Home Security On my mind again

[pennwalk]

What kind of money?
Does this system contact a central station or the authorities?


It looks like it will be in the "a little less than 1$ per square foot" ball park.
It does contact a central monitoring station. About $250/year for that service. Do any jobs ever come in under the ballpark figure? He said it would be less than half a mil and I told him I definitly had less than half a mil.

Chris

 

[pennwalk]

Well, looks like you've got something to at least let you know someone's coming in...then what do you do?

I guess crawling under the bed ain't going to cut it?

Chris

 

[MossRoad]

What kind of money?
Does this system contact a central station or the authorities?


It looks like it will be in the "a little less than 1$ per square foot" ball park.
It does contact a central monitoring station. About $250/year for that service. Do any jobs ever come in under the ballpark figure? He said it would be less than half a mil and I told him I definitly had less than half a mil.

Chris

YIKES! That seems expensive. The goal of an alarm system is, in my opinion,...

A. Scare away an intruder.
B. Notify you of an intruder.
C. Notify someone else of an intruder.
D. Not cost an arm and a leg.

I've installed several alarm systems myself that meet those points. The most expensive was about $500 and the rest were considerably less. If done correctly, the intruder will leave well before the monitoring company even answers the call.

 

[Soundguy]

Hmm... trying to think of the first computers i used... A timex sinclair and that horrible little membrane keyboard come to mind.. had a 16k ram pack, and i used a microcasette recorder with it for data storage... seemed hi- tech at the time... ( z80 proc? ) had a trs 80 slant 4.. apple 2e vic 20 / c64 along the way too... a coco / color computer...Even an old CPM unit in the late 70's with an 8088 chip.. Had tandy's varient of an XT, as well as their compact line of the 'HX ' series... Ahh.. the glory days of PC's... I remember repalcing a few 8088 chips with NEC V20's to get that 1% increase.. and same with 8086 chips / NEC V30's.. etc... I miss all that old hardware... Had an old sperry pc with a herc video adapter and green monochrome screed ( had an amber too.. ).. had a souped up mem card and a couple MFM 20meg drives setting on a perstore controller card burning them up to get 30 megs out of them... ran a slow serial network before arcnet was easilly available.. I think I had thomas conrad cards if memory serves me.... I can still remember the first day I got a 286.. had a 40 meg hdd and I found a 100 meg kalok drive to fit in it.. but the bios wouldn't support the drive and hed to get a new controll that had to have the bios parameters programmed via debug.. Ironically.. I DO miss the old days of computing....

Soundguy

About the alarm system. The guy is a friend of mine from back in the days when we both used Atari computers(can you believe you could actually do something with 16K memory?) He installs GE networx systems. Sensors on the doors to see if the door is opened, wireless sensors on the windows to see if the window is opened or broken(battery lasts 5 years), Motion detectors inside that somehow ignore the cat. Keypad in 2 places. The system is suposed to be expandable and there is all kinds of other stuff you can add on. What do you think?

Chris

 

[rox]

ctpres, I'd be glad for any education you have time to give us. We have 7 doors and 16 double hung windows on the ground floor. We are struggling to find a way to have the bedroom windows open at night and still be safe. We are safer than we were a week ago but we are going to get safer.

Chris

Pennwalk- I am not through reading the thread yet, I hope that when I get to the end I will ahve read that the cops got 'em. In the meantime as you consider home security measures I'll add in to the conversation what we ahve in France. First off every window has some type of wooden shutter. We have roll down steel shutters. Kind of like a roll up garage door. They really do make you feel safe, nobody is going to get in without you hearing them and even then they jsut won't be able to get in. The shutters are built so that you can raise them jsut a little bit and like an accordian the "inni" folds ahve small holes in them to let in air. Actually I think a better design is to have them roll up instead of roll down. If they went from the bottom up you could leave the tops open for 12" or so. In other words an bad guys would be entering at the tops of your windows not the bottom. Many wood shutters, and you lock them form the inside at night have little flaps in them for letting in the night air, they pop out like little awnings. That would cover your windows but I don't have anything to add about the doors. We ahve patio doors and the shutters roll down over them at night. Where we live we actually don't use them all that much as we are pretty safe. Only one way in and out through a steel fence that you ahve to have the code to get through. There are steep hillsides that nobody would want to climb to get to us fromt the sides.

One more thought. I like a barrier over the windows. To me it seems safer than an alarm. A window can be broken an an alarm will let you know about it. But roll down steel shutters means there is a steel barrier between the bad guy and the glass.

