AutoDiet Feeder

I was scared from reviews that this wouldn't work and I'd be SOL with returns. But this product absolutely works! I have two stations since my cats are now on two different diets. I travel a lot and needed to make sure they could use feeders with two different diets and without them getting into the other cat's food. My cats are pretty good though and aren't obsessed with food so they don't try and do anything funky and don't push each other out of the way. I will say that one of my cats is really scared of anything, and even she's fine with this. I did make sure to program her to the feeder she preferred to make her training go more smoothly.I was really careful with training my cats with the feeders since I've been burned by automated cat products before, and they adjusted pretty quickly. First I just put the feeders out with no batteries for about a week. Then I turned them on and programmed the tags so that they could only get into their specific feeder. The doors were set to default open as recommended. The only hiccup was that when they figured out the doors could move, they got a little freaked out for a day or two. But now they naturally figured out to go to their specific feeder. Absolutely amazing. As others have said, I do recommend putting them on books or boxes though, so they don't have to bend down to get the tags to register.Con: The menu interface is infuriating. As a coder I'm not sure how else you'd program it, but it makes me want to throw the feeder. If you save something it goes back to the first menu, the response time is slow, etc. But you don't need to mess with it much. The feeder itself is also a bit expensive.I highly recommend watching this youtube tutorial about how to set it up. It has step by step instructions as well as recommendations and explanations for the different food modes. It also explains how to restrict your different cat profiles / other animals.[...]This product was a life saver! I think most people who hate it didn't take the time to properly have their cats adjust. (Or their cats are just bullies.) I really think it works!

PLEASE save your money. Wireless Whiskers is a sketchy, shady online company at best with absolutely horrible customer service. Their website (you can google it) looked new twenty years ago (RED FLAG). The seller of the Amazon version is equally awful to deal with, passing along the 20% mandatory restocking fee for returns (RED FLAG!).I purchased this item because I have three kitties on one particular diet and another kitty on an Rx diet. I needed a solution that would provide my three kitties on a normal diet a way of portioning out their meals and keeping kitty #4 from snacking on the no-no food.While the WW website brags that this unit will do all I wanted and more (can you say "as tacky as Sham-Wow"? - we're talking top-of-the line, late-night infomercial quality junk from a third-rate seller. Their website offers absolutely NO way to contact customer service other than by email...and trust me, they WILL NOT respond to your questions, complaints, or RMA requests (RED FLAG).The unit I ended up with malfunctioned straight out of the box. Unless any of the kitties would move close enough and lower their heads to where the RFID tag was physically TOUCHING the front of the feeder (and remain that way the entire time they were eating or the gate would close), the feed gate would not open, and even then, oftentimes, it still did not open. The unreasonably noisy feed gate motor scared the kitties away from their feeder, which, if you are a cat person, you know that means that once a cat has been scared away from what should be a positive location, it is difficult to get them to try it again. Cats are quick to make associations - positive or negative, and they remember!The limited interface offered options to leave the gate permanently open, permanently closed, default open, or default closed. Unfortunately, my unit arrived without a user manual, so I was forced to search for one online, download it, and print it - just over 50 pages long.For $279.99, this is no bargain. Purchasing Wireless Whiskers is like taking three Benjamins and lighting them on fire. Customer service is nonexistent, there are unreasonable return terms, and a terrible product to begin with. Because of the company's wretched restocking fee, they are trying to keep almost $56 of the original purchase price just for attempting to do business with them. It's not my fault that their project is faulty, antiquated, and, overall, just junk.Save your money and heartache and go for something more reliable, like the PetLibre pet feeder. I now have four of them ($169.99 each) and they work like clockwork and are whisper quiet.Never, never, NEVER EVER again, Wireless Whiskers. This product should be removed from the market because the technology itself (calling it technology is a stretch) was cutting edge - 30 years ago.If you're reading this review and decide to proceed with ordering anyway, you cannot say you were not warned. Don't make the same mistake I did.If I could give negative stars, I would have.RUN AWAY!!!!!

I got this feeder because we got a new kitten who needs to free feed and an adult cat who needs to be kept out of the kitten's food. It was pretty easy to set up and has tons of different options for size and times of meals. I do like that it lets you see how long your pet has eaten each day and how much. We do have to use the "extreme shut" to keep the big cat out. It plugs in, but also has batteries in case of a power outage. The feeder is very light and the top pops off easily, so we put it next to our kettle bells and put one on top to keep the other cat out and prevent it from being tipped over. The rings for the tags are not great quality. There is a big disclaimer to say they MUST hang with both rings, but within 3 weeks we went through all 4 rings because they all broke off, which then was a problem because the kitten couldn't eat. We also lost a tag because it fell off the ring and after searching everywhere we couldn't find it. Thankfully there was a second tag! We attached that one directly to the collar and there haven't been any issues. The kitten is smart enough to know it needs to crouch by the doors to open and then when it's eating it rests in theright spot so the doors stay open. Just some things to keep in mind.

I have a small dog who overeats. This product was promising, but did not work for our small dog. It does not dispense controlled amounts. Instead, it allows the door to open for a set number of minutes at intervals. Our small overeating dog just simply kept his head in the way of the doors when they tried to close, and he kept eating, The doors made a couple of attempts to close but he didn't care, and kept eating. Finally the machine gave up and remained open even when the dog's head moved out of the way, and stayed open. Programming took quite an effort-- instructions are very confusing.I think this could work great for cats, or dogs who are not as bent on eating as mine is.