I am a building contractor and recently had an A/C contractor install a high end 18.6 SEER Lennox Heat Pump with a dual stage compressor and variable speed air handler in one of our custom homes. We paid for, and the final invoice clearly indicates that they were to install a Lennox thermostat with humidity control. They actually installed a Honeywell TH8320 which does not have idependent humidty control. I'm trying to figure out what to tell them to replace the thermostat with.
The Lennox tech support individual told me that he thought that for true optimal humidty control where it works by running the blower on low to rapidly dehumidify the home, we would have to use the Lennox 81M28 thermostat and that he didn't think we could use other brands.
My question is this: do you think that that the suport tech was correct that we have to use a Lennox branded thermostat to work best or to work at all with the Lennox for humidity control? I'm questioning him since he didn't sound 100% like he was positive about the advice he was giving me.
If it's true that other brands will work just fine with the Lennox system, do you have a recommendation for the best/most reliable/most bells and whistles/whatever brand of thermostat? Since we definitely have to swap out the thermostat, I figured we might as well ask the question as to which is the best one to buy for them. The Honeywell units sure look much nicer than the Lennox thermostats (the Honeywell VisionPro TH8321U1006 has independent dehumidification control), but I don't want to make a decision based purely on appearance.
Thanks so much for any guidance you can provide me.
DavidAJ