I went yesterday to Circuit City to price an alarm but they wanted to nickel and dime me to death. I was looking at a Viper 6xx which was $390 “installed” plus $30 per door, plus this and that. So I would get out paying closer to $500

Let me start off by asking what makes a good alarm? "Get a Viper" or "CrimeStopper is good enough” is not the answer I’m looking for. Why is a Viper better than a $50 eBay special?

What’s a good DIY alarm? I want keyless entry, possibly a trunk pop (I know it will require a solenoid), and a good alarm. In all honesty I’d rather do the job myself. It might take me a month and I’ll have to purchase a bunch of tools I don’t have (but I’m sure I wanted them, just didn’t know it) because I’ll know the quality of the job (good or bad)

Can I order the alarm online? where?
Can I install it myself? I’m proficient with wiring diagrams, soldering, etc, but does it come with a clear instruction manual?
Do I need special tools? Other than the basic electrical tools, wire cutter, solder iron, multimeter, etc. and screwdrivers and wrenches; I thought I read the Vipers need to be programmed with a special tool.

Thanks

trunk pop isnt possible with our cars first thing... I hear viper makes a pretty good alarm but I have installed a couple systems in cars and I still dont feel safe about installing an alarm I would have to sit down and thinka bout where the wires go for a while before I would do it. But dont get it at best buy or anything go to a custom shop much better install...

Any alarm sold by DEI (Viper, Rattler, bla bla) have lifetime warranties on them only honored if they are installed by a professional shop.

Why is Viper better than a $50 ebay alarm? I dunno, why is Alpine better than Kraco when it comes to cd players? I can't explain it, doubt anyone on this board can....but we know they are :thumbsup

DEI alarms are good for the following reasons: great customer support, well built, lots of upgradability, reliability, and an awesome warrenty.


to sum up all of your questions, alarms are quite easy to install, as long as you just take your time to do the job correctly. if you rush through it youll end up with a tangle of wires under the dash. wire charts (to help you find the staock wires to tap into) can be found online (im not at home, dont have my links w/ me) and tha alarm manual will give you a great idea of how to install it. make SURE that you hide the brain in a good location and wrap up all the wires with electrical tape to make it look stock under the dash when you get done.

Thanks for the help SPL. I need a reason for doing something and just being told it’s so doesn’t help.

What brand would yall recommend for a DIY install? I see a ton of Hornets on eBay. The ones I have seen have a remote start which I don’t really care for. Could I install an alarm with a remote start without installing that feature?

I thought HondaHater had a remote trunk pop. Why can’t a solenoid be installed there?

you can install one. Like you said, its been done, its by far not a plug and play thing. You have to mount it at a weird angle and something else.

>trunk pop isnt possible with our cars first thing...

nope very possible. did mine myself. cost about $20-30 for parts. it was a PITA finding the right mounting point and the part of the latch to attach the cable to but after that it was pretty straight forward. oh yea i hate running wires :P i just finished running MORE wires tonite for the power antenna i just installed (to replace the fixed one my car came with)

as far as alarms a lot of the quality is based on the install. you need to make sure you hide the brain really well and make all your wiring nice and neat. you want it to look stock. you want it to be such that when i thief starts trying to disable your alarm he finds it too diffcult and gives up to go look for an easier target. no matter how good an alarm you buy, if you can disable it in a matter of seconds it's a total waste.

there's lotsa fun stuff you can do with extra channels on an alarm too. i added a power trunk release and a home made window remote control unit. i'm gonna upgrade to an alarm with more channels later so i can activate my headlights, stereo, maybe pop the hood, etc. all by remote. fun stuff. :)

MY fiance just got an alarm installed in her car for like $175 its a prestige by audiovox it works very good. just thought i would throw another option out there for you

i bought a crimeguard from crutchfield.com. it was the best one they had and was around $250. it was really easy to install because it came with harnesses specific to our cars. a few splicings here or there. the hardest part was making everything neat. while i heard some people say that crimeguard isnt the best you can get, i think it has worked pretty good over the last year and a half i had it. it comes with motion detector which is really sensitive, a microphone that detects glass breakage, shock sensor, keyless entry, just about everything you would want except trunk pop.

The shops around here that I had asked wanted $300+ for a basic Viper alarm installed.

I knew with enough ingenuity you could add a turnk pop.

Thanks,

where are you located??

another good thing to do is to create a metal box around the siren so that it can't be destroyed, and yes hide everything VERY WELL... a pro theif can tear an alarm apart in seconds if it's not installed well... a back-up battery is nice too but not all alarms come with that... get one that works with the horn as well cuz the louder it is the more quickly a theif will leave it alone...

just some advice my friend at a alarm shop gave me... i'm gonna get the viper installed when i get an alarm... but i hear that A/C Delco makes the same thing as a viper (auctual same product) but with a different name, for less if you can find one.

WTB--- Dodge Omni:


http://www.geocities.com/shadyporshe851proof/frame_content/indexframe.html

mods:
star stage III clutch, + the normal mods + bass + lights. well u get the pictur

I'm in Rhode Island

My next alarm is going to be a viper for sure. DEI have a good range on the remote transmitters. Plus w/ the viper you can hook it up to pretty much anything.. sunroof, windows, remote start. U can make the windows and sunroof close automatically when u arm it. You can also add another remote when your run out buttons. I wanna see a car w/ air ride hooked up w/ a viper. You can have a seperate transmitter for the air! neat. I have an Avital alarms right now.

clifford .. i love my alarm it came out to like i think 400 installed .. its a sick alarm w/ proximitie sensors and so much more!

I got a generic alarm from etronics.com for $50. It has a 5 buttion remote, lock, unlock, and 3 aux buttions. I can make the aux buttions do whatever i want. Trunk pop, close windows, whatever. I am installing it today so we'll see how it works out. Hell if the keyless entry works for $50 ill be happy!