Getting local weather

I think I may have talked about this before but I can't find it, so maybe I haven't already brought this up ..

Most of us already know how the temperature and humidity announcements in Zara are obtained via internet from Weather Underground data which is then fed into Zara using a simple html format that Zara can read so it can announce temperature and humidity readings at whatever scheduled times you want it announced. I presume it works much the same for Salamadra or any other radio automation software.

Weather underground gets its data from a vast number of individual PWS (Personal Weather Stations) so all you have to do is select the weather station closest to your area for the most accurate data for your specific location.

So I figure why not just buy our own PWS station for local data, thus bypassing both Internet connection and the Weather Underground site? Just have your PWS feed Zara directly, it would be more accurate than WU because you won't be drawing data from a station miles away.

Well turns out there's a little snafu involved with that idea... Evidently almost all, except for the most expensive PWS stations require an internet connection to extract the data from your own PWS.. in other words, your personal locally owned weather station collects your local data, but you can't directly access that data - it first gets uploaded to the net, and distributed to the online weather sources like Weather Underground and only from there then you can download the data for import into whatever use you have for it at home.

In other words if you buy your own weather station and you want to extract the data for whatever purpose then you must have internet! Which seems ridiculous to me, but I guess that's how they insure people will subscribe.

However.. there's some work-arounds..

Since the PWS do wirelessly send the data directly to the little led display in your house (I forget the frequency of the top of my head but think it's like 49mHz or something), and there is a optional device called a GW1000 wifi gateway, (they're about $30), and what it does is allow you to extract the data directly without an Internet transfer first.

After some research I ended up on eBay and bought a Ambient Weather WS-2902C (first picture above) used but essentially new in original packaging and tested as working for $85 and I found a brand new GW1000 for $20.. So about $100 investment.

But now I think it might have jumped the gun getting an entire PWS , it may be overkill because I could have probably just bought a $10 wireless temperature and humidity device like a WN31(WH31) combined with the GW1000 to feed Zara the temperature and humidity. That would have made it only a grand total $30 investment

But that's alright, there have been past discussions of hacks to get Zara to also announce additional things like windspeed, direction and rainfall, etc. so maybe buying a whole PWS wasn't a bad idea, but I do kind of wish I started experimentation with just a cheap wireless temp and humidity sensor like the WN31. But what's done is done, still I should have considered it more before spending cash on anything.

Well I just got it and still waiting on the GW1000 to arrive, but presently that's my game plan. I've never heard of anyone else trying this so I figure I'll give it a go.

Truth be told I have no idea what I'm doing exactly, but the concept of the idea seems sound . I guess I'll find out .