Which house alarm to buy?

noshankus

Hi Guys,

I have just bought a new house which is fitted with wires for the contacts on each window and door.
Now, I know there's three things I need:

1) an alarm box or console for typing in the key-code and activating and de-activating the alarm
2) a bell - which I believe can be a generic bell
3) the sensors for each window/door

My question is, which would you recommend? I'd love to get one of those that can send an sms if the alarm goes off if possible.
The house is three floors, so would like to have 3 "zones" set up.
Zone 1) 2xDoors and 5xWindows
Zone 2) 6xWindows
Zone 3) 4xWindows

I don't want any motion sensors to be honest, but wouldn't mind if some were thrown in. My main worry is all the windows.

Does anyone know of an alarm box that would have that many separate connectors for the sensors? I.e. at least 17? As I said before, I'd love one that could send me an sms too

I know you can get someone to install it for you for €2000, but to be honest, I love doing things like this myself and would prefer to buy the components myself and do it as a little project!

Thanks for your help!

altor

noshankus wrote: »

Hi Guys,

I have just bought a new house which is fitted with wires for the contacts on each window and door.
Now, I know there's three things I need:

1) an alarm box or console for typing in the key-code and activating and de-activating the alarm
2) a bell - which I believe can be a generic bell
3) the sensors for each window/door

My question is, which would you recommend? I'd love to get one of those that can send an sms if the alarm goes off if possible.
The house is three floors, so would like to have 3 "zones" set up.
Zone 1) 2xDoors and 5xWindows
Zone 2) 6xWindows
Zone 3) 4xWindows

I don't want any motion sensors to be honest, but wouldn't mind if some were thrown in. My main worry is all the windows.

Does anyone know of an alarm box that would have that many separate connectors for the sensors? I.e. at least 17? As I said before, I'd love one that could send me an sms too

I know you can get someone to install it for you for €2000, but to be honest, I love doing things like this myself and would prefer to buy the components myself and do it as a little project!

Thanks for your help!

Hi noshankus,
you could install a hkc panel.. on this you can use what is called point id sensors, they are giving there own name and point number to allow you to tell them apart. that way if you have a text dialer installed and your alarm activates the text would tell you what window or door activated the system, good for fault finding too. the internal motion is also on point id which is good because it will send a verified text to your phone to let you know someone is in the house in the event the intruder gets into your home..
hope this helps..

noshankus

altor wrote: »

you could install a hkc panel.

Hi altor,

thanks. So would you recommend:

SW-812 & SW-1212 Control Panels with keypad
Housing: 1.2mm mild steel
8 on-board zones fully analysed
Supports 4 keypads & 1 four-zone expander
Expander is pre-fitted on SW-1212
All expander zones are fully analysed
48 zones with ID sensors / zone modules.
4 Users (7 SmartLink, 7 remote users)
250 event engineer log
Plug-on digi modem supporting PSTN SMS texting
Central station protocols: FastFormat, Contact ID, SIA & Extended SIA

Just a couple of questions as I'm not familiar with the terminology:

1) Does the "48 zones with ID sensors / zone modules." mean I can connect 48 wires to it, one for each set of sensors?

2) Does "Plug-on digi modem supporting PSTN SMS texting" mean I can stick a SIM card into it and it'll SMS me with info for example if it goes off?

altor

noshankus wrote: »

1) Does the "48 zones with ID sensors / zone modules." mean I can connect 48 wires to it, one for each set of sensors?

2) Does "Plug-on digi modem supporting PSTN SMS texting" mean I can stick a SIM card into it and it'll SMS me with info for example if it goes off?

A HKC SW-812 panel is what you need.

1) zone 1 is set on entry exit on the panel, eg front door.
zones 5 - 8 are id zones, which means you can put 10 id sensors on each of these zones.
2) the panel needs a gsm text dialer if you want to use a sim instead of your phone line. costs over €400 for this gsm alone.. Plug-on digi is for use with your phone line if you have one. this does not come with the panel..

2011

Just to add to Altor's good advice:

1) Does the "48 zones with ID sensors / zone modules." mean I can connect 48 wires to it, one for each set of sensors?

The chances are your house is not wired like this with a "home run" for each sensor. If it was you could series a number of sensors within the panel. Generally a group of windows and/or exterior doors are "daisy chained" together. For example a typical cable run (for a zone) might be from the panel to upstairs front window 1, from there to upstairs front window 2 and finally from there to upstairs front window 3.

Sensors connected on zones 5 to 8 (inclusive) can be "addressed" thanks to "ID sensors".
For example, if you were to look at zone 5 in isolation:
It would typically be wired with a 4 core cable, two cores for tamper and the other 2 cores for detection. Even though the ID sensors on this zone share the same 2 detection cores due to the fact that they communicate with an "intelligent" signal each one can be identified by the panel. This way you know exactly which sensor was activated, rather than which group of sensors.

