The timing is good, though, since for the new house, we're going to need several phones, and ideally with the function that they can call each other, so we can use them as an intercom through the various levels. If I'm working in the basement, it'd be nice to call Kevin in our bedroom and tell him he needs to wake up.
So any suggestions for cordless home phones you like?
Just got this one.
http://www.amazon.com/Panasonic-KX-TG6545B-Expandable-Cordless-Answering/dp/B0036D5XFA/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1291237710&sr=8-6
I got a Panasonic several years ago, not the same one that Huzefa linked to but fairly similar-looking, and I’ve been pretty disappointed with it—it’s not bad, it just tends to be fuzzier and generally lower-quality than a cell phone.
But that could be just the generation I have, or it could be just the way that all cordless phones are; dunno.
I also am not terribly fond of the clunky interface for viewing missed calls and such, but it doesn’t bother me much because I basically don’t use my land line at all any more.
I do like the fact that I can turn off the audible ringer on the remote but leave the blinky ringer light enabled, so if I’m awake and in my room I’ll see the light but if I’m asleep the sound won’t wake me up.
One other thing is that I like having one non-cordless extension in the house, because if the electricity goes out, I gather the cordless phones are useless but the corded one gets power from the phone line itself. But this is probably only relevant in a disaster-type situation.
I agree with Jed that it is prudent to keep one non-cordless phone in the house. If power really goes out in a broad area, you may get no cell phone coverage and you certainly won’t have a landline. If you don’t have a cheap normal phone lurking around (to be used only in emergencies) you can’t call the power company to find out your power won’t be restored for a week 🙂
The best cordless phone I have ever owned was a Siemens Gigaset (http://gigaset.com/hq/en/cms/PageCordlessPhones.html), which I used for over 5 years, which is almost unheard of for a cordless (all my previous phones batteries died within 2 years, and it’s cheaper to buy new phones rather than replace the batteries).
The only reason we stopped using the Siemen’s phones is because, we needed a multi-line phone because of a home business. Also we needed more handsets which were no longer to be found since they stopped selling them in Canada.
So we bought the Philips SE6590B (http://philips.onlinephonestore.com/cat/11522/Multi-Line-Phones.html), which for the last year and a half has been working great!
Both phones have intercom buttons.
If you don’t need multi-line than my number one choice would be the Siemens, which now is apparently called just Gigaset, but the additional handsets are expensive
Philips on the other hand are not as expensive and if you luck out like we did we found a set with 5 handsets included, for a wonderful price. Also it has a nifty color screen, where you can put your own pictures, a different one for each handset, but that just for fun…lol.
Hope the above helped!
Maybe its the area we live in, but I have yet to see a power outage knockout my cell phone service. I do however see the utility of a single corded phone. You could always buy a really cheap one for that. The new DECT phones have pretty good clarity.
We have used the same line of phones for about 9 years. Love them. I have a set I can give you to try out. This could be a good reason to meet up.