing the outdoor sensor array to not get false readings. This is annoying on the WS-2902A.
* light and dark themes
* automatic brightness and on/off adjustment schedule to custom times
* automatic total yearly rain reset on January 1st (or any month you choose to be yearly reset). Yes the WS-2902A keeps Total counting forever unless you manually remember to reset it on January 1st.
* easier to calibrate and set alarms
* buttons on the WS-2000 can be used at night as they are labeled on the display and you can feel for them as they are physical buttons. The WS-2902A buttons are not visible at night so you are flying totally blind as the screen does not provide enough light to even see the buttons and they are not raised buttons so you can't feel for them either. This is a big deal because with the WS-2902A you need the buttons as all the data isn't visible at one time.
* ability to roll forwards and backwards on Revision firmware versions. The WiFi firmware that doesn't seem to do much only goes forward. On the WS-2902A you can only go forward to the current newest version
* the WS-2000 being the more premium model and ability to be easily customized will probably see more changes in the future...where as the WS-2902A is pretty much limited to what it does now
* WS-2000 hardware seems like it is identical or very close to the WS-1001 hardware that was hacked and screen layout customized. Although I haven't seen this done yet on the WS-2000 it is promising if someone were to look into this as the method would probably be same/similar enough.
And Lastly I'll leave you with a nice side by side view of both:
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Last Edit: March 24, 2019, 08:09:08 AM
Platokidd:
I have the WS-2902A and after researching til my eye's burned, I just ordered WS-2000 earlier today.
galfert:
--- Quote from: platokidd on March 15, 2019, 04:34:16 PM ---I have the WS-2902A and after researching til my eye's burned, I just ordered WS-2000 earlier today.
--- End quote ---
Great, good choice. Hopefully you also remembered to get a WH32B which you'll need, unless you already had one from using an ObserverIP. The WS-1000-BTH also works but is an older model.
I also want to point out that the WS-2000 also connects to WeatherCloud as I mentioned before. People often miss this because it isn't mentioned in the manual, and there isn't a way to configure it on the display itself. The only way to configure WeatherCloud on the WS-2000 is to use the awnet mobile app. The awnet app also provides some extra functionality to turn WU off as that can't be don't on the display...even though you were able to enter the credentials on the display...once they are in there only a factory reset will take them out ...unless you use the awnet app, and then you can enable and disable.
Platokidd:
--- Quote from: galfert on March 15, 2019, 04:48:09 PM ---
--- Quote from: platokidd on March 15, 2019, 04:34:16 PM ---I have the WS-2902A and after researching til my eye's burned, I just ordered WS-2000 earlier today.
--- End quote ---
Great, good choice. Hopefully you also remembered to get a WH32B which you'll need, unless you already had one from using an ObserverIP. The WS-1000-BTH also works but is an older model.
I also want to point out that the WS-2000 also connects to WeatherCloud as I mentioned before. People often miss this because it isn't mentioned in the manual, and there isn't a way to configure it on the display itself. The only way to configure WeatherCloud on the WS-2000 is to use the awnet mobile app. The awnet app also provides some extra functionality to turn WU off as that can't be don't on the display...even though you were able to enter the credentials on the display...once they are in there only a factory reset will take them out ...unless you use the awnet app, and then you can enable and disable.
--- End quote ---
Do believe it comes with the Indoor Thermo-Hygrometer-Barometer from Amazon. Would this be the WH32B ?
I am on Weather cloud now with my WS-2902a, so Im think that should remember how I did that, hopefully...
Can't wait to get the WS-2000 up and running.
galfert:
Being that you said you already owned a WS-2902A and you said you ordered the WS-2000 today as an upgrade, I thought you meant that you just got the WS-2000 display, not a whole new station. From just now having read your other post I now see that you did order a complete WS-2000 station because you want to use the WS-2902A at another location. So yes the WS-2000 complete station comes with the WH32B.
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