My 2Gig reported Radio Module failure. The error lasted a little over 3 hours and I could not communicate with the panel via phone or computer. While the radio module was down, I opened the panel to diagnose, triggered the tamper fault and disconnected the power causing low batt fault. Later, the error cleared as suddenly as it presented. When it cleared 2 hours later, all faults reported at once, except for the radio module failure.
In the three hours that it was down, I never received an alert that communication had been lost. Is there a setting that I need to change to alert me to comm failure?
Unless you have the dual path/backup communication bridge, or POTS, then when your cell goes down, you will not get an alert (because the panel cannot communicate with alarm.com)
Q22 “Lack of usage notification” can be set to alert you, lowest setting though is 1 day. (so if panel goes incommunicado for 24 hours, an alarm.com alert is triggered) The default is 7 days inactivity.
Forgive the naive question, but if there’s nothing to report a loss of communication with the panel then all an intruder has to do is knock my panel off the wall or use a pocket rf jammer to render the 2Gig useless. Am I understanding that right?
Not really, no. When a sensor is triggered, ostensibly before the panel is smashed, a “pending alarm” signal is sent to the central station. If that’s not followed by a disarm notification within a specified period of time, the central station should be calling to investigate.
However, yes, a loss of communication prior to the alarm event would indeed prevent the trigger from being sent. That’s why it’s pretty critical in my mind to have dual path, e.g. cellular and wifi, communication set up. In the event of a cell or internet failure you should still be protected during a break-in and subsequent smashing of the panel. Nothing is foolproof of course, but if you’ve built in enough safeguards to slow entry in the first place, and made sure that your perimeter protection is solid, then you’ve bought time for the panel to alarm or even better, for the crook to look for softer targets.
Make sure you enable Q65 “rf jamming causes trouble” this is disabled by default I think
This is how it works…
Assuming your panel has communication
Soon as a delay entry sensor is triggered, a signal is sent to alarm.com, something like “delay entry front door, standby by disarm confirmation”. If alarm event is not sent, or a disarm confirmation is not received, a “smash and crash alarm event” is triggered with alarm.com.
Personally, If I was using a Verizon module, or otherwise had loss of cellular communication events that lasted for hours, I would get the Bridge or POTS module. If the panel cannot communicate for whatever reason, you have a serious issue.
Good info. Would you mind describing the specific hardware & install of the wifi or broadband redundancy option. I’d like to get that in. Bought the panel from Surety in December '14. -Tim
Apologies. I’m not an alarm pro brother Riven and I rely on you guys to spoon feed it. My reply was to J.P. since your message hadn’t come in yet. “Would you mind describing the specific hardware & install of the wifi or broadband redundancy” is in reference to dual path recommendation he made. I will research the go!bridge. -Tim
Q22, lack of usage, is an alert regarding panel usage (arming, disarming).
Q23 is the communication loss alert (locally).
Alarm.com notifications would be generated based on Alarm.com’s ability to reach the panel. It looks like the outage in this case occurred precisely between modem pings and data (weather) commands and communication was restored shortly prior to the next command.
Q22, lack of usage, is an alert regarding panel usage (arming, disarming).
Yes, but if this is set to Q22(1) which is one day, and the panel is for whatever reason, not communicating (lets for example go with loss of cellular), then there will be no “arming/disarming” occurring… thus an alarm.com notification is triggered.
Correct?
On the flip side, I can see Q22(1) being problematic for say when you will be away for a period exceeding 24 hours though (as it may trigger a lack of usage notification), but then again it is a simple matter to remote the panel and verify functionality. This is about as close as one will get to a failsafe alert if the panel cellular goes offline unless there is the backup POTS or Bridge.
That is correct. That is incorrect. Alarm.com does not generate directly based on panel programming, but based on the panel sending that No Activity signal. Radio Not Responding notifications will typically occur in that time frame or sooner however, as they are based on automatic modem responses to ADC.
Radio Not Responding notifications will typically occur in that time frame or sooner however, as they are based on automatic modem responses to ADC.
Perhaps I am missing something here…
Are you referring to Q25(1) radio modem network failure reports? or are you referring to “cell phone communication failure” Q21? (periodic daily test) Because I wasn’t aware that there are other automatic “modem/radio not responding” alert notifications.
Q25(1) cannot “report” radio network failure if the radio modem network is offline/down (unless there is dual path/secondary POTS or Bridge)
Q21 is defaulted to 30 days (1 month) for logging “No Test Received” events that would trigger an alarm.com alert notification for a panel where the modem/radio is not responding (and there is no POTS or Bridge). In other words, once the panel lost cellular connectivity, it would be 30 days before and alert was triggered by alarm.com for the “panel not responding”.
Even if you changed Q21 to a daily test, it would still be 24 hours same as Q22 “lack of usage” (which would be approx. the same time frame as you say).
If your panel is not communicating, panel programming can only affect local function. Alarm.com modems are pinged and after missed repeat pings, your panel is determined to be not communicating, generating an alert from Alarm.com (not the panel).
. Alarm.com modems are pinged and after missed repeat pings, your panel is determined to be not communicating, generating an alert from Alarm.com (not the panel).
I know it works like that for the cameras at least (after two missed “check ins”, an alert is triggered), but I was not aware it worked like that for the cellular modules.
Per ADC, I was told that the modules are indeed pinged, and if it fails 3 consecutive ones, an alert is triggered and sent to Dealer. This is not User configurable, and is separate from any programming Q’s (like inactivity or periodic test reports).
24.5 hours of no cellular modem communication is the magic number for the alert. So if say the panel cellular goes offline (e.g., 12:30pm to 1pm the next day) for a duration not to exceed 24.5 hours an alert for “panel not responding” should be visible on the ADC site, and notification be sent to the Dealer as well.
This needs to be enabled for Users/customers to receive alert/notification:
