Telephone Reviews

Yes, this machine has a lot of bells and whistles but the sound quality is so poor that I cannot understand a great many messages that are left. That's why I'm looking for a new answering machine. Stay away from it.

How many times have you been in another room, heard the phone ringing, and thought "I wonder who that is??" -- without having to go and check the Caller ID. Well, with this answering machine -- you can!! You can program up to TEN phone numbers into this machine, with your own pre-recorded announcement -- such as, "This is Mom, calling from her cell phone". So whenever "Mom" calls, you will hear that announcement, shortly after the first ring! This has been so helpful to our family. We have two young children, and we don't want them to answer the phone if it is a stranger. But if they hear the pre-recorded announcement -- "This is Dad, calling from his office" -- then they know it is OK to pick up the phone. I think this particular feature is so valuable.

Even though this answering machine is made to answer TWO phone lines, we only use it for ONE. So it is just a little annoying (when programming it) to designate "Line 1" versus "Line 2" -- when we will never use a "Line 2" -- but I think that is a very small inconvenience.

Also, the quality of the digital recording (both for callers hearing your greeting) and for playback of messages isn't quite as clear as other high-quality digital machines that I have heard. But once again, I am willing to sacrifice a little bit of the recording quality for sake of the other features which we find so useful.

We highly recommend this machine.

We are totally satisfied with this 2-line answering machine. We have a Siemens 2420 Gigaset phone system but the built-in answering machine is poorly designed so we disabled this function when we got our AT&T 1782.

We used to have a couple of dozen messages of only fast tones/beeps when a telemarketer would call and hang up. Now we only get real messages from real callers. It took me about a half hour to setup but it really isn't that difficult. The features are really worth the effort.

If caller has a blocked number, we use the pre-recorded message that we do not accept blocked callers and it hangs up without a chance for the caller to leave a message.

If a caller is unknown, ie, caller-ID doesn't show up, then my recorded voice announces to the caller that we do not accept telemarketing calls. We have it set that the caller can leave a message, you can have it hang up also, because sometimes a known caller's number sometimes don't appear (fault of the phone companies not the answering machine) and it gives them a chance to leave a message or say please pick up. We also have it set so while it is ringing it announces "Unknown Caller". Best of all, it is smart enough to know after a telemarketer calls and there is either silence or the annoying beeping, to not to record a message and hang up.

You can record separate messages for normal callers for line 1 and 2. It also has a feature for 10 known phone numbers so that you can announce to us while the phone is ringing who the caller is and the option to have a special message play to that caller if you are not home. A wonderful feature during dinner and other times when you don't want to answer the phone or even look for the caller-id!

There are many other features that I don't have room to describe. We have also tried Telezappers and they do not work.

We have our privacy back and now know who is calling without having to even look at the caller-id. This product is wonderful! I am tickled on how happy this product makes us.

This is a good phone, except it has one major flaw which makes it unusable. First off, a minor flaw is that it is hard to pick up the reciever as it is locked in there, I don't like that. Another flaw is that while you are picking up and putting back the phone, it makes a VERY high and LOUD screaming pitch. This makes it almost deafening for someone on another phone in the house. This phone will be going back ASAP because it is unusable. Stay away from this phone at all costs.

I bought this phone for my elderly father last October. The caller ID screen is larger than alot of cordless phone CIDs and you can adjust the contrast by pushing the "options" button, and choosing between 1-4 in "contrast." 4 is the darkest contrast so that is what we set my father's phone on. The phone is very attractive, and can be either wall mounted or sit on a desk. There is a piece on the bottom of the phone you adjust for either wall or desk placement.

Now for the negatives. My father has trouble hearing and he had trouble hearing on this phone at times. After I bought him this phone, I told him I had 30 days to return it, so please check it out to see if he could hear with it. Well, he used it, but I never heard a negative word about it until it was too late to return it. He is now using an old phone of mine that has volume you can turn up very loud and he's happy.

Personally, I think this is a very good phone. The only negative I noticed is a light background buzzing noise when you make a call on it. If you need a corded phone with a nice size caller ID screen with big letters and numbers, this is a good phone. It would make a good back-up for someone who prefers cordless phones, but needs a corded phone for those times when electricity is off.

Hands down this is the best corded caller-id/call waiting id phone on the market. For the extra few dollars it beats all the other brands in performance and features. I picked mine up after returning 3 Southwest Bell Freedom Phones that were not what I expected. BJ's wholesale Club has the phone for $12.99 plus tax (if applicable). Like I said, $3.00 more than the SW phone and 100% better.

when chatting on the phone, my cheek pushed the button on the handset accidentally hanging up on the person.

