Need recommendation please

[Nightcheck]

Hi -

I recently retired my ancient Alpine 8030 and its companion - the
8200 pager. It worked beautifully and only a few times in over 10+
years did I ever have a false alarm.

Now I need a new system and need some assistance:

1) I can't seem to locate any magazines specializing devoted to car
security. I seem to remember many years ago there were several mags
specifically for car audio and security - but I couldn't even find a
single one at our local Barnes & Noble store which carry's just about
every magazine printed. Can anyone tell me the names of any magazines
for car audio and security?

2) In the price range of under $300. can anyone provide me with their
opinion of the best Brands and models on the market now? (ones that
have a paging system)

3) I ran across a "ScyTek Galaxy 5100RS" - which looked interesting. Is
anyone familiar with it - and if so, what your opinion is?

Thanks so much...


Rick

[Scott Gardner]

On 26 Oct 2005 09:26:25 -0700, "Nightcheck" >
wrote:

>Hi -
>
> I recently retired my ancient Alpine 8030 and its companion - the
>8200 pager. It worked beautifully and only a few times in over 10+
>years did I ever have a false alarm.
>
> Now I need a new system and need some assistance:
>
>1) I can't seem to locate any magazines specializing devoted to car
>security. I seem to remember many years ago there were several mags
>specifically for car audio and security - but I couldn't even find a
>single one at our local Barnes & Noble store which carry's just about
>every magazine printed. Can anyone tell me the names of any magazines
>for car audio and security?
>
>2) In the price range of under $300. can anyone provide me with their
>opinion of the best Brands and models on the market now? (ones that
>have a paging system)
>
>3) I ran across a "ScyTek Galaxy 5100RS" - which looked interesting. Is
>anyone familiar with it - and if so, what your opinion is?
>
> Thanks so much...
>
>
>Rick

There haven't been a lot of innovations in car alarms in the last
10-15 years, and they've become almost commodity items - that's why
they're not getting much magazine coverage and the prices have dropped
so much. In fact, unless you want one that integrates with a GSM cell
phone or has GPS tracking, $300 will get you just about any alarm on
the market.

I just installed a Clifford 2-way paging alarm in my wife's car, and
for $169 or so, it had all of the big features except for a remote
starter, which she didn't want. The biggest difference between the
modern Cliffords and the older ones is that now you can adjust most of
the system parameters from the remote, rather than having to fiddle
around under the dash. That includes things like arming delay, active
or passive arming, shock sensor sensitivity, silent arm/disarm,
etcetera.

Be aware that since alarms have gotten so inexpensive, there are a lot
of "no-name" brands out there, and the construction quality varies.
My wife's old alarm was a Crimestopper CS2005FM, but Crimestopper
didn't actually manufacture it - they just bought it from an offshore
company and put their name on it. It worked well enough, but the LCD
remote was poorly designed, and the lanyard ring where it attaches to
a keychain kept breaking off.

Just like the old days, you probably can't go wrong with one of the
higher-end Clifford or Viper alarms, and you'll still come in WAY
under your $300 limit, assuming that the $300 doesn't have to include
installation as well.


--
Scott Gardner

"It's a small world, but I wouldn't want to paint it. " - Steven Wright