I bought this thing besides all the negative feedback. For 20$ its much less than the 120$ driveway alarms. the volume is a non issue; If its too loud, put a piece of tape on it. the false alarms can be 99% eliminated and fix the real issue--moisture!! Put the sensor in a 10$ cedar bird house; This keeps it from getting wet and keeps false alarms low. And it hides it from people that would take and disable it. Small animals and windy days can increase the false alarms. okay for 20$, plus 10$ for the bird house (from Lowe's) and 2 cents in tape make a great buy. The range is not 400ft more like 300ft and only one door. Driveway Patrol Sensor and Receiver Kit
I admit it -- sometimes I just forgot to check to see if the cat wanted back in. The Driveway Patrol fixed all that. Setup about a foot or less off the ground in a relatively sheltered location by the front door, it does a great job of watching the front of the driveay and the front door. I originally set the sensor up to look down the entire length of the drive but it proved much too sensitive for this to be useful so I aimed the sensor low ACROSS the driveway near the front door and this has worked out fine. It now tells me when the cat is ready to come in as well as when a pizza or package delivery has arrived.
The Driveway Patrol actually saved me quite a bit of trouble one day when I had been waiting the entire afternoon for the cable guy -- he eventually showed up late, didn't even bother to knock or ring the bell and only stayed just long enough to leave a note telling me I wasn't home. Due to the Drveway Patrol, I managed to wave him down at the end of the drive. This alone made the gadget worth the price.
As I've said, the Driveway Patrol does exactly what I need it to do. The only false alarms I get are from visiting neighbor cats, racoons and the odd bird. The only things I would change about the gadget would be to add a volume control that had more settings than 'loud' and 'very loud' and the fact that the chimes will ring continuously while being triggered and then for another 10-15 seconds beyond that.
UPDATE OF MY REVIEW DUE TO JULY 2006 HEAT WAVE: I have two of these low-cost alarms set up, and both become quite intermittent when the temperature reaches 90 degrees and above (in the shade): Sometimes they go off when a person/car goes past, and sometimes they do not. As soon as the temperature decreases though, they become much more reliable. I WOULD NOT RECOMENDED THESE DEVICES FOR SECTIONS OF THE COUNTRY WITH HOT WEATHER, SUCH AS ARIZONA, TEXAS, NEW MEXICO, ETC. Original review: I am very impressed with this alarm: It is accurately able to detect people coming up the stairs of my apartment, and sets off the indoor alarm -- and it has not sent out any false alarms (Most problems with this alarm (that I have read in the reviews below) appear to be caused by the sensor being in direct sun light. This seems to cause these units numerous difficulties, and should have been addressed in the Patrol Sensor's enclosed instructions -- but isn't. However, by simply shielding the outdoor sensor from all *direct* contact with the light of the sun by using tape or opaque plastic, or repositioning the outdoor sensor, appears to eliminate false alarms or no alarms). This alarm unit appears to be quite well made, and the price is, of course, incredibly low. Great buy!!
I have had 2 of these units for years and both work OK. I use them to monitor for people at the side door of my law office. Having had 2 of them for years I offer these tips. First, the outside motion sensor takes a 9 volt battery and you should use only lithium batteries in the outside unit as lithium batteries are not as temperature sensitive as regular batteries, which perform poorly when cold. Lithium batteries are more expensive up front but they last 5 to 7 times or more longer than a regular battery. With the inside receiver unit you can use whatever battery type you prefer or an AC/DC adapter. The inside unit needs 3 "C" size batteries. Second, some reviewers have complained that the unit goes off for no reason. We found that flying insects were setting off the unit by flying near it. My solution has been to spray flying insect killer around the unit every 2 weeks or so in the summer. That works for us. Others might want to adjust or reduce the sensitivity of the motion detector by placing black electrical or other suitable tape over the sensor window. But rest assured that if an insect flies into or on the sensor, it will set it off. That is probably true for any motion detector, no matter what the price. To be sure, there are better quality units on the market, but not at this price. Once we switched to a lithium 9 volt battery in the sensor unit and wiped out our flying insect problem about a year ago, the units have worked perfectly.
I purchased mine about 2 months ago, I was very happy with price and had read the reviews so I was prepared on how to deal with false alarms , weather ect. This product is very affordable. We placed our just under the peek of our carport, on a flat piece of metal. This protects it from the weather and is out of reach.
I like the idea of placing it in a bird house to. Would protect monitor against weather and would be be able to cover of areas without being noticed. We live in the woods at the end of our road, our neighbors drive forks off from ours on the hill just above us, I was always hearing cars but couldnt tell which way they went, since trees in our yard block the veiw I couldnt see either. We also have sneaky neighbors that I thought prowl around at night.While I would have preferred that we could have placed it further up the driveway near the fork, we felt it was safer to place it nearer our home. So I am ordering another to put on the other side of our home. Its well made too. Volume has high low setting. You can set the receiver on any flat surface or mount it. If these were offered in stores they wouldnt be able to keep them in stock, thats how good I think they are.
They also detect motion at night that really suprised me. And can be used anywhere you want to detect movement. - Home Security - Motion Detector - Motion Sensor - Driveway Alert'
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