FIRE DETECTOR AND ALARM SYSTEM

A fire alarm system having recorded vocal warning messages and/or instructions is provided. The fire alarm system has a microphone by which a user can record a vocal message specifically suited for a small child or adult in need of verbal instructions. This allows the person hearing the warning message to respond correctly and quickly to a fire alarm. This recorded vocal message can be transmitted in combination with a fixed alarm signal in response to the detection of a fire condition. In a preferred embodiment a fire condition detector 10 is controlled by a CPU 65. Upon initial power-up, the combined watch-dog timer and power-on-reset circuitry 80 resets CPU 65 permitting it to execute machine instructions stored in ROM 95. User commands are issued via switch 75. The user speaks into microphone 25, which applies an audio signal to the microphone amplifier 125, which sends an analog signal to the analog-to-digital converter 130, which in rum sends a digital signal to CPU bus interface 135 for storage in RAM 90. CPU 65 monitors the output of fire condition detector means 10. Upon detection of a fire condition, detector means 10 activates the alarm state. CPU 65 then transfers the pre-recorded digital information from RAM 90 to the digital-to-analog CPU bus interface 40, which in turn provides a analog signal to amplifier 50, and ultimately loudspeaker 60.