A keypad is nice to have, but I’d love Ring to release a keyfob, as you get with Abode, since this is often the most convenient way to arm or disarm the system. With the external siren, you can choose the volume level from silent (a little pointless, although the LEDs flash), up to loudest. Ring doesn’t state the decibels figure for all of the volumes, but says that Loud is 100dB at 1m. That’s loud enough to attract attention, for sure.

At its most basic, the Ring Alarm (2nd Generation) works much like any smart (or dumb, for that matter) alarm system. It has three modes: Away, Home and Disarmed. Away arms all of the sensors; Disarmed has them all disabled; Home has your selection of sensors active. If you don’t want to have to recharge batteries, you can either permanently power the siren (you can wire it into a transformer or buy the Plug-In Adapter 2nd Generation), or buy the solar panel for the Spotlight Cam. For the Home and Away modes, you can set the entry and exit delay. The entry delay is the time in seconds you have to disarm the alarm when the main sensor (as defined in the installation) is triggered – say, you opening the front door. The exit delay is similar but is the time in seconds before the alarm becomes active, giving you enough time to set the alarm and get out. Currently, the Ring Alarm professional monitoring** service is available only within the U.S. (excluding American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands) and Canada (excluding Quebec). When it launched a couple of years ago, the Ring Alarm soon became my favourite DIY smart alarm system. Today, there’s the Ring Alarm (2nd Generation), which maintains the title of best DIY alarm system, adding in better sensors, a neater control panel and an outdoor siren.At this point, you get an alert sent to your smartphone, which appears as a notification. It can be easy to miss – it’s just another beep on your phone along with all the other notifications you’re likely to receive through a day.

Range Extender (2nd Gen) which is designed to be easier to use with a new button and indicator light on the front. Liquid error (sections/product-template line 350): Could not find asset snippets/pdp_bundles.liquid Modes don’t just control the alarm, they can also be used to control which cameras record. This is brilliant if you have Ring cameras, particularly indoor units, as you get fine control over them and cut down on the number of times you end up recording yourself walking around the house. When triggered, the Ring Alarm (2nd Generation) will sound the internal and external sirens. The internal model is loud at 104dB – certainly loud enough to make itself heard. The internal siren can also play a ‘chirp’ when a sensor is triggered. You can choose what sound to play, and the volume on a per-sensor basis, although you may just want to disable the feature completely. It’s much neater, and the new size makes it easier to place this model where you want. It’s also less intrusive, if you want to have multiple keypads around your home for arming and disarming in different locations.

Designed around your life.

The Ring Alarm (2nd Generation) is still the best DIY alarm system for most people. With its excellent range of sensors and new outdoor siren, you get the coverage that you need, while the new keypad is far smaller and easier to use. The good news for anyone with the original system is that the new components are compatible, so you can upgrade the bits you want to. If you've started with a 1st Gen Ring Alarm kit, you can add 2nd Gen devices to your Alarm Base Station. If you buy a new 2nd Gen Alarm Kit, you can add both 1st Gen and 2nd Gen devices to your Alarm Base Station. However, if you’ve opened your front door to let the kids out, or because you were loading the car first, this is just annoying. The only way around the issue, in my example, is to shut the front door, then arm the system, then open the door, go out and then shut the door.