My next cordless phone system - You may want to look at this (1 Viewer)

[Ronald Epstein]

I would imagine many readers of this forum have
migrated to a complete cordless phone system
for their homes -- you know, the one with a base unit
and satellite handsets that you can place all over
the house so you are always near a ringing phone.

For the past 3 years I have owned a Siemens
2.4ghz system that has served me well but has
a major problem working alongside my wireless home network.

I am sure any of you that have these 2.4ghz phones
know the interference problems that a wireless network
on the same frequency can cause.

Well, I was about to treat myself to a new phone
system for my office and home. I did a lot of research
over the past week and found that UNIDEN topped
the heap of these 5.8ghz cordless phone systems.

I was about to purchase the Uniden Tru8885-2
system -- that is, until I saw THIS baby....

Introducing the Uniden ELBT595
cordless phone system with BLUETOOTH.

One look at this system and all one can say is....AMAZING.

I have been writing Uniden Customer Support and this
system is not due out till March 2005. There is also
no pricepoint set as of yet, though I bet it will be
awfully expensive.

However....

For gadget freaks like us, this looks to be a
revolutionary home phone system with endless
possibilities including tie-ins with other bluetooth
devices including other cell phones and PCs -- as
well as the ability to walk around with a cordless
bluetooth headphone that will enable you to answer
the phone from anywhere in your home.

I currently have bluetooth capability on both my
cell phone and PC.

So, if you are currently shopping for a phone system
I would highly reccomend the Uniden Tru8885-2,
or if you can wait another three months, the upcoming
Uniden ELBT595 may be the phone system of your dreams.

 

[DaveF]

Landlines are so last century. I'm cell only.

It looks like a cool system. But I don't understand what Bluetooth gets you over normal wireless (besides a wireless headset). (My PDA has bluetooth and I can't figure out what to do with it.)

I'd like to see a home system that could receive my cell phone calls. Then, when I'm home I could have a more convenient phone system that carrying my cell around room to room. If I had a bluetooth cell, could this system interact with it?

 

[Scott Merryfield]

Everyone should always keep at least one wired phone in their home. Cordless phones are useless during a power outage.

 

[Mark Romero]

Do you work for a phone company??

 

[Philip_T]

I also would love to see one of these kind of setups. Especially if no land line was required. You just plug your cell phone into the main cradle when your home which activates all the satellite headsets. Then I could ditch my land line entirely.

Curious as to what Bluetooth does exactly also.

 

[Keith Outhouse]

Hi Ron,
I've also been using the Siemens 2.4ghz for a couple of years now and my wife just went out and bought the Uniden Tru8885-2. We like it a lot more than the old one.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Keith,

I'd buy that Uniden today if not for the
fact I saw this bluetooth model coming around
the corner.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

No, I work in IT for a large multi-hospital healthcare system. I had to work from my home during the blackout in August 2003 that took down most of the eastern half of the U.S. Some areas around here were without power for 3 days.

The 2.4GHz and 5.8GHz phones that Ron mentions still require a landline from the phone company for the base station. However, they also require electrical power for the base station to communicate with the handsets. Keeping a cheap wired phone available for these emergencies is sensible. I was amazed at the number of people who had absolutely no phone service during that blackout because they had only wireless phones in their homes.

 

[DaveBB]

I keep an old crappy corded phone in my "emergency box" for situations like that.

I had some friends who lived in Memphis when they had a horrible ice-storm about 7 or 8 years ago. Their power was out for a week and since they only had cordless phones: no phone. The stores even ran out of corded phones.

 

[Craig F]

Why are you so interested in Bluetooth? It uses the same 2.4 GHz spectrum you are trying to avoid and has limited range.

 

[BrianW]

Not in my house. I agree that a wired phone should be kept for emergencies (and I have one for extended outages), but with UPS prices as low as they are, why would anyone not have a cordless phone (along with other "essentials", like TiVo, computers, and security systems) on a UPS?

