I want Doorbell Sounds from my ELK speakers
- Thread starter kccustom
- Start date
upstatemike
Senior Member
Doesn't the Elk have a few locations for recording custom voice responses? You could record a doorbell wav into one of those and have a rule to play it when the doorbell button is pushed. I do this with my Stargate and it is very reliable.
wuench
Senior Member
I have attempted this, and actually have it working (if you call a somewhat crackly jetsons sound coming from your speakers working).
The first issue I had was, I wanted to wire my doorbell directly to an input, with no transformers, etc. The only way I found to accomplish this was to buy a non-lighted doorbell. Then it works like a regular input, but you need to put it on Fast Loop Response and adjust that parameter to avoid double rings. A lighted doorbell leaks too much current to use on a regular input. The other option is to use a transformer and the doorbell interface that elk sells.
Step 2 is getting the sound into the Elk. The ONLY way to do this is via the phone. Unless you want to add the ELK sound card, find a way to power it, connect relays to your speakers to switch them between the elk and the card. I bought all the parts for this, but decided it was way too complicated for a doorbell, so I stuck with the phone method. If you time it right you can get ok sound through the phone, but it's tricky.
The positives of this approach over a normal doorbell are: 1.) I now have a doorbell that works even if the power fails, 2.)I can route the doorbell sound to everywhere I have speakers, so I can now hear it when in my home theater, 3.) I can have the elk take actions when the doorbell rings, like page me etc.
So that pretty much sums up your options. I hope ELK chooses to incorporate a more modern way to import wavs into it's future products. I would definitely upgrade to an M1G 2.0 just for that ability.
IVB
Senior Member
PC HA engines rock!
I do this, but I use CQC to do it. I know DavidL does it via ML. I use a non-lighted doorbell, wired to an Elk input (fast loop response). The wife wanted the non-lighted doorbell anyhow "cuz it was artsy fartsy period-time looking". CQC monitors the zone, and when it sees a change it plays a .wav file. The PC is hooked up to a mixer which takes both it & the Elk onboard input, and sends to an Elk-800 amp, which then powers the speakers.
But that's still not all! I wired the speakers into an Elk output & relay expander, so I can emulate "speaker zones", and turn on/off zones at will. I have 3 sets of zones:
1) Outside Front door. Used to warn folks about detection if in armed mode.
2) Inside House. Used for Doorbells.
3) Outside Back yard. Used for when we have parties, and I want to hear the doorbell in the backyard.
I personally prefer to not use my audio speakers for this type of stuff, but I could do that too.
I do this, but I use CQC to do it. I know DavidL does it via ML. I use a non-lighted doorbell, wired to an Elk input (fast loop response). The wife wanted the non-lighted doorbell anyhow "cuz it was artsy fartsy period-time looking". CQC monitors the zone, and when it sees a change it plays a .wav file. The PC is hooked up to a mixer which takes both it & the Elk onboard input, and sends to an Elk-800 amp, which then powers the speakers.
But that's still not all! I wired the speakers into an Elk output & relay expander, so I can emulate "speaker zones", and turn on/off zones at will. I have 3 sets of zones:
1) Outside Front door. Used to warn folks about detection if in armed mode.
2) Inside House. Used for Doorbells.
3) Outside Back yard. Used for when we have parties, and I want to hear the doorbell in the backyard.
I personally prefer to not use my audio speakers for this type of stuff, but I could do that too.
thewireguy
Active Member
I have my doorbell wired to a zone. When someone pushes it I have my keypads beep till I press (*) and I have my elk speaker say" Front Door" then a tone. It works great and I know if someone rings the door when I'm not home because the keypads a beeping. Also I am in a townhouse with 3 floors. I have keypads on the 1st and 3rd and the speaker on the 2nd. So I know when someone is at the door no matter where I am at. Also I am installing a Axis PTZ camera in the front of my house so when someone pushes the button the camera will zoom in on the door. If I can pull if off the plan is the camera will take a pic and email to me and I can look at it on my Blackberry.
I want to have the ELK make an announcement over the standard ELK speaker when any of the outside doors to the pool area are opened. I can set the chime feature to sound when the door is opened, but that is not consider enough of a notice to avoid having to install those big ugly door alarms on each door. But I am hoping if I can program this so that the ELK will speak a warning that might work. We don't have any young children so am not really concerned safety wise, but want to try to satisfy the inspector.
Can any one give step by step instructions on how to do this? The is a new ELK installation on a new construction. We have the basic alarm setup working but that is it so far.
Can any one give step by step instructions on how to do this? The is a new ELK installation on a new construction. We have the basic alarm setup working but that is it so far.
Steve
Senior Member
You have several options, it really all depends what will satisfy the inspector. The easiest is as you said, to use the chime. What part about that doesn't satisfy the inspector? You have 6 voice slots you can use for each zone, so maybe for the doors in question you do 3 of the 800Hz tone in a row followed by warning, zone violated? If that satisfies him then all you need to do is programs the voice slots for those zones and put the chime on Voice. If he is looking for more of a loud alarm or a siren, you could hookup a siren or sirens (or piezos, or whatever) and activate them for x seconds when a zone is tripped. Like, WHENEVER Back Door Zone is VIOLATED THEN TURN ON OutputX for Y seconds. That assumes a siren of some sort hooked up to a relay.
I'm sure there are other ideas but like I said, it all depends on what the inspector wants or will be satisfied with.
I'm sure there are other ideas but like I said, it all depends on what the inspector wants or will be satisfied with.
The thought is that most folks quickly start to ignore the little chime from the keypads when any door is opened and so it isn't considered sufficient protection for doors that access the pool.
I am very new to the ELK and was looking thru the manuals and did not find specific instructions on how to get the ELK speakers to speak a particular phrase.
IVB
Senior Member
In the zone setting, select the phrase you want. Then, set chime to voice mode, and on any zone violation it'll speak whatever you put in there. You have to set all zone violations to voice mode - you can't have some be tone and some be voice.
wuench
Senior Member
Yep. Phone and laptop. Took several tries to get a reasonable sound. At first I was VERY unhappy with it, but it doesn't sound so bad now, I guess I am used to it. It is really difficult to time right so you don't get static at the beginning.
In my opinion this is the biggest disappointment with the ELK I have found, no line in for recording custom sounds.
kccustom
Active Member
I have an OVOlab phone Phlink that can play a audio file through the phone line via an apple script, I don't have a clue how to do it at the moment but if I can get it to work I think it will sound ok, but, I just put the audio file on my laptop just in case
