I'm not sure what you are expecting of an alarm system. The tech is surely not new but you're just monitoring contacts and it's utterly reliable and that's the point. Look at the Konnected system. This is the newest one on the market and while it does offer some nice new connectivity additions it's basically the same thing for a reason. These systems do the job really really well and there is limited need to do much else or you run the risk of introducing weak points. The wired system is bullet proof, requires little if any intervention once it's setup and quite difficult the purposely defeat. I lived with my last system for 17 years. Not a single problem and no little batteries to replace. I can spend around $100 and defeat the ring system. My HE system is something I am regularly tinkering with and experience plenty of problems. In one of the recent HE videos they even discuss HSM and how they do not recommend using it as a proper alarm system for the reason of reliability.
For $150 you're getting the brains, a panel to house everything, a backup battery and a keypad. You could add some wiring and a couple of sensors for $50 more. You could also spend $200 on a base Ring system and still only get the brains, a keypad and two sensors and it won't match the reliability of the wired system.
I'm sure it is. All of that stuff is great practice. I have cameras and lights too. My comments are specifically about an alarm system though and the value a dedicated system has as well as the value of a wired system over wireless if you have the option.
In the end, none of this stuff will deter someone determined to get into your house and none of it will prevent that fire or carbon monoxide leak. It will however be the most reliable way to react to all that.
I'll add a short story. There was a spate of break ins last summer in my area. A small group from out of state were traveling through the state breaking into homes. They wore masks and nondescript clothing and didn't care about cameras or alarms. They smashed their way in and were out before the police could get there targeting specific kinds of items they could easily get away with. There were a few instances when people were home including kids and that is the instance that is the most scary.
Ha! I enjoy the conversation my friend. It's all good!
I'm sure there might have been some liability thing there but you of all people should be acutely aware of all the possible issues with the reliability of using HE for something "mission critical" like an alarm over a dedicated system. Especially if it's doing other things and you're constantly tinkering with it. The forums are littered with posts about slow downs, device failures, etc etc.
I have a pretty simple HE setup and I have just had to start scheduling hub restarts after finding slow downs to the point of becoming unresponsive and even a few crashes. Battery reporting in devices is not consistent. I have also had a couple of device failures which were unknown until I needed something to work and it didn't. Fortunately, all of my critical systems are completely independent of HE in their operation and I just use HE to monitor them and report and to do some fun stuff.
My point there, which I clearly didn't write, is just about reliability. The one time you get that level of an attack where your security stuff is not a deterrent, you need your system to work without intervention.
There was another one more localized near my general area with one guy who was using a wireless jammer. He fortunately got caught too.
I do and I trust it fully. I also have cameras as well. Just I side note, I work for my local 911 center. We get false alarms all the time from the paid services. In fact , probably to the tune of 98% are false. I have yet to have a false alarm that the wife or I didn't cause ourselves. Also, the time from alarm activation until time we are notified is quite long sometimes. With mine I know instantly.
Well that's a different conversation and not exclusive to any setup.
I could never fully trust any HA system for anything mission critical. But that's just me.
Me too.
Not mutually exclusive scenarios. My system not only contacts a monitoring service but alerts me instantly which is great but I know there is someone else contacting help if I can't.
Hubitat is used for our primary alarm - in particular for Sleep mode.
For extended away/Vacation - we turn Ring Alarm on thanks to it's 24hr monitoring, battery backup (I also have my hubitat on an UPS) and cellular backup.
This combo has been fantastic. For example when Ring is enabled I have Hubitate kill the power to my garage door via a zigbee smart plug, it doubles down and does some light mimics. I have it play a song on my Sonos when there is motion detected at my door, etc.
No idea why this thread is now about the cost of the system. Wasn’t even a question.
If you’re building the house, wired sensors do make sense if your at the stage in building where that still makes sense.
I’m also in the dedicated alarm camp. There’s an unofficial integration with Hubitat Elevation that’s really good (all warnings aside). Even if the integration stopped working I’d still be happy with the cost of the Ring Alarm system, the features, its reliability, and the optional service cost.
Ring offers a complete package that can work with existing wired sensors for $375
Can you please expand upon how you do this?? And how it works? If you don't respond, does Noon light dispatch 911? Is it for fire, smoke, CO and intrusion , or only one of them?
We've used their service with Hubitat for over 3 years now and have been very happy with them. They respond within seconds of Hubitat (HSM) triggering with a phone call and text messages. They only call one phone number but will text with multiple numbers at the same time so if you miss the call or are unavailable someone else can cancel false alarms etc. I don't believe they can determine what is triggering the alarm (police, fire, flood etc. although there are options for these in the driver/app) but they do contact the police shortly after if you don't cancel in time. We had this happen last year where we were in a no cell coverage area but we added our neighbor to the account for text. They sent the police and communicated with our neighbor. (turned out to be a bad contact sensor of course .
I just followed the instructions here:
If you need a certificate for your homeowners insurance they can provide that as well. After the discount on our premium I think we only pay about $3/mon.
I hope this helps and am happy to answer any other questions you may have. It may sound like I'm promoting them, but I am in no way affiliated with them. Just a happy customer and glad that they integrate with my beloved Hubitat.
P.S. I believe they are affiliated with Konnected who wrote the integration for Hubitat for their Konnected Device, however I don't own one and am instead using the amazing Hubduino integration to monitor all my contact sensors. Neither is need to use this though.
