AcuRite 01517 Wireless Weather Station with 5-in-1 Weather Sensor: Temperature and Humidity Gauge, Rainfall, Wind Speed and Wind Direction

I bought this to replace an old LaCrosse "weather station" that the outside sensor finally stopped working on. Granted it was probably 10 years old so it had definitely proved it's worth.I did a fair bit of research before deciding on this model as I was concerned about the size of the sensor unit and unsure what would be the best mounting option. I can happily report that the overall size of the outdoor unit isn't as big as I was expecting so it's certainly not intrusive looking.I also wasn't about to get anything that required mounting 30 feet off the ground! First I really don't have a place in my yard that would work for that kind of mounting and I wasn't about to start installing a separate mounting pole anywhere. Not to mention the concerns for general maintenance of the outdoor unit if it was mounted somewhere totally out of reach. I do have a 10 X 12 deck attached to my house so I mounted the outdoor sensor on the deck post that was at the farthest corner with the most open area away from the house and it works great! Due to the construction of the house it just happens that the mounting spot is on a northern exposure area. I have a good sized but not huge back yard and I do live in town so there's really no place with a totally unobstructed mounting place since there are other buildings and trees within 50 feet. The total height off the ground is maybe 6 feet max but that's not affecting the accuracy at all.Overall installation was a breeze. It maybe took 10 to 15 minutes total to put it together, mount the outdoor unit and plug in the indoor display. No muss no fuss, it started working immediately! Super impressed by the ease of set up!The "feels like" and wind chill readings are spot on with what the weather service reports for my area and those are the readings I was most intrigued by. I live in a northern climate where wind chill is a big deal in the winter. The temp reading is extremely accurate. The only precipitation we've had since I installed it are snow and sleet and I have't been super diligent about cleaning out the rainwater collection bin so I can't really say how accurate it is yet but it has given me a reading of total rainfall so I'm assuming it's working fine.The only real suggestion I have for the indoor display is to consider wall mounting it. The base isn't super sturdy and mine fell off the counter causing a corner of the display that fits in the slot of the counter base to break off. The piece that broke is clear so it's not an issue looks wise and the fall didn't affect the performance at all so I'm not knocking any stars off the review but please do be aware that the counter top may not be the best mounting option if you have kids or pets that could knock it off.

This weather station was much easier to set up than the one I just replaced it with. It self calibrates to your altitude and location. The display screen is easy to understand and read. You don't have to turn on a light at night to see it. I like the colors rather than the monochrome display on my old unit. The scrolling feature on the bottom is nice that you aren't having to push a bunch of buttons to see the history of the weather. I mounted this at the peak of my roof and it's working well up there. Changing the batteries might get a little tricky as the battery compartment is on the bottom of the unit but hopefully I won't have to change them but once a year or less. I used Lithium batteries so they should last a long time. The solar feature should help them last also. We haven't had any ran so to speak of so not sure how well that works, but my dad has the exact same unit and his works very well, measuring down to .01 of an inch. Pretty accurate. I have no complaints about this unit at all.

4. Now 3.5 years later (2021). Definitely needs a component update. Replaced the anemometer and the temperature sensors with components from AcuRite. Unit is like new! Kudos to the company for providing and easy and cost-effective way to breathe new life into the machine.3. Update: About 2 h after changing batteries, the unit is now fully operational. Nothing in the manual to indicate that I should wait this long ...2. Change in my opinion. Two and a half months later, and the anemometer is no longer working. Changed the batteries. No effect. Am now about the engage the company in a warranty exchange. Will post my comments when I hear back on how that worked out. Stay tuned.1. Happy so far. Easy setup. Batteries are easy to change. BUT have only had the unit for a month. My last weather station (not this brand) only lasted 14 months. So, if this one holds up over the long-term then it deserves 5 stars - we'll see.

We live on an acreage, and I love that I can track weekly rainfall so that I can plan my watering. Beyond that, it answers all my questions weather wise.

This unit is well made. The outdoor sensor is well designed and easily mounted, even having a bubble level on top to aid in proper installation. The display is just the right size, easily readable, with 3 controllable brightness levels. Readings seem to be very accurate as compared to other devices we have. One major disappointment is that the wind speed and direction readings are not instantaneous.You have to wait 18 seconds for the wind to update and 30 for the direction. Since we have the unit in the TV room where the old hardwired Heathkit unit was, we always checked the speed when we heard big gusts of wind. Not now. It was always amusing to watch the wind direction arrow spin around when heavy winds were about. I assume that having a wireless unit feed back instantaneous readings would be an extra drain on the batteries. The Weather Ticker is an interesting feature, but if you are interested in a particular reading, for example peak wind gust, you have to wait for it to go by in the window, which has a great deal of stored data.