Best digital weather station?

I bought an Ambient Weather WS-2080 (http://www.ambientweather.com/amws2080.html) about two months ago and am happy with it so far. It is a very full-featured weather station for the price. It uses a radio signal to communicate between the weather station and the display console, and updates the display every 48 seconds. The display shows a lot of information, and has a USB interface that allows a computer to capture the readings and create graphs from them. I haven't used the USB interface yet, but it was one of the features that attracted me to the WS-2080.

It's possible to adjust the calibration of the various sensors from the console, but for temperature it was close enough out of the box that I didn't bother. We've had some rain a few times in the last month and it seems that the readings produced by the WS-2080 are on the low side, so I might end up calibrating the rain gauge. I did find the configuration procedure to be fairly confusing, with a lot of button-pushing to get to the various settings. You definitely want to have the manual in hand when you do it. There is software that comes with the WS-2080 to configure it but it's Windows-only and I have a Mac and Linux household so I haven't used it. There is open source software for Linux that is supposed to be able to talk to the WS-2080 to capture the sensor readings, but I haven't had a chance to try it yet.

I mounted the sensor pod on my TV antenna mast above the antenna, which puts it only about four feet above the roof; probably not the best place for the temperature sensor. I did buy the accessory solar radiation shield for the temperature sensor, but a better solution might have been to mount the temperature sensor in the shade on the north side of the house. The various parts of the weather station connect together with phone-cord-like wiring with RJ-11 connectors.

Thanks for the recommedation, David!

I have an older model La Crosse wireless forecast station, with temperature, wind, humidity, barometer, and rainfall. The rain gauge was never much good but everything else has been going strong for over 5 years. Newer models are available at hardware stores or the web. They are not very expensive and work fine for home use. link text http://www.lacrossetechnology.com

Consider adding your station to the Weather Underground Personal Weather Station network. More than 25,000 weather stations across the globe already send data to Weather Underground. Follow the link below to review a list of available hardware and software. You can also browse the weather stations in your neighborhood to see which hardware is popular.

Weather Station Hardware

If you want a weather station that last. The only way to go is Davis. I've have the Davis Vantage Pro Wireless Station since 2004 and it's still working like the day I got it. Wind, Temp, Humidity, Rain Gauge is all wireless. And it keeps data stored. Yes it was $800 but 8 years later it is working just as great as it did on day one.

Davis Instruments have a reputation for building durable and very accurate weather stations. However, their display consoles feel dated and are not user friendly as you will need to buy an additional piece of equipment just to get your weather data online. The Davis stations are expensive compared to other alternatives but you do get what you pay for in this instance. For another option that is more affordable take a look at the Ambient Weather WS-1002-WIFI Observer. This website has some more info on the best home weather stations https://www.weatherstationadvisor.com/