I searched for "speakerphone" and found this phone. But it's not a speakerphone. I returned it, so I can't comment on whether this is a good phone if you're not looking for a speakerphone.

It was very comterble to talk into. I LOVE IT!!!!!!

All the useful features of the Casio Phonemate TA-119 Answering Machine and Speakerphone prompted me to purchase it and try it out. While most of the features would normally be useful they are very difficult to use.

Programming the machine with multiple greetings using the greeting file was a difficult task thanks to the poorly worded and often confusing instructions. Switching from one greeting to another is even much more difficult. Switching the greetings evolves several steps and its actually easier to just record a new one each time the greeting needs to be changed. Furthermore, the greetings sound quality is very poor.

One could find many of the same features as in this machine without the useless greetings file for much less. I wouldn't recommend this answering machine for this reason.

I bought this economical model to replace an old PhoneMate model I got in 1988 and which went on the blink in 1993 due to the capstan drive for the message cassette having failed on me. Having this previous experience with PhoneMate and their likeable features induced me to seek a suitable replacement from the same company. This specific model appealed to me greatly and buying it from Amazon with their great prices and shipping made it a little more appealing to me. First, there's no audio tapes to worry about, so there's no degradation of your greeting(s) over a period of time as with constant use of audio cassettes, nor is there the operational problem of moving parts, as became the case with the old PhoneMate. Second, having the feasability to make your own 10 greeting messages is a nice feature although I opted to use the default PhoneMate machine greeting message, "Please Record Message", << beep >>. Still, it's nice to have a choice for when conditions dictate it. And the third feature that I found very nice to have is the storage area that you can transfer the message(s) to so you can "clear the que" in a manner of speaking. So is having that speakerphone option.

On the down side, the short amount of recording time pales when you compare it to the 30 minutes on the old PhoneMate cassettes. Consumers will have to be patient waiting for the industry to develop longer recording capabilities in this digital techonology. I found the speaker qualities to be close to the old PhoneMates in terms of understanding what the machine was saying, so it was no significant improvements there.

Overall, I'm glad I bought it. It's faster to operate compared to the old cassette versions from PhoneMate and there's no wear and tear. Ideally, it should last me a lot longer than the first PhoneMate I had. I'd recommend it to anyone who's familiar with the old answering machines, who's looking for a fine economical model and who can put up with a short amount of recording time.

I have bought this answering machine for more than 6 months and I love it!!! The sound quality is good. Good price. Lots of useful features. It's so easy to use with big buttons and thier meaningful descriptions. I've read reviews and product descriptions. Its qualities and features reach all my expectation. Good choice.

I bought 2 of these along with the Cobra FRS radios so that my wife and I could drive our own cars across country and still communicate. The radios worked fine, but the headsets were an absolute waste of money. First off, the batterys wouldn't seat properly, so sometimes they worked, but sometimes they didn't. Then there was the trouble with getting the vox and volume settings set properly that others have complained about. Plus, the mikes won't stay where you put them. So we threw them in the back seats, and used our radios as handhelds all the way from San Diego to North Carolina.

This is a nice product. It has many good features and given it were a little better put together it would be a perfect product.

The problems I found with the product are as follows:

1) The VOX is useful but doesn't always work as one would hope. It has a tendency to pick up every little sound and if you turn down the sensitivity then the VOX won't pick up every word so you have choppy transmissions. Examples Too High : "(air from walking, breathing) Hey this is so-and-so and I am back at camp. (more air from walking, breathing) BLEEP(end of transmission signal) (more breathing and air)" Too Low : "This BLEEP so-and-so BLEEP camp BLEEP" It might be possible to find a perfect setting, but I sure haven't found it yet and I have been playing around with them.

2) The PTT button is kind of sensitive. When I use the PTT (which is always since VOX would pick up any and every paintball shot) the button is very similar to the buttons on my FRS-100 because they have to be pushed hard and right in the center. Press any bit off of the center of the button and you will get choppy transmission similar to the ones in the VOX example.

Don't get me wrong, they are kinda nice and if you are willing to put up with the PTT button and the VOX, they are wonderful.

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I used it when i was hunting for ducks in NY, it worked great. The sound was good and i could walk without it moving. It is a hassle to have to pick up the radio so this is a great product for people like me( lazy).

