Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

We had a break-in 2 weeks ago. The intruders triggered the motion detector, the siren sounded, and the intruders ran out pushing each other on the way. Thank you, Fortress Security. Luckily for us, we had video surveillance which recorded the intruders from the moment they came to the house and until the moment they ran away. Now I know exactly what I need for this security system to be complete and to protect my house. I am writing this review to share with you our experience and the use of the Fortress Security before and after the break-in - the lessons learned. 1. WHY IT IS PRUDENT TO BUY YOUR OWN SECURITY SYSTEM. There are two considerations to that. First is the cost. If you choose ADT, for example, you will be paying monthly fees which are at least $25. Second consideration is the response. Your own security system calls you and notifies you, while, for example, ADT system, which we also considered, notifies an operator who in turn call the local emergency line. In an area with high crime the response of the police to the calls that come to the emergency line about burglary are at a very low priority. The police may show up in one hour or even more. They go to attend violent crimes first and if everything else is done then they will respond to the break-in reported by ADT. I am speaking from experience. You must have a “break-in routine” in place. If you are in the area, you can call 911 and notify them about the break-in. If you are not in the area, you must have a police emergency number for the area where your house is. Keep their emergency number on speed dial. From there on you control your destiny. With your own security system you can alert anyone about the break-in – a neighbor with a shotgun, for example. Or you can run a loud siren mounted on the roof of your house to alert the neighborhood. 2. MY CHOICE OF FORTRESS SECURITY It was affordable and a number of different sensors was available. We selected the Fortress Security system S02 since we know it is easy to disrupt an internet connection but the land line isn’t easy to find these days. We were disappointed to see that this system is easily disarmed by just unplugging it. Basically, anyone can swiftly “turn it off” if they know what you have in your house. This why I knocked off one star. 3. INVASION The burglars do not appear out of thin air. Imagine you have an invisible line 1 ft away from the outside walls of your house. The burglars WILL cross that line (POINT OF DEFENSE 1). They will look for the entrance. If your doors are protected and the burglars are not trained to pick locks, they will look for the windows that are low, close to the ground. If the doors are not protected and/or the burglars are trained to pick locks, they will go through the door (POINT OF DEFENSE 2). The windows, however, are the easiest (POINT OF DEFENSE 3). Do not think that Home Depot window bars will protect your windows. My bars were destroyed within 2 minutes just by pulling them forcefully. A complete waste of money and effort from my part. The burglars with try to open your window from the outside. If this doesn’t pan out, they will break the glass and attempt to unlock the window and open it. They will try to open it because they do not want to climb through a broken glass. When they are inside, they will walk around to explore the area (POINT OF DEFENSE 4). 4. SENSORS If you want to trigger the alarm at the POINT OF DEFENSE 1, Fortress Security doesn’t have anything that will help you do that. We found some great sensors from another company and adopted them to work with the Fortress Security. After the break-in we installed one outdoor sensor per wall which triggers the Fortress Security alarm when anyone over 3 ft tall approaches the house doors or windows crossing the 1 ft perimeter. For the POINT OF DEFENSE 2 you need to get a door open sensor. They come with the basic package for the Fortress Security or you can choose them as add-ons. For the POINT OF DEFENSE 3 you need a window open sensor unless you have a very large glass window that shatters and through which a person can walk in unharmed. Then you need a glass break sensor. All are available from Fortress Security. For the POINT OF DEFENSE 4 you need motion detectors for every major crossing in the house. Say, someone broke-in through the bathroom or a bedroom window and your “open window” sensor there was out of battery and so it didn’t work. The burglar will not stay just in the room he entered. The burglar will go further. So you may have a walkway leading to the bedroom doors. Put one there. If you have a living room in the center, then put one there. You get the drift. Do yourself a favor – get a siren. No burglar wants to attract attention. If your house is surrounded by other houses, if you are not in a secluded location, a siren will help you. Fortress security has a basic, very loud indoor siren. 5. POST-INVATION After the break-in we understood that we only can rely on ourselves, since the police takes forever to arrive. We wanted to know if and when strangers trespass our territory. We learned how to mod outdoor sensors and to have them work/communicate with the Fortress Security. We have a sensor that intelligently scans our backyard. We have 4 house perimeter sensors. Luckily there are 32 zones for the Fortress Security S02 where each allows up to 20 accessories. The only downside is that with the S02 we receive a pre-recorded message which doesn’t specify which sensor is triggered. As I mentioned, we have a video surveillance of the outside of the house and we now installed one camera on the inside which is focused on the Fortress Security display window which, when triggered, will show the number of the sensor that did that. Upon a phone call from the system, we go to the surveillance feed and check what’s going on there. Combined with the sirens, a loud speaker that allows to communicate with the burglars though my phone, and a very loud outdoor siren that I can turn on or off from my phone and alert the neighbors, I think we are pretty much set. I would say, the Fortress Security is a pretty decent and affordable option if you want to build your own custom security and take control of your security in to your own hands.