The term 'DIY home security system' probably, for most people, calls to mind the image of a young McCaulay Culkin, beating the heck of the marauding crooks in Home Alone I and II. Of course, Home Alone was an early 90's phenomenon, popular in a time when auto-detection, visual and information technology were, despite decades of concerted effort, in their infancy, and something only qualified systems engineers or genius geeks could really do with as they pleased.

But computers have traveled light years in the past couple of decades. Hardware glitches, though still not a thing of the past, are far rarer, and operating technologies such as media recording and storage and motion detection is now a fairly simple business, accessible to anyone with the time to skim through a short user manual or do a little browsing on the internet. You can, believe it or not, actually build pretty efficient DIY home security systems using simple webcams of the sort people use to chat online. With a little more cash in hand, you can even override issues of poor lighting by installing your own infrared security cameras.

Remember, though, that more than half of all burglaries in North America happen due to negligence, when a window or door is left standing open, and the alarm system left off. Thus, before you get too technical and fancy building home security camera systems, concentrate on your low-tech barriers against intruders. Make sure you have sturdy locks, burglar bars over your windows, and that you and your whole family are habitually obsessed with keeping doors and windows locked even should you just be stepping out to visit your neighbors. Remember that you, as the caretaker of your DIY home security system, remain its most critical element.

On from this, you'll want to install contact sensors on all your windows and doors. Contact sensors are simply two pads which, when in contact, complete an electrical circuit. If that circuit is broken by, say, the opening of the window, a switch will trip in the contacts, causing them to signal to their central hub (which, in the case of a DIY home security system, would probably be your personal computer). Contacts can be purchased for less than ten dollars at most hardware stores.

If your DIY home security system effort is going to include the rigging of a full-blown home security camera system, it's possible to have your contacts serve as the activators for the recording function of your cameras. Thus your cameras will be set to record as soon as the contact circuit is broken and the perimeter of your fortress is breached. Truly, if the lighting in the house is decent, and you're generally at home at night, there's no reason to construct your home security camera system using anything more snazzy than a few good webcams. Webcams start at under $20, and go right up to the point of being far more accurate as regards color and contrast discrimination than the human eye.

Infrared security cameras present an opportunity to take your DIY home security system to the next level, leaving it immune from changes in lighting conditions, and ensuring that you find out what happened in your home entirely regardless of whether a bulb blew. The flip side of this coin is the fact that buying one may leave you feeling like you've been robbed - while infrared security cameras have become a lot cheaper in recent years, decent ones are still priced in the $2000 area. The question is really one of need - if your home is adequately lit by streetlights from the outside, then your home security camera system probably won't be much improve by the purchase. Keep in mind, however, when doing your cost-risk calculations, that infrared security cameras can double as fire detectors, eliminating the need to install smoke detectors.

For more useful tips on Home Security Camera Systems be sure to check out www.Home-Security-Pro.com.