The box of sensors is the easy part. The hard part is an alarm that doesn't cry wolf: one sensor mounted at the wrong angle, one curtain above a radiator, and the siren goes off at three in the morning. After a month of that, the most expensive system in the shop ends up exactly like the cheapest one: switched off.
Commissioning is the work in between: sensors in the right places, control panel and siren configured, a personal code for everyone, notifications that actually reach your phone. Battery-powered wireless systems, with the electrical system left untouched. And at handover we test it together: open a window, watch your phone ring, learn to arm and disarm without thinking about it.
First of all, a site visit and a quote: free and clear, before we start. It also says what we don't do — no mains electrical work, no security-company contracts — so you know exactly what you're buying.
A serious alarm doesn't start from a catalogue: it starts from a question — what needs protecting, and from what. The European EN 50131 series, the one on "intrusion and hold-up alarm systems" as CEI, Italy's electrotechnical standards body, presents it, and the Italian standard CEI 79-3, "Alarm systems – Particular requirements for intrusion and hold-up alarm installations", published in December 2024, say the same thing in engineers' language: assess the risk first, then choose the system. CEI 79-3 sets out "the methodology for analysing and determining the level of criminal risk, for the design and construction of an installation"; in the public draft of the standard, the Performance Level is a "conventional value, in increasing order from 1 to 4, prescribing the minimum requirements for the design, construction and operation of the installation". You don't need to learn any of this: you need a site visit done in that spirit.
The same draft names the number-one enemy: the "improper alarm: an alarm caused by factors external to the system, or by faults or malfunctions other than a real danger of intrusion and/or robbery". In practice: the cat, the curtain, a sensor in direct sunlight, a battery dying quietly. An alarm that rings for nothing gets muted the second time and switched off the third — and a house with the alarm off is just a house with a sticker on the gate. Tuning is the invisible part of the job: sensor reach, excluded zones, entry and exit delays, and a final test with the house lived-in, not empty.
Wired or wireless? The standards series covers both worlds with dedicated parts: "cable interconnection of devices" on one side, "equipment using radio-frequency technology" on the other. We are an IT lab and we stay inside our own fence: we commission battery-powered wireless systems and their configuration, without opening up the electrical system. If your project calls for a mains-wired siren or work reserved for a licensed installer, we say so in the quote and that part goes to an electrician: a clear boundary beats a crooked promise.
On your phone, the alarm becomes genuinely useful. The Carabinieri, in their official advice on home burglaries, recommend installing "anti-theft devices you can control from your smartphone, connected where possible with the emergency numbers". The first half is exactly our job: notifications configured, app connected, tested together. The second half is a contract you sign with a security company — we are not one, and we don't do call-outs. If you also want to see what's happening at home when a notification arrives, the natural next step is video surveillance; if the alarm has to live alongside lights and automations, there's the smart home.
Then comes everyday life, where alarms are won or lost. The Carabinieri again: "every time you leave the house, remember to switch on the alarm" — and the only alarm that gets switched on is the one that's easy to arm. So we hand over personal codes for everyone in the house (you type them: we don't ask for them and we don't keep them), notifications running over a home network in good order, batteries checked and a simple maintenance reminder. Commissioning is done when what should ring rings, what should stay quiet stays quiet, and you can run it all without the manual.
| Entry points to protect | Doors, windows, floors, side entrances: the site visit counts them one by one. Every opening is either one more sensor or a risk accepted with open eyes. |
|---|---|
| Type of system | Battery-powered wireless is our territory; components wired into the mains call for a licensed installer, and the quote says so. |
| Environment and habits | Pets, curtains, radiators, direct sunlight: anything that can cause improper alarms moves where sensors go and how they're tuned. |
| Users and codes | How many people come and go, and with which permissions: every extra code is configuration, every regular guest a decision to make. |
| Notifications and connectivity | How it should reach you and on which phones; what must happen when the power or the network goes down. |
| New system or existing one | Bringing a system already in the house back into service is different work from starting fresh: sometimes shorter, sometimes not. |
What genuinely moves the cost of a set-up: how many devices and accounts, how much data to move, what is already in place. Agreed together before we start — the quote is clear before, not after.
ElectrONIK Lab is an independent workshop: it is not an authorised service centre and is not affiliated with the manufacturers. The trademarks named here belong to their respective owners and are used only to identify the devices we work on. Your statutory consumer rights towards whoever carries out the repair are unaffected.
Free diagnostics, a clear quote and the part chosen by you.