PetSafe vs eXtreme Dog Fence Comparison

I installed and tested two in-ground dog fences recently. The bad news is that I had to try out two different brands to find something that worked. That's actually the good news, too, because now I have the experience and knowledge with both brands to help you make a decision.

How it All Started

We got a dog about a year and a half ago. He's been a great addition to our family, but part of getting a dog was the understanding that we wanted to install an in-ground pet fence as part of the deal. Nobody in our neighborhood (well, maybe one or two families out of more than thirty) has an actual physical fence and so we didn't want to mess up the nice open feel that we have going on now.

We also knew that most of the neighbors in the neighborhood had in-ground fences. This is actually where the real story begins. And if you were paying attention to the image at the beginning of this article, then you might already know how the story turns out.

The First Attempt

I ordered a very highly-rated in-ground fence from PetSafe on Amazon. People were generally very happy with it, and a few of our friends and neighbors had PetSafe models in their own homes (one of our local installers seems to use them exclusively).

It all started on a late summer day. It was about two days before my boys started school for the year. I took a day off of work to get the job done. Based on all the information I could find, the job would probably take a few hours.

Preparation

I rented a cable installing machine from my local Home Depot and came home to get started. My first step was to lay out the wire and basically do a dry run. I figured it would be better to get everything in place and test it out before I start burying wire.

I got everything laid out and temporarily held in place with landscape staples (which I only started using about halfway through the job — originally I had been bending the flags that come with the kid to hold the wire down and it ended up being a terrible idea).

Testing

Once it was all in place the next step was to take the collar and walk around the permieter of the yard to test it out.

I started walking around and everything was going great. Cross the line, hear the beep, walk back into the yard, hear it stop. I walked about three-quarters of the permiter of my yard and it was going great.

Then, I got to the side of my yard where the neighbor also had an in-ground fence. I kept swinging the collar back and forth to test it.

Silence. Nothing.

I was... frustrated.

This portion of the job had already taken me over an hour. And now I had wire strung all over my yard that I couldn't bury yet but also didn't want to move and replace if I didn't have to.

Unboxing the PetSafe In-Ground Fence