Types of alarms

A burglar alarm is a device (usually electronically controlled) designed to scare and/or panic an unauthorised intruder. The primary objective of a burglar alarm is to scare the burglar away, the secondary objective is to alert attention ie of passer bys, or a passing police car. The frequency/volume of a siren is such that it induces panic in most people when activated. Criminals know full well they have limited time to break in, gather their booty and get out, and with an alarm siren screaming at them their anxiety and adrenalin levels go up and so they flee.

An alarm that only ‘scares off’ the thief is known as a Local alarm, this type of alarm has limited effect as criminals are known to deactivate them by destroying the ringing siren or sirens, (with introduction of the “wheelie bin” criminals have access to a handy step up to help them reach a low mounted siren) leaving them to continue ransacking the premises.

Monitored alarms are fast becoming the standard to deter theft from both homes and businesses. This is achieved by connecting a transmitting device such as either a GPRS dialler or a modem dialler. When an activation is detected, the alarm panel can ‘call’ either a control room, a mobile phone or send an sms or any combination of these three. Most monitored alarms that have been installed over the years are modem type and are now outdated and antiquated.

Criminals often bypass both the power and the phone lines prior to breaking in, which renders a modem alarms ability to get help useless. They then proceed to smash the sirens and continue on their destructive way. Modem alarms are programmed to phone the control room and report they are operational; this is usually scheduled once a day. In the event you’re on holidays and targeted by a criminal, this is of little use because you may not discover any problem until up to 24 hours after there has been a problem.

GPRS alarms operates in a similar fashion to a local/modem alarm, however has the added benefit of using (wireless) mobile phone sim card technology which can contact the control room as soon as any part of the alarm equipment is either tampered with or activated. In addition the GPRS panel sends a signal every 90 seconds to the control room which is known as “polling”. Most GPRS panels have a back up sim card in case the first one doesn’t or can’t work. We recommend using two different carriers (ie Optus and Telstra) as recently one major carrier lost all of it’s mobile phone lines (including GPRS) when an errant back hoe severed a major line.

Locating the panel

It is critical to have the GPRS panel located where it is well protected and the panel has enough time to contact a control room before the criminals locate the panel and destroy it. This is where the real skill of designing and installing a working alarm system is critically important, I’ve seen many alarm panels randomly screwed on any convenient wall just waiting for someone to come and easily disable it.

Arming, Disarming and remote control

Most alarms can be programmed to use a blipper or a fob (similar to the ones used to unlock modern cars) for arming and disarming, or the standard keypad can be used, however this is not as convenient as remote technology. Many modern panels can be armed or disarmed from another location. I have on more one occasion arrived home only to discover the alarm has not been set, now it is possible to receive a SMS that is triggered when the alarm is left off and then “arm” it remotely.

Isolating and arming particular zones or areas

In a domestic (less often in a business) situation an alarm can be set to protect designated areas, whilst leaving other areas isolated. For example you would arm the downstairs portion of the house, without arming the upstairs area, this means you can protect one part of the house from intruders, whilst you sleep safely upstairs.

Smoke Detectors

We can also incorporate smoke detectors that communicate directly with the fire brigade. I have had smoke detectors ready to go off at KGB headquarters for years now, when I lock the doors at night I’m confident that if an electrical fault causes a fire the GPRS will send a signal direct to the fire brigade without the need for a passerby to notice and hopefully call 000. This definitely is a giant step towards my business being less at risk from a devastating fire. This highlights another benefit of a GPRS panel which will continue to work even if the wires connecting it are burnt.