For those who do not want WiFi on their appliances you still can get highly rated reasonably priced washing machines without WiFi, even from the companies that are putting WiFi in nearly everything.
E.g., I recently bought an LG WM3400CW washing machine for $650. On Consumer Reports it is tied for 3rd on the front loader ratings list. The LG 3900 and 4000 are tied for #1 with overall scores of 87, then the 3400, 8900, and 3600 tied for #3 with overall scores of 85.
Nearly every LG has WiFi nowadays, but not the 3400. Consumer Reports says it does but I think they probably got confused because it has LG's "Smart Diagnosis" which lets you get diagnostic information via LG's mobile app.
On models with WiFi Smart Diagnosis does indeed use WiFi.
On models without WiFi it uses sound. The washing machine plays sounds that sound similar to the sounds that acoustic modems made back in the pre-broadband internet days. Their mobile app listens to those and extracts the diagnostics data.
> On models without WiFi it uses sound. The washing machine plays sounds that sound similar to the sounds that acoustic modems made back in the pre-broadband internet days. Their mobile app listens to those and extracts the diagnostics data.
That's actually pretty cool! I think we should use this for more stuff to help usher in the R2-D2 future.
There was a company called chirp who offered an sdk for this, they also had fun proof of concept apps where you could share arbitrary data to people around you via sound. They eventually got bought by sonos and their offerings vanished...
I don't know how other smart speakers (eg. Google Home/Alexa) do this, but the Yandex Station smart speaker uses this for initial wifi setup. You enter the Wifi password on your phone in their app, then your phone plays a series of sounds in which the SSID and the password are encoded, the speaker listens to that and connects to the network.
That’s not an option for me. I live in a rental unit in the SF Bay Area so the appliances are what they are. I cannot afford to buy because I was born into a disenfranchised generation. The LG washer/dryer I use removed all dials and most buttons for a “sleek” look so if I want simple settings such as “permanent press” for clothing beyond jeans and t-shirts I have to use the app to select “permanent press” mode. Otherwise I get “normal” which cooks my clothes. I get a notification on my watch when the cycle ends which is useful so I guess that’s nice.
Generally with devices that are WiFi enabled but do not inherently need WiFi to do their main job there are a few possibilities.
• You do not have to configure WiFi to just use the device. It can do all the functions that type of device generally does, with a reasonable interface. You can configure WiFi to gain access to extra features, such as sending notifications or a friendlier interface.
• You have to configure WiFi to initially set up the device and/or to change some settings later, but it does not need to use WiFi during normal operation. WiFi can be used during normal operation for extra features.
• It needs WiFi during normal operation. Without WiFi you can only do at most a basic subset of normal operations.
For devices that do need WiFi it is worth distinguishing between devices that need to use the internet (directly or via an app on the local network) to function. There are devices that need WiFi because they use that to talk to a required app, but neither the device nor the app need internet.
This can be important when you have an internet outage. A device that requires WiFi but does not require internet can often continue to work when your internet is down as long as the outage is upstream from your home router.
For people whose reason for not wanting to configure WiFi is that they don't want the device sending their personal information to the device maker, it is not necessarily enough to just leave omit configuring WiFi. Allegedly some devices will look for open WiFi networks and use those if you don't explicitly configure a WiFi network.
As far as LG washing machines go I believe they fall under the first bullet item above.
E.g., I recently bought an LG WM3400CW washing machine for $650. On Consumer Reports it is tied for 3rd on the front loader ratings list. The LG 3900 and 4000 are tied for #1 with overall scores of 87, then the 3400, 8900, and 3600 tied for #3 with overall scores of 85.
Nearly every LG has WiFi nowadays, but not the 3400. Consumer Reports says it does but I think they probably got confused because it has LG's "Smart Diagnosis" which lets you get diagnostic information via LG's mobile app.
On models with WiFi Smart Diagnosis does indeed use WiFi.
On models without WiFi it uses sound. The washing machine plays sounds that sound similar to the sounds that acoustic modems made back in the pre-broadband internet days. Their mobile app listens to those and extracts the diagnostics data.