Smashing windows make noise and cause attention.
On this particular day, I parked the car at Parramatta's Westfield carpark on level 5, went down stairs for not even 5 minutes, came back up and found my car door semi-opened....which I found unusual as we all know, these cars lock themselves after 60 or so seconds.....I looked inside and they got as far as unscrewing my steering column cover and my key barrel dangling....another 2 minutes and it wouldve been gone. I looked around and saw 5 lebanese kids (probably from Auburn) watching me in a hatchback all with a 'damn ! spewin !' look on their faces. I got their number plate just as they drove off.
I reported this to the cops, they came and finger printed the car and tells me that I was extremely fortunate as there has been a string of these imports stolen from that very carpark in recent weeks. Oh yeah, that number plate was stolen as expected.
So yeah, I went straight out and spent $600 on an pager alarm system the very next day.