I recently bought the Ring V1 7 piece kit with free indoor camera on the offer they had last week. I also grabbed one for my parents as they were paying ADT a fortune. It’s due to arrive today, but I have a few questions I was hoping someone could help me with.
The kit comes with an indoor camera. Whilst this is great for when the alarm is armed (to check for false alarms/on the dog/etc), I dont want it on when we’re home. I have some spare Kassa smart plugs so could manually turn the camera on and off. But ideally i’d like it to automatically turn on when the alarm is armed. Is there an easy way to get the Ring panel to switch the plug on when its in armed mode?
Given the price I got PIR sensors for each room. I have a HUE setup and also HOOBS installed for HomeKit. Can the sensors be linked to this to control the lights? Both as a deterrent if the alarm is triggered and for routines (i.e. turn the living room light on when I walk in between certain hours).
I have an existing dumb wired external siren. I understand there’s no way to connect this to the alarm?
I understand the internal siren is in the main panel? This will be locked away in a comms cupboard, so ideally I’d prefer a siren elsewhere in the house as well. I can’t see anything on the Ring website, are there any third party sirens that I could use?
I’ve also got an alarm for my parents to replace their ADT system. We keep an eye on each others properties when we’re away/etc. One of the reasons to move to a smart alarm was the hassle of false alarms and having to physically go and turn the alarm off. Only issue I see is we’ll each get all the arm/disarm events for the others household? Any way to change the notifications based on user?
Thanks in advance for any pointers, will save me lots of digging
Thought I’d update the thread for others as I’ve managed to address two of the questions:
I linked my Kasa account to Alexa and then used routines to achieve this. Based on Alarms mode the Kassa plug connected to the camera is either turn on (Home/Away Modes) or turned off (Disarmed Mode). There’s a short lag of a minute or two whilst the camera boots and acquires Wifi.
I believe I could use Alexa Routines to achieve this as well. Have to think about how to actually achieve it though. For example when the Alarm is armed if it goes off, might be useful to turn lights on as a deterrent and also give the indoor camera some light to get a better image.
For general usage though, I’m not sure how to use them for bedrooms. Perhaps some sort of Google Home/Alexa command like “good night” which disables the routine for the night (so lights dont switch on when you’re moving in your sleep). Similar for living room, perhaps “movie” could disable the routine so the living room lights don’t switch on when you want the lights off.
The indoor camera is in a large open plan living area. At the opposite end the doors have sensors and there is a PIR. I thought I could link these to the indoor camera so it is triggered if any of those sensors go off. But on the Ring App I can only link the Indoor camera with my doorbell Cam. The alarm sensors arent listed as options.
I guess I could use an Alexa routine? Is that what others are doing?
i.e. If Alarm is in Home/Away mode and sensors X/Y/Z are triggered, start recording on indoor camera.
Cameras are linked under the Ring Base Station settings rather then PIR settings. Guess it makes sense as theres no harm in triggering based on alarm going off, as the PIR going off would do that anyway.
Hi @Fr4. Welcome to the Ring Community, we’re glad to have you here! I see you’ve found the answers to a few of your questions, so I’ll do my best to answer the other questions and provide any information I think may be helpful.
For this question, while you can use the smart plug you mentioned having, you can also use the Modes feature to determine how your Indoor Cam behaves based on which mode the system is in. You can designate the Indoor Cam to not detect motion when the system is Disarmed or in Home mode, for example, and have it detect motion when the system is in Away mode.
While Ring is not integrated with HomeKit or Hue, you may be able to use an Alexa routine to have the lights behave a certain way based on your Ring Alarm system triggering. I’ve added the Alexa tag to your post so other neighbors looking for Alexa-related posts can find this one as they may be able to chime in with what routines they tried. We also have an Integrations board if you wanted to post any questions regarding Ring and Alexa there as well.
That is correct, your existing outdoor siren will not be compatible with the Ring Alarm system. With that said, we do have an Outdoor Siren available for purchase on our website now, which you can find listed here.
Yes, the siren plays from the Base Station itself. Typically we do not recommend having this stowed away in any sort of closet or cupboard, as this will not only impact the volume of the siren, but it can also impact the connection between the Base Station and the alarm components such as the Contact Sensors. However, you can purchase a Dome Siren that will work with the Ring Alarm system to help amplify the sound of the siren in the instance that the alarm is triggered.
Your parents will be able to add you as a Shared User for their system, and vice versa. You can control which notifications you receive via email or mobile for each location, so you can customize what you’re notified about. The Ring Alarm notification settings will be under the Settings option from the Main Menu in the Ring App.
I hope this information helps answer your questions and helps you get started with your new system. Feel free to browse our Help Center as well if any other questions come up, or you can give our support team a call at one of the numbers available here and they’ll be happy to answer any questions or assist with setup concerns as well.
I appreciate you can use Modes to set the cameras behaviour. But for cameras inside the house I’m more comfortable knowing they are completely powered down. Perhaps I’m just overly paranoid, but using the smart plug and Alexa wasn’t much hassle, so I figured “why not”
Yes I’ve seen that an Alexa Routine should work. Will have a play when I have more time. It’s a pity the Smart Home ecosystem is so fragmented For the Lay person it creates so much confusion and unnecessary hassle.
Thats really disappointing. I appreciate Ring sell a Siren, but for people with existing alarm systems it’s an unnecessary PITA having to get up a ladder to switch the Siren out. My house is 3 floors and I have two existing Sirens mounted very high up. Also I’d prefer not to advertise which Alarm I have.
Would be good if Ring would add a Siren actuator to their portfolio. I guess I could use a smart plug and Alexa routine, but I’d worry about reliability. Wouldn’t want the Siren to stay on if I remotely disabled a false alarm, as I’d be oblivious unless I checked the Smart Plug state.
Fingers crossed all the sensors appear to connect fine to the base station. I do have a repeater in the middle floor aswell, perhaps that helps.
My Comms cupboard is secure and has a separate power feed for the Alarm. Plus there’s a LAN switch in there, so I can wire the Base station.
Call me paranoid, but I don’t feel its sensible to have the Base Station somewhere easily accessible. I tried to search for the Dome Siren, but it appears its not available in my region (UK). Are there any other options?
Thanks, I havent installed their alarm, but will come back with any further questions when I have.
@Fr4 Thanks for the feedback you’ve shared! The Dome Siren isn’t available for use in the UK, so thanks for mentioning which region you’re located in. We currently don’t have any other external siren options at this time, but I’d just recommend keeping an eye on our website for any future product releases or updates.
I understand only the wired Ring products act as repeaters in the Mesh network. So since I have a Base Station, Plug in Extender and Indoor Wired Camera, these would be the three Controllers in my network that form the Mesh?
None of the PIR’s, door contacts will act as repeaters as they are all battery powered. And the Alarm panel is also battery powered at the moment.
Just ensuring my placement of the 3 controllers is good.
Glad you asked, @Fr4. When it comes to the Zwave connection and communication of your Alarm devices, this is controlled by the Alarm Base Station. Although this signal is efficient over long distances, the Range Extender will also help to extend to reach to your other Alarm devices. Our help center article about zwave goes into more technical detail of how this works.
This is much different from your other Ring device, which will use wifi to communicate, and do not communicate with your Alarm system. With that being said, your Alarm and Camera devices can still work together in the form of linked devices. Ultimately, the Alarm connection is separate from your other Ring devices. I hope his helps!
For the Lay person it creates so much confusion and unnecessary hassle.