Sprinkler System Controller Rant

[dtech]

Recently moved to a new house, it has a big lawn (which ultimately I plan to mostly replace with rock/xeriscape) it also has a Rain Bird ESP-ME3 controller, this thing is absurdly overly complicated compared to controllers of the past, I have no patience for having to figure things like this out, it has so many features that I'll never use and most people likely don't either, it sells for approx $200, whereas simple easy to program units of the past were $40 . Is this really progress ?
Reminds me to a degree of the VCR programming jokes from yrs past. I came very close to tearing this thing off the wall and smashing it, but I'll probably replace it with something very simple (if it exists) and sell this over engineered pos. End of rant

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[FunInTheSun]

Recently moved to a new house, it has a big lawn (which ultimately I plan to mostly replace with rock/xeriscape) it also has a Rain Bird ESP-ME3 controller, this thing is absurdly overly complicated compared to controllers of the past, I have no patience for having to figure things like this out, it has so many features that I'll never use and most people likely don't either, it sells for approx $200, whereas simple easy to program units of the past were $40 . Is this really progress ?
Reminds me to a degree of the VCR programming jokes from yrs past. I came very close to tearing this thing off the wall and smashing it, but I'll probably replace it with something very simple (if it exists) and sell this over engineered pos. End of rant

I feel your pain. But sometimes looking at an overview of the feature set helps things make more sense. Even if it's just so you know what you want to turn off.
Here's a link to the manufacturer's page for the thing. It has videos...
https://www.rainbird.com/products/esp-me3-series-controllers

 

[dtech]

I feel your pain. But sometimes looking at an overview of the feature set helps things make more sense. Even if it's just so you know what you want to turn off.
Here's a link to the manufacturer's page for the thing. It has videos...
https://www.rainbird.com/products/esp-me3-series-controllers

thanks, I lack the patience to spend time figuring out some of these rube goldberg like devices, the old sprinkler control had a dial, + and - buttons and a lever to select watering days, truly intuitive and simple. Now so many electronics devices utilize ASICs which allows for a multiple of functions, but to program these things one has to deal with stuff like "press and hold this button for 5 secs, then press this button until the display flashes, then hold both buttons simultaneously to save the changes" and so on , just hate dealing with the added time and steps to figure it out. Why anyone would put a $200 sprinkler control unit with every imaginable feature is beyond my admittedly limited comprehension, and then the stupid thing is mounted on an outside wall - likely because a lot of homeowners use a lawn service and never deal with programming the unit themselves.

 

[FunInTheSun]

thanks, I lack the patience to spend time figuring out some of these rube goldberg like devices, the old sprinkler control had a dial, + and - buttons and a lever to select watering days, truly intuitive and simple. Now so many electronics devices utilize ASICs which allows for a multiple of functions, but to program these things one has to deal with stuff like "press and hold this button for 5 secs, then press this button until the display flashes, then hold both buttons simultaneously to save the changes" and so on , just hate dealing with the added time and steps to figure it out. Why anyone would put a $200 sprinkler control unit with every imaginable feature is beyond my admittedly limited comprehension, and then the stupid thing is mounted on an outside wall - likely because a lot of homeowners use a lawn service and never deal with programming the unit themselves.

Yeah. I design test equipment for industrial use, and some of the convoluted things (other) designers make users go through to avoid adding another dedicated switch is unreal. Saving $ 0.18 in hardware cost, but makes the thing so hard to use that nobody wants to use it. Stupidity...

 

[P. A. Schilke]

Recently moved to a new house, it has a big lawn (which ultimately I plan to mostly replace with rock/xeriscape) it also has a Rain Bird ESP-ME3 controller, this thing is absurdly overly complicated compared to controllers of the past, I have no patience for having to figure things like this out, it has so many features that I'll never use and most people likely don't either, it sells for approx $200, whereas simple easy to program units of the past were $40 . Is this really progress ?
Reminds me to a degree of the VCR programming jokes from yrs past. I came very close to tearing this thing off the wall and smashing it, but I'll probably replace it with something very simple (if it exists) and sell this over engineered pos. End of rant

Hi DT,

Yep....have same....over complicated for no reason of which I can think....

best,
Phil

 

[pbethel]

First thing I did when I moved in to the AZ house was unplug the controller.
I fought too wet for the majority of my life (160 inches of rain per year avg.) trying to keep plants healthy that needed dryer conditions.
I'll be d*mned if I am going to do the reverse in my retirement in an area in a multi-decade drought.

 

[RDJTX]

I hiered a guy from a sprinkler company to come program the on I have. they update it whenever we have them out to do a systems check.

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