It's common knowledge that wireless security systems are much easier to install than their wired counterparts. What many people don't understand, though, is that wireless signal range can be as big a detriment to installation as running wires, drilling holes, and busting drywall. Especially on large properties or houses that have some outlying areas that need sensors, wireless component signal range will be the limiting factor and usually the thing that drives consumers away from wireless systems.

Luckily, there's a relatively simple solution. Let's take a look at the wireless networking world and make come comparisons so the concept is easier to understand. While the application of the two technologies is quite a bit different, the technology is fundamentally the same.

Take your home or office, for example. If you use wireless networking, you know that there are areas that the signal doesn't reach. You may have a great connection where you are, but if you take one step to the left or walk 10 feet down the hallway you might completely lose the signal. This type of problem is solved by placing a wireless bridge in the general vicinity so that it can extend your network. It takes the existing signal and rebroadcasts it, doing the same with any signal it receives from your computer. It acts as an amplifier, taking a weak signal and resending it out.

So it is with wireless home security networks. You can buy a wireless signal extended to place at a midpoint in your house between the base station and your most remote sensors. It will pick up the signal from your sensors and retransmit it, giving it a boost of energy so the signal can reach the base station.

In the method, a wireless home security system can be extended and bridged almost indefinitely, and cover a much larger area than a single base station could cover otherwise. It's a feature that is not very well known, but one that solves the problem that many people have when they get their wireless home security systems home and set up. It's very frustrating when one of your sensors won't reach the base station and you're not sure if there's anything you can do about it.

So don't be afraid to get that system and install it if you have a sprawling ranch with a large main floor, or your house is old with lots of plaster and lathe. Range extenders will solve your problems easily.