Pros: Cool metallic grey/black color combination, lots of features
Cons: Too much hiss and background noise. Talking on this fun isn't enjoyable.
The Bottom Line: If you like features and lots of them, this is a decent phone. But you'll have to endure the constant hiss in the background. I do not recommend this phone.
rice75's Full Review: Vtech VT2468 2.4GHz 1-Line Cordless Phone
I mean it, don’t believe the hype. If (Cordless_Phone.frequency() > 900 MHz) then (Cordless_Phone.phone_is_better()=true) is not always the case. Sure there are cordless 2.4GHz phones out there that are leaps and bounds better than the average 900 MHz model, but in the case of the VTech VT2468 2.4GHz Cordless Phone this simply isn’t true.
The worst detractor from any phone is a background hiss. That low, incessant, nauseating hum has driven people mad before. I myself find that if I had a ball peen hammer nearby, my VTech VT2468 2.4GHz Cordless Phone would be a pile of broken plastic and wires. I just can’t abide with a phone that hums in the background. Unfortunately, when my last trusty phone/answering machine combo was called to a higher plane, I replaced it with this piece of work. Don’t get me wrong, it rings, it dials and yes I can hear the person on the other line. But I have trouble concentrating on their voice. In the back of my mind all I can think about is another fitting demise for this horrible impostor of a phone.
There are some good things about this phone, right? Sure, the buttons are pleasantly soft. They give the user a nice feedback. It has other pluses here and there but nothing that should prompt you to buy this phone. Unless of course you want to listen to the background hiss as it slowly leads you down the path of insanity.
Features
This is a Telephone/Answering Machine Combo. The base unit is nice and small and isn’t cluttered with too many buttons. Only the necessities are there: buttons associated with setup, buttons for playback and management of the three mailboxes and a page button when you lose the handset. The answering machine has a rather unpleasant sounding voice that guides you through the menus but notwithstanding the voice, the machine has some decent features. There are three mailboxes which can be accessed by the caller by pressing “*” and “1, 2, or 3” after the message is over. The message default is mailbox #1. The answering machine has a couple of things I refer to as “FYWNU” (Features you will never use). One of them is actually pretty handy but may be too much trouble for what its worth. You can have two different announcements, one for normal answering machine operation (which obviously isn’t a FYWNU) and one for setting the system to only play the announcement (sounds cool, but I think it’s a FYWNU). The announcement only setup is good for when you are on vacation and don’t want to receive messages, because in announcement mode it doesn’t record messages. You can also access the answering machine remotely from another telephone. This can come in very handy.
The phone also has payload of features as well. The display has three rows of text for Caller ID readouts. Along with the normal caller ID, the VTech VT2468 has call waiting caller ID. Although being able to know who’s calling is great, knowing who is interrupting your current call is even nicer. Unfortunately this is most likely an additional service from your phone company (read: it’ll cost ya). The caller ID keeps track of 98 incoming calls with all the pertinent info of the call (who it was, phone number, date and time) so when you miss a call and the caller isn’t courteous enough to leave a message, you still know who it was. Along with caller ID, the telephone has four different ring tones, a ten telephone number memory, and a forty telephone number directory. They both function the same way so I’m not exactly sure what the difference is. They both take some effort to program in numbers and since I’m lazy I dub the directory features FYWNU. (maybe you will, I know I won’t)
Use and Feel
This is where the VTech VT2468 falls flat. For all its features and whiz-bang cool stuff, if the calls sound bad, no amount of features can compensate for bad calls. The phone feels comfortable in the hand and is ergonomically pleasing but this just isn’t enough. The answering machine has its flaws as well. After you’ve heard a message it automatically saves it without reminding you it has saved them. So next time you get a new message you hear the creepy voice say you have “Two new messages and forty-seven old messages (the ones you forgot to erase, stupid)” Okay, I added the italicized part but I would like some visual feedback reminding me I have some messages to delete. And deleting! That’s another black mark. On my old answering machine, as I listened to a message, if I knew I was going to erase the message I could press the “erase” key at any point during playback and it would erase the message after playing it in its entirety. With the VTech VT2468, as soon as you press the “delete” key, it deletes it, right then and there. Never mind if you hit the key two seconds into the message, it’s gone. And last time I checked, there isn’t a recycle bin for answering machines.
Overall the VTech VT2468 proves the adage that too many features don’t make a product better. If this phone had good sound quality I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it but since sound quality is what a phone should have more than anything else I just can’t recommend the VTech VT2468, 2.4 GHz or not. There are better phones out there. I hope you can find one, I sure didn’t!
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