Ron, that looks like quite a gadget. Unfortunately, I just ditched my Siemens system for a Panasonic system and already have four handsets. Alas.

 

[ScottHH]

I've seen some of the cheaper systems where there are two phones and only one has a telephone line. My problem with these phones is that if someone is on one of the phones, you cannot pick up the second handset to get on the call.

According to Uniden's website, this phone has "4-Way Conferencing (2 Handsets + Base + Outside Call)". If I'm on an outside call, can anyone pick up one of the other handsets and jump on the call? Then if I hang up, can someone pick up a third handset to jump on the call?

Since none of the additional handsets are wired into the phone line, is the reception on all of the handsets dependent on how far they are from the base station?

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Unless I am missing something, the phone itself is
a 5.8 ghz system.

The bluetooth will be useful for a wireless headset
or interactivity with my computer/bluetooth cell.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

The battery in a UPS will only last for a short period of time (20 minutes to a few hours, depending on the current being drawn). That will not be much help for an extended blackout like we had in 2003.

Now, if you have a whole-house backup generator along with that UPS, you would be "cooking with gas" as a friend of mine would say. Of course, those systems are considerably more expensive than a $40 UPS being sold at CompUSA.

 

[DaveBB]

The friends I mentioned who lived through the week+ long power outage in Memphis had a whole-house generator added when they moved from an apartment to a custom-built house. I think he said $3000+ for the whole-house generator system. He said adding it to an existing house is even more expensive.

 

[Mary M S]

Scott I keep one corded (and always will for the reasons you state). Had neighbors a couple of years ago who had migrated to 2 or three new cordless in their homes without ever thinking the subject out. They were coming over borrowing my corded during the two days we had a severe icestorm. They both (since that lesson), have re-purchased one inexpensive corded phone for just those situations.

I also make sensitive calls on the corded, since one of my neighbors (a good friend) called me 3 times in one summer to let me know she could hear my conversation perfectly, which was being picked up by her cordless set!)
Very good advise.

PS. Thanks for the heads up RE on the uniden setup. I have a Panosonic base and 3 satilites and recently needed to add a fourth handset. Dismayed to find out they no longer produce the add-on handsets for my base. Its life cycle was only 2 years!!! Ticked me off slightly!!

 

[Aurel Savin]

Looks like a nice phone, but personally have found Uniden phones to be very small and cluttered with way too many buttons.

 

[BrianW]

My Panasonic system lets you do this, and it works great. I loved my Siemens system, but "conferencing" calls among handsets was SUCH a pain. Replacing it with the Panasonic system was cheaper than hiring a receptionist.

On the Uniden, I see that you can "name" each handset. I could do that on the Siemens phones, and I really miss that feature. If you have one phone named "Kitchen" and another named "Home Theater", they tend to stay in their respective rooms. My Panasonic phones just have single-digit extensions, and when a phone is left out of a charger, someone finds it and simply places it in the nearest charger, so they get moved around a lot. So not only do you have to remember which extension is for each room, but there's almost no likelihood that the phone you're trying to ring is anywhere near the room with the person you're trying to reach.

 

[SarahG]

I forget what model Uniden we have, but we got one when we signed up for our voip service and it's been great. I had never used an expandble phone system before and don't know now that I'll ever go back. I still don't think I've figured out all the features yet, but the think already does everything I want it to.

 

[Robert_Gaither]

Bluetooth does several good things as it allows you to use a handsfree kit which is usually is designed for comfort to converse using this basestation unless it's a relay from each handset (which would be nice and could effectively increase the overall range). This would also allow people to use a bluetooth dongle on a homecomputer or laptop or use the integrated bluetooth of a laptop or PDA to use a dialup ISP (for those who still use one). For some the landline usage is cheaper than their cell (usually for local calls as it won't eat into your minutes) and this would make it practical to buy an expensive BT handsfree kit to double with the cell and get more out of it.