I Need a Good Way to Get Buzzed

March 1, 2012 2:57 PM

Apt Buzzer Hack - can I change my apartment buzzer to call my cell phone instead of buzzing an integrated intercom system?

We are renting an apartment with an intercom buzzer system, where person at front door presses a button that sends a buzz to an intercom-only phone attached to the wall of my living room. I then have to be home and hopefully hear it so that I pick up the phone and press a button on the phone to buzz them in.

Our previous intercom system went to our cell phone, which was fabulous as I didn't have to be home to buzz water/delivery folks in. Is there any way to hack this system to do so as well? Willing to spend $100-$250 as we are planning to stay here for awhile.

Possible pertinent info: The intercom phone is attached to the wall and can't be used for anything other than as a walkie talkie between the guest and us and to buzz in, fyi. We pay nothing extra for this 'service.' We have iPhones. The building was built in the late 80s and there are less than 30 units.

posted by curiositykilledthelemur to Home & Garden (8 answers total)

I don't think this is possible. The intercom sounds like it is a closed loop system and doesn't interface with the POTS system at all.
posted by thewumpusisdead at 3:13 PM on March 1, 2012

Agreed that it really depends on the system, and it sounds like this is a dedicated, closed system so it's unlikely. But only the apartment manager could tell you for sure.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 4:02 PM on March 1, 2012

You might be able to pull this off by taking apart the intercom box, and re-routing the signal into a computer running Asterix or some other PBX. If you managed to get this to work, you could patch the intercom into a voip call to your cell phone(s).

This seems like it would be fairly time-consuming to put together for someone not used to working with these tools, and at the very least would mean dismantling your intercom in a way that might be annoying to put back together when you move out.
posted by homotopy at 4:45 PM on March 1, 2012

I program more complex versions of these things as a tiny part of my job. If your place has some crappy old Aiphone system or similar, then the intercom is wired direct and you won't be able to do what you want. Getting it to do what you want would involve replacing the entire entry system, not just for you but for everyone.
posted by Sternmeyer at 7:15 PM on March 1, 2012

If you can open the phone on your wall and have the current activate a switch that will make a cheap pc email you, then you could use Prowl to notify you of the buzz or do something else. I would ask in the Make forums. Here. Arduino will be involved. You could also buy a label maker and put your cell number or a google voice number next to your intercom button.
posted by mecran01 at 6:09 AM on March 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

I vote for putting your cell # next to your intercom button.
posted by Falwless at 7:26 AM on March 2, 2012

But then, you still would have to be home to buzz them in. Forgot about that part.
posted by Falwless at 7:27 AM on March 2, 2012

Extending mecran01's idea if you can get that signal in to a PC then hacking up something with asterisk / freeswitch and a voip provider to call you with should be a problem. Getting inteligible speech both ways is a little more difficult depending on the specs of the intercom system, but likely possible, that just leaves the buzzer signal to open the door which would probable be another arduino / relay hack.
posted by dirm at 4:28 PM on March 2, 2012