Recommendation for cordless home phone?

[radhak]

We finally switched to VOIP (2nd attempt) : this time I chose T-Mobile's @Home service - purely for the cost ($10 + tax = $13.45 net per month). After a few hiccups it seems to function without dropping now.

Now I need to change my instrument(s). We have a very old set of Uniden; now I want something that has
(a) decently longer battery life. The current one runs out of juice after 25 minutes of talk and I am left hanging if on a work conference (last 1 hour at the least).
(b) More handsets for all the rooms
(c) a decent headset; can't handle the single-ear-piece ones. Want something over my head; again, for my work calls.
(d) And the other stuff : clarity; speakerphones on handsets

So what do you say? I like this Panasonic TG7434B, but would be happier if I could find one at BJs / Costco etc.

[ironhat]

I don't have much to offer except to cross Uniden off your list. It just occured to me that being in a home office you just might like them for the very reason which I was about to caution you. You can't get on the other remote and hear or speak. We communicate with a daughter who is further away and if we answer on the Uniden one of us has to use the ground line phone.

[Hoover]

I don't have much to offer except to cross Uniden off your list. It just occured to me that being in a home office you just might like them for the very reason which I was about to caution you. You can't get on the other remote and hear or speak. We communicate with a daughter who is further away and if we answer on the Uniden one of us has to use the ground line phone.

Thanks for your post, I thought it was just our phone that did that. In the market for a new phone, definitely crossing Uniden off the list. Thanks again ironhat.

[thrytis]

I've gone through many cordless phones, and in my experience the only way to have one that holds a charge for several hours of phone calls is to plan on replacing batteries once a year. I have a GE 2.4 set that has held up pretty well for a couple of years. No dead buttons and no issues with the headset jack, which i can't say for the Uniden and VTechs i've used before. For headsets, i've had the best luck with Plantronics. I still expect to replace them at least once a year though with my heavy use (typically several hours of use a day).

[RAV2]

I went with panasonic after many years of Unidens.

Very happy.

I got a great deal at Target online on a 4 phone and answering system - like $99.

I did not need the 4th phone so I am keeping it as a backup.

Chose the Panasonic for the use of rechargeable AA batteries. No proprietary batteries and can upgrade the one's in the phone as needed when I want.

No need to now after almost a year and a half. No limit on talk time, range is excellent, paging function is more useful than I thought and we use it all of the time.

[twistsol]

I have the Uniden TRU9466, and you can definitely have more than one phone active on the same line at a time. Ours are a two line set and we have six handsets around the house. I believe the maximum was 12 but don't quote me on that. Some nice features are 99 number caller ID recall, all the handsets sync the time to the base unit and the display is easy to read.

It has a standard jack for a corded headset and I use a cheap over the head model and the phone itself is on a belt clip. I've frequently do 3 hour plus conference calls with no sign of fading (from the phone anyway).

We have two incoming lines to our house and you can hear the conversation on the other line faintly, but I think that may be more with our service provider than the phone. It hasn't been enough of an annoyance to test the real cause of the issue. The party outside the house can't hear the cross talk. The only real annoyance is that the command buttons on the hand set switch order depending on whether you are on line 1 or line 2. This is huge for conference calls because depending on which line you're using, mute might be on the left or the right.

[jon_ramp]

We have a 4 hand set Radio Shack Uniden clone. We can have multiple handsets active on the same call. The problem we have is interference when the microwave is running. The Uniden set we had prior to this one did not have that problem, nor did any of the other cordless sets we have had over the years.

[radhak]

I checked, and we actually have a Vtech ! We only have a 2 handsets and for now it's a sprint if we want to get it before the machine does!

I am happy/surprised that the AA rechargeables on the panasonic give good service. I always had the idea that proprietary battery, while expensive, are better in holding charge and longevity.

Do I need to worry about DECT (or non-), or which frequency? I read in an Amazon review that 1900Ghz is the way to go because it is not used widely.

[os1kne]

I went with panasonic after many years of Unidens.

Very happy.

I got a great deal at Target online on a 4 phone and answering system - like $99.

I did not need the 4th phone so I am keeping it as a backup.

Chose the Panasonic for the use of rechargeable AA batteries. No proprietary batteries and can upgrade the one's in the phone as needed when I want.

No need to now after almost a year and a half. No limit on talk time, range is excellent, paging function is more useful than I thought and we use it all of the time.

+1 ditto for me. (except that I got a 3 phone setup).

[chabin76]

+1 ditto for me. (except that I got a 3 phone setup).

another ditto here. I got my set at Costco about 3 months ago with a manufactures rebate. It replaced another Panasonic set that we had had for more than 7 years. It worked really well still but the buttons on one of the handsets started getting a bit messed up after have a couple of our kids play with it. It held up better that I thought that it would.

[parnelli]

I don't own them, but I saw the staples ad had a 4 phone panasonic cordless for something like 80 dollars.


ps- I also thought I read that TMobile was discontinuing @home?

[Knottscott]

We've had several...Panasonic, Sony, Uniden, GE. The V-Tech phone with multiple handsets is our favorite so far....good battery life, good sound, good range, reasonably priced (~ 45 for 3). We no longer have to take each phone back to it's original cradle either, so it doesn't matter if the "upstairs phone ends up downstairs, or the basement phone ends up upstairs,etc. Each handset fits each cradle. Nice system.

[dreichel]

We had some work done today at our office by an independent phone technician. We asked him about a cordless phone to go with our NEC system that he installed previously. He said it wouldn't be a problem (the base becomes a new extension and you can "park" a call to that extension when you want to use the cordless handset), and he recommended the Vtech brand.

[LCHIEN]

...I am happy/surprised that the AA rechargeables on the panasonic give good service. I always had the idea that proprietary battery, while expensive, are better in holding charge and longevity.

....

They buy the same batteres as you get at the store. They just buy them in bulk volume with w/o label and solder tabs welded on, assemble it, then heat shrink them into a package with a weird little 5 cent oddball connector you can't get. THen charge $10 or $15 for $6 worth of batteries because you can't get them to fit anywhere else.

[Woody]

Panasonic

Our Panasonic phone system with 4 cordless handsets and a answering machine we bought 3+ years ago - rocks. No problems.