The sound quality of the Earhugger headset is fine; I hear things fine through it, and whoever I'm talking to can (usually) hear me clearly. But it feels really "flimsy" when I'm wearing it; as if it's going to fall off much of the time. And because it doesn't go on that securely (despite my having an average-sized ear), I have to wrestle a lot with the boom microphone to get it in a good position, each time I put it on.

Once you get it on and position it properly, and if you don't move around much (you can't recline or lay on your back, for example, without it feeling like it'll fall off), it's comfortable and the sound is good. But it's a little too much work to get there . . . I've found far better headsets since buying this one.

It was really a nice one.I suugest everyone to buy this headphones because of the following reasons,Its 2 cheap to afford, Its 2 light to carry,its 2 fancy to wear. bye ur stuff on amazon. Mirza Ahmed WI USA

In searching for a headset to overcome my bad soundcard for voice recognition, this is the only one that worked. And it is the most comfortable one I've used too!

Have the base with 4 extra handsets. Great range - maintains coverage even where a previous 2.4Ghz set failed. Handsets are small but with great keypads and simple operation. Speakerphone works well and handset will stand unsupported on desk when using speakerphone - improving clarity. Only complaint is the LCD screen can be hard to read in certain lighting conditions. Smaller antenna on handset than the newer extended range handsets make them a better fit in the room.

Great add-on to the 1000N and 1050N bases. As small as a larger cell phone, belt clip is great to keep the phone on your hip while you use the headset. Range is great -- in the city/suburbs I can go a block or two away from my place and it still works fine. Only complaint is that you can not edit any names stored in memory (just the numbers!) so you have to delete the entry and then re-enter it.

ALSO -- the reason I went with this phone is because it does NOT interfere with 802.11b as some of the others, especially Panasonics, do (the Gigarange Extreme interferes).

Even though the Panasonic KX-TG1050N base phone has been around for years, we're getting an additional handset rather than ditch the base phone.

A previous reviewer said it's only 10 bucks. The price seems to have doubled and the quality halved. I can hear other callers crystal clear. The problem is this: they keep saying, "What? What? I can't hear you. Hello?" Microphone adjustment doesn't make a considerable improvement. This headset is for those who like to listen. If you'd like to join the conversation, your words will fall on deaf ears!

I bought this thinking it will really save my time. But, it proved not of much use to me because the microphone seems to be not that good. The person on the other side can't hear me properly, it's feeble & I have to switch back to hand-full mode instead of hands-free.

Exceptionally durable, ergonomic, good price. Good sound quality, but softer sound . It works very well with cordless phones and some cell phones (such as Motorola, which accept 2.5mm plug).

I have had this phone for a year and have had problems with Keys sticking and not switching from speaker to the hand set. I have had calls dropped when selecting the speaker phone and then hanging up the phone on the cradle. I bought this phone because ATT has been always reliable. It is just like the rest. Why can't someone make a decent home office phone? We can put men on the Moon.

This is s great phone. It is perfect for your home office so you can answer either line while on the computer.The speakerphone option could be clearer but for the price it is good.

We have had this phone for a number of years, & it's still working great. Only problem: I have lost the manual & am having a problem obtaining a new manual. I need it to reprogram the memory phone numbers. Anyone know where I can get one??

for a home based business w/a cordless phone-- cant use it.Has very good clarity @ close range.

So far, the Bell Sonecor performs OK. It came with the spring
detached from the Cassette door, which keeps the door from being held firmly shut. Better 'quality control' would have prevented this.

It is difficult to remount the spring because of possible damage to the unit in the process and components are mostly plastic.
I am using it as is.

Returning it for exchange is not worth the expense involved.

The device NEEDS a dedicated AC adapter.
I am a salesperson and as such I coordinate meetings with various customer/prospect personnel and technical personnel at my company. I usually set up these conference calls and normally keep the notes of the calls. There are many questions and action items that need to be followed up on as a result of these meetings. This recorder allows me to fully participate in the call without worrying about keeping notes and when the call is over, I can go back and retrieve the entire contents of the call. I can then create notes of the call and send to all parties involved to verify that everyone is in agreement as to the action items from the call and who made what committments.
I have 1 or 2 conference calls a day and this device allows me to make those calls as well as my normal call load and have a life.
The sound quality is very good.
It also has the ability to play the recording back into the handset if you want to allow a third party to hear the call.