Cordless portable doorbell...any good?

[lastminute]

I need a set of cordless portable doorbells...one for the house and more importantly..the garage/workshop! (Tons on Amazon)

I see now there are cordless units which work from the household 13 amp sockets..I just wonder how the door unit is powered.

Thanks for any guidance.

Gerry

 

[sammy.se]

A small battery powers the switch.

I go through a set every 3 years or so. I tried buying expensive, it still fails (water ingress) so now I just buy the one that is cheapest and has the most positive reviews.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

 

[AES]

In a word, yes!

Mine is of course from a Swiss source (that's where I live) but it works fine, all the way down 3 floors to my cellar workshop. It just plugs into our standard mains socket. You mount a door bell (push switch) on/beside the front door somewhere, then plug the main unit into a convenient mains socket somewhere.

Mine does need a battery for the front door bell push but I can't remember off hand - either a AAA cell or a silver zinc button cell - so you can tell how often I've had to change that battery can't you?

That's it, nothing more than the above.

As you say, there are "millions" of different models around. Mine was dirt cheap (20 quid-odd equivalent?) I forget, and I bet that apart from the fact that Swiss mains sockets are completely different to UK mains sockets, there's no real difference between what you've seen on Amazon and what I've got at home.


But you MAY have to be careful on max "radio range". As said, my house is on 3 floors (I live on the side of a slope) so the range of mine is more less vertically downwards, whereas you seem to be saying your shop is "down the garden" - i.e. further away from the main unit in a length ways fashion.

What difference (if any) that will make I dunno, but I guess when buying new (mine's yonks old, packaging long gone) your packaging will state max range.

HTH

 

[Phil Pascoe]

It's the push buttons that fail, even the ones with decent IP ratings. Make sure you buy one with at least one extra button and put it away.

 

[transatlantic]

You could build a wooden awning for your doorbells

 

[Mrs C]

Perhaps you just need a dog!

 

[Robbo3]

I have a wireless baby monitor in the shed which allows me to hear the doorbell or telephone.

Edit: The monitor is in the house & the speaker is in the shed.

 

[sunnybob]

They are badly affected by any steel in the line of site.
I bought one as an emergency bell when my frail mother in law stayed with us. It was a complete failure. Wouldnt even work from one floor to the next because of the amount of rebar in the concrete floor.
If your shed is metal, it will have on be on the outside

 

[Just4Fun]

I have 3 of the cheap models from Lidl. Two of them have enough distance between indoor & outdoor units that I was unsure if they would work, but I have been pleasantly surprised. They work very well: reliable, loud sound, good range. I am happy with them.

I have had these for about a year I guess. I have not yet had to change the battery in any of the outdoor units.

I cannot however comment on Bob's observation:

They are badly affected by any steel in the line of site.

My house is a wooden house with no steel to worry about.

 

[MickCheese]

I've tried loads, none are very good and are unreliable. Maybe it's my house or the location of the bell. I don't live in a mansion just a bungalow.

For the past few years, I have had a Ring doorbell. In fact, I'm on the second one fitted within the past few days as the first failed. The new one was £89 and links to my phone, computers, and Alexa.

It does need a fairly good wifi signal. You can monitor whoever approaches your door on the phone video link and you can talk to anyone at the door from anywhere.

I answered the doorbell from Costa Rica (when holidays were allowed).

It is better to have it hard wired so it needs a power supply then you can use the 'live view'.

The video of the second generation one I now have is better than the first, there is a subscription if you want the videos saved.

A good security measure. But £89, a lot more than the cheap and cheerful bells on 'Banggood', 'Wish' or even Amazon.

Mick

 

[whatknot]

I am another one who has been through several different types, all went US in a year or so, range was never a problem and we live upstairs in a tallish building with very thick walls, but either the bell push failed or the unit

Having got fed up with missing deliveries/collections or visitors on several occasions I gave up with them and went back to a wired battery door bell (as I still had one pre cordless bells) so far its had one set of batteries

Cordless are great, when they work, which often they don't

(I did make a cover to keep the rain off the bell push and sealed it with a gasket, still it failed)

 

[Richard_C]

I'm on my third cordless doorbell in 23 years. They cost peanuts. You need to replace the batteries in the receiver bit every 12-18 months because that end is always using a bit of power to be always listening, bell push only uses power when pushed.

I've though about Ring video doorbells and see that it might be useful as I age and take longer to get to the door. But for now, the privacy and security issues outweigh the benefits. I think they have solved the hacking issue now (which allowed back door into your router and therefore to everything) but Amazon bought Ring, use face recognition and hold/share data on all sorts. That means Amazon and all their data-mining customers, and in some states the authorities, know exactly where your house is, where you are because it knows where your smartphone is, and in many cases who is ringing the bell and when. The ones with motion sensors record everything in range, including passers by on the street if its close to your door. It's just as much an issue for your visitors as it is for the doorbell owner.

Now, I know if we use smartphones and the internet there is a big trade off in personal privacy, but even the US Senate has jumped on Ring for its lack of transparency.

Web search for "Ring doorbell privacy...." and make up your own mind.

 

[sunnybob]

oh ho, another conspiricist.

Do you have a gas or electric smart meter? Yes? dont worry about the doorbell, the government are already in full control of your electronic life. :roll:

 

[Richard_C]

Sunnybob, you are obviously well skilled in how politics works now. Your reply is straight from the Bannon/Cummings playbook.

Instead of engaging in debate, challenging or giving another view of the facts you simply attack and try to discredit the person whose view differs from your own. In football parlance, play the man, not the ball. You have not challenged on the matter at hand, you've simply called me a conspiracist - without evidence.

It's a good, if lazy, tactic. It requires no critical thought, no understanding of the facts or issues and can be deployed at a moments notice on any topic.

I'm not going to reply further to this topic, it's not a place to dismiss legitimate observations by calling people names.

I ended my last post by saying people will make up their own minds. I'm sure they will.

 

[sunnybob]

The "conspiricist" wasnt an insult. I know many conspiricists.
If you took offence, then that was not my intention.
Also, my comment was nothing but the truth. Any competent hacker can get through a smart meter and into your house system. let alone a government.
If you have truly left a thread for a perceived but not real insult, that is a shame.

 

[John Brown]

The last time we were "offered" a smart meter, it was connected to the phone network, not WiFi. Not entirely sure how that would enable a hacker to do anything sinister.

 

[Richard_C]

Sunnybob.

I guess it's the way it was said: "oh ho, another conspiricist"has a certain dismissive edge to it. I accept it was not your intention. Let's move on.

There is always a trade off: I drive on the motorway past Heathrow and many other places, my car number plate gets recorded. I get on the local P&R bus or a train and the onboard camera records my face. I order from Amazon or use a payment card in a supermarket, my buying history is shared with other organisations. I use a smartphone so leave a trace of my whereabouts. All sorts of other things. These are all choices I make.

For me the privacy and security risks from a Ring Doorbell and a smart meter* outweigh the current benefits. For others it will be different. It would be naive though to think that you can have all that functionality without some privacy trade off. If I lived in an area with a lot of burglary, or struggled to get to the door quickly, I might welcome Ring. It is an alternative to a cordless doorbell, but my cordless doorbell does me just fine for now.


* plus the implementation of gen 1 meters was a complete failure, change supplier, meter no longer smart. Will wait for a few million more customers to fit gen 2 before I trust the capita-run back end to be reliable and for the bugs to be sorted.