Cellular Backup

rfdesq

Senior Member
Can someone point me to the definitive primer or give me their personal experiences on cellular phone backup systems? I will be using it with an ELK M1 Gold monitored by Nextalarm. I am looking for a backup in case the primary telco wires are compromised.
 
I was recently looking into this as well. ELK has a Cellpack that works with the Digicell transceivers found here. I can't seem to find the pricing now but I believe the monitoring was under $20/Mo (wireless only). The Digicell unit itself is arouns $175 street price.
 
The Uplink Cellular Tranceiver interfaces to the ELK M1XSP serial port expander to provide wireless alarm reporting.
 
I'm currently has M1G and being monitored by NextAlarm.com thru landline. I checked with NextAlarm.com to see whether the latest model of Uplink Digicell AnyNET would be able to communicate with their CS and the rep told me NOT SURE since they don't have any experience with this latest model.

I guess other Uplink model is OK with NextAlarm.com.

Please post your information if you find out anything else.
 
opie said:
I was recently looking into this as well. ELK has a Cellpack that works with the Digicell transceivers found here. I can't seem to find the pricing now but I believe the monitoring was under $20/Mo (wireless only). The Digicell unit itself is arouns $175 street price.
Nextalarm provides cellular as an additional service to your normal plan at $7.50 a month. Find the information here:

https://nextalarm.com/help/Wiki.jsp?page=CellBackup

I wonder if that is something the insurance companies look favorably on (more discount). Seems pretty reasonable to be able to get traditional and cellular monitoring for about $16.50 a month. While very cool, I was wondering how 'appropriate' it was for normal residential use. Will the typical normal burglary go so far as to cut the lines (in this case telco and cable as they won't know how it is monitoried)?

I'm still working on finishing my basic installation so I never really came to a conclusion on that. I was leaning towards it probably being overkill (for me at least).
 
Thank you all for your excellent responses to my query. The reason for my original post was in response to yesterday's Discovery Channel "It Takes A Thief" episode. That is the show where ex burglars break into a house then do a security makeover. Yesterdays episode had them cutting the telephone line and explaining how that disabled the outgoing signal. I have an email into Nextalarm regarding compatibility with the latest Uplink Digicell Anynet.

Spanky, the latest M1XSP manual from the ELK website reads that Uplink support is still in Beta. Has that changed?
 
Hmmm, I wonder if the old sticker deterrent would work there, like putting an official looking sticker to the effect "Protected by cellular backup" on the phone demarc outside.
 
Uplink may have stickers. Here is the Nextalarm response:

Hello,

Any Digicell (1500, 1650, or any others that exist) are compatible with our service. The cost for monitoring the Uplink would be $7.50 per month added to your basic monitoring plan billed annually in advance.

NextAlarm Customer Support
 
Just spoke with Uplink. There is a new unit to be released this summer. It is a digital 1650. It is basically a digital version of their analog 1650 and reports full CID information to the central station rather than a few generic codes.
 
Uplink may have stickers. Here is the Nextalarm response:
And that is on a box inside the house - defeats the purpose... What I meant was that stickers can be a deterrent. Many thieves when they see a sticker like "Protected by ABC..." (as long as it is a real sticker, yard sign, etc simply go on to the next house. You could be bluffing but they don't know that and they usually just want an easy score. My thought was to use that concept and put a sticker on the demarc box outside (that they would see when going to cut the wire) saying thay you have cellular backup which just may indicate to a guy thinking about cutting the phone lines to go to the next house. Of course if a thief wants in YOUR house for whatever reason, he's gonna get in. But this could be just a simple cheap deterrent for the common amateur thief.
 
I ran my phone line on the outside of the house through PVC.
Not that it would stop someone who is determined, but they would have to rip it off the house before they could get to the wire.

Total cost, about $12.

Ty
 
Interesting article. For a few hundred and $7.50 a month...

What it does not mention is the use of a siren at all. Just because the line is cut, if a siren goes off, is there not a greater chance the neighbors will call the police, or the burglars will be pushed to leave.

Then again, it also references murder and rape, so the attacks are made when people are home. It does not report on whether or not the systems were armed at the time of attack.

On the PVC approach, the lines are exposed once they head towards the house. I would guess a tree trimming type tool would make it easy to cut it even if encased in PVC at the entry point. If the pole were made collapsible in some way it would be easier to carry, but I'm assuming if someone is burglarizing a place, they have a car/truck of some sort.
 
Mike said:
For a few hundred and $7.50 a month...
That hit the nail on the head. I've decided to go with the new Uplink Digital 1650 mated to the M1 Gold through the M1XSP. Let them cut the phone lines and the cable, I'll still be monitored. The combined fee is less than I'm paying now for monitoring.
 
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