Fire Alarms
Building Codes Throughout NY State Require Approved Fire Alarm Systems in Most Commercial Building and for many New Businesses.
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Commercial Fire Alarm Systems:
Throughout NY State Building Codes require that certain facilities install and maintain an Approved Fire Alarm System.  An Approved Designation Requires Filing an Application for Permit and Design Approval prior to installation commencement.  Burglar Busters designs the fire alarm system.  Burglar Buster prepares all the necessary drawing for submission to the proper Municipal Authorities.  Once written approval is received Burglar Buster installs your Fire Alarm System as per the Approved Plans Subject to Inspection.  We facilitate the job from inception through completed Signoff of Inspection.  We provide for yearly Service and Fire Alarm Central Office Monitoring Services.

NY State License # 12000240227
Nassau County Fire # 2627491

Gamewell Authorized Dealer
Firelite Authorized Dealer
ADT Authorized Dealer
A fire alarm control panel (FACP), also called a fire alarm panel. Technicians usually refer to the FACP as the panel. A fire alarm control panel is the central control device that receives information from input devices (smoke detectors, heat detectors, manual fire alarm stations, etc.) The panel then processes the information to trigger an output device (bells, horns, or strobes).
There are three types of panels: coded panels, conventional panels, and addressable panels.
Still Utilized in NY City Installations Coded panels were the earliest type of central fire alarm control, and were made from the 1950s to the late 1970s. A coded panel is similar in many ways to a modern conventional panel (described below), except each zone was connected to its own code wheel (Ex: An alarm in zone 1 would sound code 1-2-4 [through the bells or horns in the building], while zone 2 would sound 1-2-5), which, depending on the way the panel was set up, would either do sets of four rounds of code until the initiating pull station was reset (similar to a coded Pull Station) or run continuosly until the panel itself was reset. Large panels could take up an entire wall in a mechanical room, with dozens of code wheels. Lists of codes had to be maintained, sometimes with copies being posted above certain pull stations (this setup is commonly seen in older wings of hospitals). Smaller panels could be set up in one of two ways. Most of the time, the panel would only have one zone, and therefore, only one code. Common one-zone codes were 4-4-0 and 17-0-0 (which is similar to the 120 bpm March Time setting found on modern panels). Alternatively, the panel could be made with no code wheels, using only what was called the gong relay. In large systems, this was primarily used to accommodate existing coded pull stations. However, it could also be used as its own zone, with the connected horns or bells sounding continuosly instead of in a particular code. These panels are not very common today, but can sometimes be found in older buildings such as those on college campuses or hospitals.
In a conventional panel, fire detection devices including, but not limited to smoke detectors, flame detectors, heat detectors and manual call points or manual pull stations are joined up with a number connected to each circuit. When a device on the circuit is activated, the panel recognizes an alarm on that circuit and could be set up to take a number of actions including directly calling Burglar Buster’s alarm monitoring station.  
An addressable panel is a more modern type of panel, and has greater flexibility than a conventional panel. An addressable panel has a number of loops, where a number of devices are able to be connected, each with its own address. There is no standard protocol as such, and thus a number of proprietary solutions exist. Loop devices have traditionally been able to have 99 or 100 devices connected, but more recent protocols allow many more. This is usually overcome by having multiple loops on one system.
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Burglar Alarm FAQ
Below you will find our descriptions of differing level of security in regards to your typical Residential Burglar/Fire Alarm system.  As you read our goal is to give you an idea of the level of security that fit your needs:

1. A Basic Alarm System should protect all of the doors that enter your house.  Doors are the most common entry point of intruders.  At least One Motion Sensor should be positioned within the house to impede the progress of an Intruder through the house.  Most Criminals want to get to your bedroom; where money, jewelry and other valuables are usually kept.  Additional Motion Sensors may be needed depending on the layout of your house.  The System Code Pad is located at your entry door.  It allows you to turn your alarm system on and off.  It has multiple functions other than arming and disarming the alarm which enhance your security.  There are Buttons on the code pad that when depressed will summon the Police, Ambulance or Fire Dept.  A Silent Holdup Code feature can be programmed to protect against push-in robbery and home invasions. Monitoring of the alarm system is accomplished by connecting the alarm system your premise telephone line.  When an alarm condition occurs the Alarm dials the central station and communicates vital information which the central station uses to contact the proper authorities and the list of contact people you provide.  All communications are documented.
2. A More Complete Alarm System includes magnetic sensors on the doors and windows in addition to motion sensors. These sensors will alarm the system when a door or window is opened. These sensors do not protect against glass breakage, but additional glass break detectors can also be used. The sensors are connected to a control panel that is operated by the keypad. The control panel processes intrusion signals and rings sirens and/or communicates to a monitoring service which then calls the owner and/or police department. This is the basic form of home alarm system.

1. Two Way Voice Alarm Monitoring allows for the central station to speak with the homeowner and/or intruder. This may be beneficial to the owner for medical emergencies. For actual break-ins, the speaker phones allow the central station to urge the intruder to cease and desist as response units have been dispatched.