I don't want any motion sensors to be honest, but wouldn't mind if some were thrown in.

I would always suggest that you put in at least 1. This is good for verification.

My main worry is all the windows.

I would agree with you here.

Good luck!

KoolKid

- 1 on the HKC its a very dated panel at this stage.
The Astec Fusion will do what you require re texting you.
Using Astec system sensors on your windows & doors it will also distinguish between sensor contacts & panic buttons all on the same home run.

If you want to go a step further look at the Signet 200IP This will give you text alerts.
It will also give you remote access via any web browser.
It comes with wireless as standard.
If you fit a GSM dialler you can also send text commands to the panel.
You can fit X10 module for home automation.
Zones , Outputs & X10 can all be controlled remotly or in conjunction with calender & zone events. EG if you open your back door after 6 pm in the winter & after 9 pm in the summer you light switches etc.... The applications are endless..
I will never install another HKC system . They have fell so far behind its unreal.

altor

If you have 10 wired window sensors on a zone on either the astec or the signet and the alarm activates, do you get a text telling you what window has activated ?

KoolKid

No , But who usies point ID for a domestic application.
Astec will tell you if its a contact or sensor.
Anyway TBH if your putting 10 sensors plus contacts on the one zone you are looking for trouble. There is excuse in the world to do it like that.

thewools

koolkid wrote: »

If you want to go a step further look at the Signet 200IP

+1

noshankus

Great! Thanks for all the info. I see from other threads that this discussion has been done before and can get quite heated. To avoid any of that, I think I'll state right now that if the Astec Fusion does what I wish (keep reading) I'll purchase that one.

The X10 automation may be a little too much for me, while it would be ridiculously cool to have I just don't have the budget or the time to play around with it at the moment.

So, were I to go with the Astec Fusion (please bear with me as I'm new to this whole thing especially the terminology), "10-80 Zone intruder alarm panel inc keypad" - would I be able to attach the wires directly to it? In my house I have all the wires dropping down near the front door and a power line too.

Assuming I can attach all the wires to various inputs on the panel and the power, all I would need as extra is the sensors and the bell, correct? Do I need to purchase particular types of sensors? I believe the beel can be any generic bell?

Also, the Astec Fusion would allow me to stick a SIM card in and set it up to send me an SMS when the alarm goes off?

As a side query (not a deal breaker) I also have a wireless LAN in my house, would I be able to attach it via that and maybe either view logs or set it up, even possibly remotely connect to it (not asking how as I'm able to do that myself at least!:) )?

Thanks guys for all your help. I appreciate that you must hear a lot of the same questions over and over.

altor

koolkid wrote: »

No , But who usies point ID for a domestic application.
Astec will tell you if its a contact or sensor.
Anyway TBH if your putting 10 sensors plus contacts on the one zone you are looking for trouble. There is excuse in the world to do it like that.

I never said anything about putting 10 sensors plus 10 contacts on one zone.. you know as well as i do that this is not allowed..

The question was can astec or signet tell you what window has activated by text if your alarm activates. Your answer was NO.

There is no problem putting 10 ID sensors on a zone as each has there own point. I use point ID for domestic, sensors cost more but well worth the extra money in my opinion.

noshankus

altor wrote: »

The question was can astec or signet tell you what window has activated by text if your alarm activates. Your answer was NO.

So this means if I do go for the Astec Fusion, if ANY window has been opened while the alarm is set, I will just get a generic message saying a sensor has been alarmed? While not perfect, I could live with this. Surely the keypad (and then by association, the SMS) would be able to tell me which zone at least triggered the alarm?

altor

If you give them all separate zones this will work but most cables are not to each window or door, the cable could be looped by a couple of windows.
this does not mater with the point ID as they are given separate point locations and names to tell them apart.

noshankus

altor wrote: »

If you give them all separate zones this will work but most cables are not to each window or door, the cable could be looped by a couple of windows.
this does not mater with the point ID as they are given separate point locations and names to tell them apart.

Maybe mine is weird then, as I have gone around to all the windows/doors and counted the wires dropping down to each of them and they match the number of wires dropping down near the door. So it seems like in fact there is a wire for each entry point.

altor

that makes it alot easier for you then..

2011

If you give them all separate zones this will work but most cables are not to each window or door, the cable could be looped by a couple of windows.

This is correct for the way alarm systems are normally wired.

it seems like in fact there is a wire for each entry point.

In that case each point is wired as a home run, this is not normal but it will work just fine. Therefore (unlike most people) you can have an Astec Fusion and a sensor per zone. This will allow you to identify which sensor has activated as you requested.

Both the HKC and the Astec Fusion are great systems IMHO. I think you would be happy with either.