When I bought my used car, it came with a Clifford alarm. Its not the top of the line, but I have a remote start/stop button, and the alarm is LOUD. I dont know if this is typical of Cliffords, but it is the loudest alarm I have ever heard. Also, if the alarm is going off, you have to turn it off before you can start the car. (also as an added bonus, if I park close enough to the dorms I can start/shut off the alarm from my room!)
A friend of mine installed the Clifford two-way alarm in his car a few months ago, after having thieves steal his car, strip it of aftermarket parts, and drag it back to campus. No one has messed with the car since, but he isn’t taking any chances.
Where I am, if the campus cops hear a car alarm they will go check it out. Many people do ignore alarms in nicer areas of town, but in the crappy areas around here they still sometimes pay attention.
My experiences with aftermarket security systems have been universally bad. Either to the point of a non-start situation, or finding a car HAD a system in the past and a crappy removal job that caused other problems (battery runs flat in a week if the fuse is in, if the fuse is out, I don’t have a horn(!))
The PT Cruiser has one of those chip authentication doodads in the keyfob and it’s been, thusfar, perfect.
84-97 Corvettes’ batteries are right behind a panel, right behind the driver’s front wheel. Common practice was to punch a hole in the battery, let the acid drain out, then flatbed the car away. I don’t know many alarms that would prevent that. (yeah, I know about mercury switches and spare batteries, but at a certain point, it’s just cheaper to have good insurance.)
Well, the answer is never for both of them because it only takes a good thief a brief time to steal a stereo. Plus, noone ever looks out the window when they hear an alarm go off. So we’re stuck with a ‘tree falls in the woods and hits a mime’ scenario.
As far as the car being driven. If the theif stole the car, I’m sure he knows how to turn the alarm off.
In my case, the after market alarm was definitely worth it. The alarm would go off whenever a loud motorcycle or car went buy, whenever it rained, when a plane flew by.
But, it had a door unlocker in the package for free, so it was worth waking up the neighbors just so I wouldn’t have to fumble for the right key! Plus, my neighbors irritated me anyway, so we were even!
Plus, it’s a deterrent, not for professionals, but what professional would want to steal my 82 custom van? My alarm is to stop the dumb dork that thinks that my 1800 dollar van has many thousands of dollars worth of hd dvd players, and cd players and breaking a window or ruining a lock on a door and finding a $5 garage sale cassette player. (And then, smashing THAT.)
hh
I’ve cursed enough owners of car alarms and their descendants into the 50th generation that karma would give a big, foreboding laugh if I ever got one.
I have a strategic layer of dust, cat hair, yellowed newspapers, and general mess to keep thieves away from my car (I don’t let anyone who is allergic to either cats or messy cars ride in my car, for their own protection). I will have to try the open wads of used tissue, though.
My best strategy is to always try to park near cars that are more expensive than mine. That way, I figure the thieves will go after those cars and leave mine alone.
I have personally heard of exactly one person who was able to prevent the theft of a car by responding to the car alarm. It was his own car, it was parked in the driveway of his house, and he was home at the time.
I live in a city. I hear (and see) alarms go off because lightning struck within a few blocks, because a clumsy parker bumped the car, because a stray cat or possum walked under the car, because a skateboarder or bike rider or drunk careened into the car, and because a fire truck or “boom car” went by. The first “talking alarm” I ever heard (the kind with a recorded voice that says “Step away from the vehicle”) was going off whenever someone walked within three feet of the car (and it was parked next to a sidewalk about four feet wide). Sorry, car owners, but when I hear an alarm go off the LAST thing that crosses my mind is “I must go to the window and make sure no one’s car is being stolen, and call 911 if it is!”
I remember that from my days at the University of Maryland, though I think the car alarms on the cars in our dorm parking lot were set to go off if lighting struck within the same state. That’s where I developed my hatred of car alarms.