ealcs@aol.com

The GE Concord is a piece of garbage.

Anybody who would buy a security system from a company called “alarm.com” deserves whatever garbage they get. How about Alarm King, Alarm Force, Barking Dog Alarm Company, or maybe even good old Acme Alarms?

LMFAO.

I’m a little confused. I assume that Frontpoint is the dealer that I would be getting my bill’s front each month? Alarm.com just supplies Frontpoint (and many other companies) with the technology to make things work? I saw an interview on Frontpoint’s site saying they use some company called Central Dispatch in upstate NY as their monitoring center. I’m confused on who the players are I’d be dealing with – Alarm.com or Frontpoint.

1) I currently have a wired Concord system I inherited with a piece of crap keypad which I hate. When something goes wrong (phone disconnect, bad sensor…) and the pad beeps I have to remember the obscure codes to get it into different modes to override stuff. So I started looking around and discovered the GE Simon system (which also lead me to Alarm.com.) I assume I can get the optional Simon Touchscreen if I go with Alarm.com? I know would gain the nice web interface to control the system but I’d like my wife and 7 year-old to have a simple icon based touch-screen to work with. Will I have to replace the whole system or will some of the old Concord stuff save me money?

2) I currently pay a monthly fee of $45 for a local company (ACS) to monitor my system and ALSO pay them an additional $60 for live patrol response. If the alarm is trigged, ACS sends out an armed patrol unit. This might be more of a question for ACS but can Alarm.com work with them? Instead of calling the police, they’d call ACS’s dispatch dept. and ACS takes it from there? I couldn’t find any info on the sites discussing this option.

Thanks in advance. I have to say, from browsing around the internet looking for info on Frontpoint, I’ve been impressed with how the company jumps in and answers questions directly on these threads. I’ve only found one negative comment and the company responded the next day with a clear, well-written response that totally took away any doubt I had that they cared. Nice job, Frontpoint.

One important point to make regarding Alarm.com’s patented “Pending Alarm” feature is that it renders the system virtually impossible to defeat, even when used in a self-contained panel. The whole point is that the system sends the “door open” signal on every door opening (with the Interactive level), so that if the panel is smashed and Alarm.com never receives the disarm signal or an intrusion, they assume it’s an alarm event and handle it accordingly. Any competent Alarm.com dealer should know this.

Thanks to Dustin for what I consider an excellent forum to share information.

To be honest, I wouldn’t be surprised if you are an alarm.com competitor for some reason or another – why else would you bother to write a comment like you wrote?

Anyways – this blog is not a scam or sham; sorry to disappoint. Good luck to you!

This whole website is clearly an advertising / marketing sham constructed and operated by alarm.com or one of its sales associates.
Lots of “geee golly, they are sooo cool”. I’m not knocking the company, as I know nothing about it, however I am saying, looking at this forum as an unbiased and useful form of research is dillusional.

I myself am not a big fan of all in one self contained alarm systems. To me, these are prone to being defeated during the entry delay into a home. A crook can simply enter through the front door, follow the beeps for the entry delay 20-60 seconds depending on your setup, and either rip the unit off the wall and smash it or most likely just smash it right there on the wall rendering the cellular communicator, siren… the whole unit defeated.

You are much better off getting a system where the control panel, keypads, and and siren are all seperate. The cellular GSM communicator or IP communicators can all be mounted in a hard to find secluded location. Ideally you want it to take someone 5 minutes or longer to find the control panel where your GSM or IP modules are also located or perhaps you even have your GSM located in your attic. (standard for us). Then if a crook breaks in, hears the beeping and follows the sound all they find is a keypad… smashing, or ripping the keypad off the wall does nothing but silence the beeping, but at the same time sends a supervisory signal because of the keypad is missing or tampered with along with the front door alarm.

So the crook can destroy the keypad during the entry delay, then can destroy the siren once it sounds at the end of the entry delay. The crook still hasn’t found the main control panel, he’s been busy trying to figure out how to silence and disable the unit. Having not found the control panel the crook will not spend much time in the property at all.

If you have a standard phone line, you can even make a greater attempt to protect that by purchasing and installing a secured and sensored cabinet and conduit over top of the local phone companies box, conduit, and wires. However, the cost to get the box, conduit, and installation is typically greater than that of purchasing a GSM Cellular communicator which would add the greatest peace of mind. But if you have a phone line, make sure it is connected as well. You’re paying for it, might as well use it.

The sad part is the majority of companies out there sell these units all the time. For the security company it’s great. Walk into a house mount the all in one keypad, panel, communicator over top of the kitchen phone jack or on some they even portray it as portable and just have you lay it on your counter… rediculous. Installation takes less then 30 minutes since most perimeter sensors on your doors and windows were most likely just installed with double sided foam tape instead of installing screws as well. The security company instantly gets a monitored alarm system installed and monitored so they can begin collected the monitoring fees. The security company saves a ton of money on installation labor as anyone can lay the unit on a counter or hang it on a wall and plug it into a wall outlet and then walk around and stick the sensors up.

Don’t get me wrong… nothing wrong with wireless if properly mounted. The all in one control units are sometimes the only option for some installations also. Such as rental properties, where the property owner doesn’t want any holes drilled. Here the tape and counter is the only option. Not the ideal option for sure, but most times it only needs to last 6 months to a year before the customer moves and then needs the system reinstalled at their next rental property.

However, for the typical home or business being protected; think about what I have written above and educate yourself before getting a system installed.

If you are looking to use alarm.com and want a professional system where your control panel and GSM is hidden and only your keypads and siren are installed in plain sight, consider the GE Concord or GE Caddx NetworX line of systems. Stay clear of the GE Simons. Both of which support wireless sensors and two way voice (with proper options) in a much greater capacity then what you could ever get with the Simons.

If you are looking at Ademco/Honeywell, stay clear of the LYNX.