Pros: Great audio quality, low price, and looks great
Cons: No phone book sharing and no wall mount for the base. Broken after 3 months
The Bottom Line: Fits the bill for style, price, audio quality, and multiple handsets. Works great in congested 5.8/2.4GHz and 900MHz households. Broken after 3 months.
DECT (Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications) is an ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) standard for digital phones.
-Frequency Range in US = 1920-1930MHz (1.9GHz)
-Capable of multiple handsets to one base station using one phone line jack. The additional headsets only need a charging base which doesn’t need a phone line jack.
-DECT 6.0 is capable of interference free wireless operations to 100 meters outdoors.
-Designed to operate in common congested radio traffic conditions like WiFi, microwaves, and video sensors. Wireless networks generally being in the 2.4GHz or 5.8GHz range while microwaves and others sit on the 900MHz range.
-Internal intercom calls capable.
-1.9GHz is dedicated frequency established by the FCC.
-Claims of 30% battery life over 5.8GHz phones
-Enhanced security as calls are digitized and encrypted
My current network consists of:
802.11 G/B network consisting of a imac as a server on 802.11B, ibook as primary computer on 802.11G, Nintendo Wii with wii connect 24 on at 802.11B, Nintendo DS lite using 802.11 B, linksys game G game adaptor for the xbox on 802.11G. So even with a mixture of 5.8GHz and 2.4GHz networks, this phone still didn't break up or interfere with the network.
My previous phone setup was a mixture of 900mhz and 5.8GHz telephones that had served me well. The 5.8 GHz telephone was only a 2 phone setup and the add-on expandable phone was very expensive from Panasonic. I was able to replace 3 phones with this VTECH bundle.
What you get
1 – Base station that includes an answer machine
3 – Handsets
2 – Chargers
Energy Star® Qualified
Answering Machine
-15 minute digital recording
-Voice menu
-Voice Indicator
Phones
-Caller ID
-Call waiting
-3 way conferencing
-50 number caller ID memory
-50 station phone directory
-Bilingual menu display (English/Spanish)
-Handset speaker phone with volume control (speaker on back of handset)
-Intercom or call transfer between handsets
-Multiple ring tones
-Handset clock display
-Any key answer
-After a 16 hour charge, the phone should be capable of 10hr talk/100 standby time.
Impressions after 3 months of use
Costco in store price was $100.
The main reason someone would buy this phone is price/looks/DECT 6.0. I wouldn’t say VTEH makes the best products that last over time from my personal experience. This being my first DECT 6.0 phone I wanted to see how this phone would hold up in my heavy traffic network home. So far, the DECT 6.0 is what was advertised. I have had 5.8 GHz phones that I had to return as they had serious feedback. This phone, even in speaker mode, is very clear and can get very loud without distortion. I have had multiple comments to how stylish the phone looks and it really does look like a long candy bar cellular phone. From good looks to very good voice quality without interference from my network, this phone so far has exceeded my expectations.
The key layout has a very similar look to the Motorola Razr phones. Similar to the Razr phones, the buttons are very hard to “feel” out because all the buttons are on a flat plane and don’t have any distinct separation. This is not so much a problem as most phone phones you won’t be dialing blindly as people do with cell phones to dial their speed dial numbers.
Switching from speaker phone to standard mode is tricky. You have to press the speaker phone to switch from regular mode to speaker mode. This threw me off as I would think pressing the talk button would flip me to regular mode but that instead just switched to the call waiting line. If you don’t have call waiting like I do, you just hung up the phone. This is not so much a negative as this was just a procedure change that I was not used to. At least the speaker button glows red when the phone is in speaker mode so it kind of sticks out.
The foot print of the extra handset charging bases are small and match the look of the handsets. The charging cradle is sturdy enough to not tip over when you drop the phone in them.
The phone book isn’t the easiest menu system to get it populated with numbers. I’ve had trouble getting numbers I’ve dialed to pull back up so I don’t have to punch in the telephone number again to save it into my phone book.
There just aren’t enough lines of text to scroll around the menu system and makes it hard to navigate. There isn’t an indicator that there are more items to choose from in the menu. Generally if there are more items you can choose, a small arrow or indicator of some sort will display to notify the user that they can keep scrolling down. I didn’t even know you could do that until I was blindly just digging into the menu as it as so few options.
Cons
-Base station can not be mounted on the standard phone jack wall mounts. This is very inconvenient since table top space is at a premium in the kitchen. Almost all phones these days have the option to sit as a table top or mount to the wall jack using the 2 pins. This was a major negative in my book as it just seemed lazy to NOT design to mount to the wall.
-On some product descriptions, it states that this phone can do phone book transfers. I have yet to figure it out and I must be blind since I don’t see it in the instructions manual. This is a serious drag once you start doing more then one phone. Why would this not be a standard feature to all multi handset phones? It is much easier to delete phone numbers then to add phone numbers with associated names.
-Thin. You wouldn’t think this is a drawback until you have to hold this with your head pinned to your neck as your doing dishes. In situations when there is too much surrounding noise, speaker phone shouldn’t be used and having to hold this phone in your neck is pretty difficult and uncomfortable.
--Update--
So after about 3 months of regular use I would like to change my statement about this phone. It is a piece of junk. The answering machine broke and I only get like one message a week. The robotic voice no longer talks at all and it seems to me the speaker is blown cause I can't even get it to playback any messages let alone guide me through the menu.
The phone sure did have a fantastic speaker phone but if it breaks in 3 months what use it is?
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