Central Station Monitoring:The list of services to be monitored at Burglar Busters Central Station has expanded over the past few years to include: Intrusion Alarm Monitoring; Fire Alarm & Sprinkler Monitoring; Critical Condition Monitoring; Medical Response Monitoring; Elevator Telephone Monitoring; Hold-Up or Panic Alarm Monitoring; Duress Monitoring; Auto Dialer tests; Open & Close Signal Tracking, or Supervision; Open & Close Reporting; Exception Reports; and PIN or Passcode Management

Security Camera Systems (CCTV) FAQ:

1. How Many Cameras Do Need?  This depends on what you want to see.  From a residential point of view, four cameras positioned at the four corners of your home is a basic starting point.  Camera #1 positioned to look across your front door towards your driveway, camera #2 positioned at the end of your driveway viewing forward towards the street, camera #3 at the far corner of the backyard viewing the garage and adjacent property line and camera #4 viewing the off-side of your property line.  This basic configuration allows for a broad view and recording of what happens on and around your property lines.   As anyone encroaches upon your property they will be walking into a camera.  The closer a person or people get to the cameras the more identifiable they become.
2. Fixed Cameras vs. Pan/Tilt/Zoom Cameras:  Pan/Tilt and Zoom Cameras are wonderful security tools when used in the proper situation.  It allows the user the ability to remotely turn the camera up and down or left and right and the ability to zoom in on an image with amazing clarity.  Guard tours can be set up to enable the camera to continually rotate across a predefined field of view.  A variety of set points and viewing angles can be accomplished with a guard tour.  Fixed Cameras come with a lens that gives you a set field of view.  Some examples are 3.6mm, 6mm and 8mm.  The lower the number the wider the field of view.  You can install about 4 Fixed Lens Cameras for the price of 1 P/T/Z Cameras with controls.  In most residential and light commercial application fixed lens cameras give you more security for the investment.  
3.  Camera Lens Choice affects what and how you see (Field of View).Lens Selection chart.
4. What are Day/Night Cameras?  These cameras allow you to see images in low light situation.  Infrared Light Emitting Diodes (LED) illuminates specific areas within a field of view.  The camera image turns from color to B/W in low light situations.  There are other technologies that accomplish the same thing.  Generally indoor Night vision cameras perform better than outdoor night vision cameras.   Within the confines of four walls the infrared light is contained and concentrated; outdoors the light tends to dissipate.  Any outdoor lighting will enhance the image clarity of a night vision camera. 
5. Digital Video Recorder Basics:  NO More Tapes.  DVRs have an internal hard-drive onto which video images from your cameras are recorded.  Depending on the size of your hard-drive and the compression rate of the DVR, months of video can be stored on the internal HD.  Most DVRs have CD, DVD or USB port for archiving important video events that you want to save.   Once the Hard-drive is full the oldest video will be overwritten.  At any point in time you will be able to look back at events as far as the recording time capacity of that DVR.  DVRs detect motion from any of the cameras connected to it.  When someone walks in front of a connected camera the DVR to begin recording. 
6. Hard-drive size and Stored Recording Times:  Recording time vary by DVR Manufacturer and the technology that they utilize.  Hard-drive size is not the only determining factor.  There are different technologies for compressing the video files for storage to the hard-drive.  The average storage time of the DVRs we represent is 1-6 months.  Larger Hard-drives will accommodate longer recording times.
7. Networking and Remote Viewing via the Internet:  All DVRs that we install have an Ethernet connection to allow remote viewing via the internet.  From anywhere in the world that you can connect to the internet, you can see cameras live that are connected to your DVR. You can also review recorded events over the internet.  The speed of the playback depends on your network speed and the DVR that was chosen for you installation.  Some DVRs need software that has to be loaded onto the remote computer to access your DVR over the internet, others allow you to use a web browser such as Internet explorer to access your DVR. 
8. Static IP vs  Dynamic IP Address:  When ever you surf the internet you are searching from an IP address that your internet provider assigns you.  It does not matter to you what the IP address is because you are searching for other sites.  When you type in www.google.com there is an IP address that is associated with this site.  An example of an IP address is 69.195.244.24.  A dynamic IP address is an address that is subject to changes. A static IP address never changes.  An analogy is your house address is static.  If you owned a motor home and traveled around the country your address is dynamic.  The Postman would not be able to deliver mail to motor home.  By the same token if your home or business IP address continually changed you would not be able to find your DVR over the internet.  Most residential internet service provides dynamic IPs.  Business internet services make available to businesses static IP addresses.  Many of the DVR Manufacturers maintain a DNS Service that allows you to find the IP address that your DVR is connected to.
9. DNS (Dynamic Name Server):   DNS Service allow you to find your DVR if you have Dynamic IP.  You will be given a site such as www.za.ddwddns.com/yourhouse , that when entered into the address bar of you web browser will automatically find your DVR no matter what IP address it reside at.  Most of these services are free and included with the installation service Burglar Buster provides.