 

[rox]

Another despicable murder in Lancaster County:

WEST DONEGAL TOWNSHIP, Pa. -- Police have arrested four local men in connection with the shooting death of a 65-year-old West Donegal Township, Lancaster County, man. And they said that the crime was random.
Ray Diener, 65, was shot and killed on his front door step the night of Wednesday, May 2. Police said the crime was a random robbery and that the only thing taken from him was his cell phone.
"They were driving in the neighborhood to look for a residence to target for a burglary or a robbery. This specific residence was selected at that point in time. It had not been targeted previously," said Lancaster County District Attorney Don Totaro.

Officials said the suspects went to the door, rang the doorbell and asked Diener to use a phone, claiming their car had broken down. They took Diener's cell phone and then Abraham Sanchez, 18, shot Diener four times, officials said.

This man was shot for a cell phone...

Stuff like this is why I carry a gun...including to the door.

Three of the four were over 18. I'm sure the 16 year old will be charged with murder too. I'm really hoping for the death penalty in this one.

Roy that is an incrediable post. Unbelievable really. I don't want to get into a Right to Bear arms discussion. I can say that living in France I do feel safer. If I am not mistaken nobody can carry a gun here legally, guns are jsut harder to come by. When I have nothing to do and have no more farm work (right) I think I'll google gun killings in France and see what the statistics are. There is jsut a lot fewer guns over here except there are plenty of what in my ignorence will call "long guns" for hunting.

 

[pennwalk]

I like a barrier over the windows.

Rox, How's it going. I bet it is beautiful where you are this time of year. I was thinking about bars over the bedroom windows. Bars would let us open the windows any way we want and the bad guys couldn't get in. Sadly my wifes first reaction was "bars! NO WAY I'm not living in a prison." Also we need to be sure that in the event of a fire we can get out the window. Actually our township requires that you can get out the bedroom windows. I saw a really nice garden trellis that looked like branches and leaves. I wondered if something like that would pass muster? I'd either have to take up metal working or find a blacksmith.

Chris

 

[Soundguy]

Actually.. long gun is a fairly 'correct' term for what you are describing.

Soundguy

y of what in my ignorence will call "long guns" for hunting.

 

[rox]

pennwalk,
Actually I am in Northern Illinois, I came home to visit my mother for Mothers Day. Boy she was so happy she was crying. I return back home to Provence Monday Memorial Day. My husband says it is quite muggy.

Pennwalk- I think the roll up shutters are ideal because when you want to you can get out, just roll them up. When I get back if I have a minute I'll take a pic and post it. In our Guest House there are manual roll up shutters, in our home they are rolled up and down by an electric motor and a switch inside the home.

 

[ctpres]

Tell us about your house and glass in any windows and doors. Are individual pieces of glass less thas one sq. foot. Maybe a DIY project is possible. I will sell you parts cost + 10% and shipping (only one guys). Prob. under $500. GE NX-8 w two keypads, 15 watt siren, 30 watt siren 5 door contacts and eight GE glassbreak detectors. If single story home it probably is very do-able. One idea would be secure windows so that one would have to break them to open or get in thru hole. One glass break can cover all glass in typical room. and you can live a reasonablly normal life in house with glass protection on. Second possibility is bidirectional motion/wall detectors. Think about a one foot wide barrier parallel to wall with several windows and a door. WITH motion on you can walk up to door let dog out but someone outside could not come thru barrier. This is one of the latest big guns in our high tech tool box. Don't recall cost on this but it is under 50 and probably closer to 30.Arrow XL

Electronics Line's revolutionary Arrow XL directional curtain PIR challenges the way security systems are perceived today. Utilizing our patented Motion Vector Analysis technology, the Arrow XL provides maximum agility and freedom of movement within the protected area, effectively replacing inferior perimeter protection solutions. The Arrow XL directional detector analyzes the sequence in which the detected signal pulses appear, thereby recognizing the direction from which the protected area has been entered. For example, if a person inside approaches a sliding door protected by an Arrow XL, the system will recognize this as valid motion and will not trigger an alarm. If, however, the Arrow XL senses motion from outside the door moving into the protected premises, it will trigger an alarm after intrusion validation. With a 9m (30ft) solid curtain vision beam, the Arrow XL is ideal for protecting display windows, skylights, sliding doors, attic entrances, and corridors. Moreover, the Arrow XL is as good-looking as it is smart, with the added flexibility of either wall or ceiling mount installation!