Home from SWW2008

Overall the trip was quite beneficial. However the time away was marred in
that while I was gone, someone broke into our business on Sunday morning and
stole a bunch of stuff. Unfortunately one of the things was my SpacePilot.
So if anyone sees a new SpacePilot show up at a pawn shop or on eBay, let me
know.

WT

 

Wayne,

I know you will write up something. Since I didn't make it this year
(too far to drive). I would like to hear about what you learned
regarding 2008 that would be useful. I think after SWW many people are
going to start getting their feet wet with 08 so it would be a great
service..

TOP

 

Dang, Wayne - sorry to hear that. I wish I still had the SpacePilot I
won at the Denver Tech Summit...I'd GIVE it to ya.

Steve R.

 

This is horrible, and I hope the police get the bastards.

It does bring up the issue of using better modern electronics and
communications to provide monitoring and video-audio documentation
when an alarm is triggered.

I have thought about this, because the standard burglar alarm company
solutions I have used, have often turned out to be a disaster because
of false alarms, and the fact that an "alarm" doesn't do a damn thing
for a smash and grab by guys here in Costa Mesa, CA.

I have experienced false alarms from maybe a dozen sources over 20
years. Bad batteries, sensors, wiring, phone line noise, bugs walking
over sensors (yeah cockroaches), alarm panels that make little sense
when buttons are pressed wrong and obviously malfunction, technicians
who earn $8/hr and know less about debugging than I do, and many more
things have occurred to me. "Call sheets" used by alarm companies
sometimes do not get followed either, so I have wound up not getting
called when an alarm does go off, which is human error.

What have users done in office security recently?

Bo

 

I have a family friend that runs a alarm company... they are a license
to print money.

They charge like $20 / month for monitoring and then contract the
monitoring out for $4.00/ mnth. If you are getting an alarm just find
a company to monitor it over the internet and then get all the
sensors... etc. and of course an cell backup in case the phone line
is cut.

BTW. SolidWorks World was great. i have some post on it at www.inspirtech.com
and so does josh and www.solidsmack.com

 

That substandard monitoring, or contracted out monitoring, is one of
the key reasons today to just set up a link to the internet with video
and audio that send an alarm to me directly & that I can pick up on my
computer or even iPhone.

Bad solutions are often worse than no solution when you can't rely on
validity of an alarm or valid timely notification. That is even more
true with cities billing you if you have too many false alarms.

I had a major alarm company come to my office and want to sell me
service, and I said...

"OK, but given the problems I've had in the past, I will only contract
with your firm if you guarantee in writing to phone me personally on
the list of phone #s I give you whenever an alarm is sounded, before
you notify the police and that you have to do it within 30 seconds of
receiving the alarm, and that you take full responsibility for any
false alarm fees and fixes, and the service must never go down with a
bad or disconnected phone line."

The salesman just walked away without saying anything.

I know a good inexpensive alarm system is possible, and I suspect it
is now not only possible, but it is not needed to hire an alarm
company to set it up and run it. I just haven't had the time to look
at what is going on.

Bo