Buy 2 Line Cordless Phone

Review by Beula:

This phone is a decent choice for a 2-line cordless phone. The corded base station is a nice plus and sound quality is excellent. Range is pretty good too.

However, for me, the negatives of this phone were a deal-beaker. The phonebook has no speed dial numbers and it takes multiple keystrokes to get into the menu to look up numbers to dial. Likewise, accessing the caller ID log takes multiple keystrokes to see the log. Both should be single key access from the idle mode.

The voicemail indicator is via text on the screen, not the light on the top of the phone so I often missed seeing waiting messages. It also seemed the VM detect was flakey as I often had messages and the phone did not display them.

The ringer sounds and volumes are poor. I use this in a office environment and the softest ringer is quite loud and there is only one normal electronic ring sound (bad design for a 2-line phone!)

Finally the biggest problem of all – the cordless handsets will randomly go “dead”. After speaking about this with Panasonic they told me there may be a problem with iPhones interfering with the handsets and making them go dead. They said there were other reports on the internet of this being a problem but had not concluded their study. Since I’m an iPhone user, I guess I won’t be a Panasonic phone user.

Review by wibble:

I own the KX-TG6502 2-line and 5.8GHz handsets. I first replaced them with the Philips dect 2-line SE6591B/17, which although a beautiful looker, was a tough sell for my workgroup because of the menus and feature set. I returned it to Amazon and bought the DECT version of the Panasonic to increase range and decrease AM bleed from a local broadcast tower.

In response to a previous poster who said the range on this Panasonic is not as good as its 5.8G counterpart, I found that the KX-TG3932T range was improved for the first week of ownership. I thought we’d solved range issues by upgrading, and although calls sounded fine at my end, the other party heard intermittent stuttered and garbled speech. Within a few days of ownership both handsets started to display erratic behavior. Callers said we sounded underwater with or without speakerphone. It wasn’t subject to the same interference from a nearby AM transmitter as the 5.8GHz version, but something was interfering with it…I don’t own an iPhone but we use two UMA Blackberrys that may have been the culprits. It seemed to come and go with atmospherics or other unknown variables. With this model I sat at my desk next to the base and several callers said they couldn’t understand me…that’s when I said send this one back, the Philips was a much better sound.

In Philips vs. Panasonic 2-Line DECT the differences are: adding a contact to the Philips syncs both handsets, whereas the Panasonic takes more steps. The Philips range is hands down better and more crystal clear. Both are very similar, yet I like the feel of the panasonic better. the volume on the 5.8 Panasonic and the Philips DECT were both better than this model, plus this should have the sync-to-address-book usb cable function that other panasonic models have offered.

Physically I like the decreased weight of the handset, the great sound, and the superior ergonomics, but your mileage may vary. Once I passed 30-40 feet and a couple walls it was worse than the 5.8 version. Though it lacks some advanced features like talking caller ID, color display, or custom rings, it is a good replacement for 5.8GHz technology…just not for our setup. I hope the next version is better.

Review by M. Cohen:

I upgraded this phone system from an earlier Panasonic 2.4 Ghz multi-line, multi-handset phone. I was getting lots of static from my Wi-Fi setup and all I read said that DECT would fix that. I replaced my system with this one and sure enough, the reception problems were gone!

Of course, I then learned that many other functions that were in the old phone were now gone.

*Ability to have two lines to have two different ring lengths for each line (2 vs 4) – GONE (Now both lines have to have the same # of rings – we used to have one 2/4 Tollsaver and the other 8 rings)

*Ability for one-click access to address book? – GONE

*Ability for one-click access to caller ID list – GONE

*Ability to have a headset plugged in and switch back & forth to speakerphone- GONE

*Blinking text to show you have an unread message – GONE* (*It does say ‘new message’, but doesn’t blink. Since it usually ends up saying ‘missed call’ unless you clear out the Caller ID every day, its hard to tell the difference between ‘new message’ and ‘missed call’ at a distance, unlike the blinking that it used to have)

What have we gained, besides the better reception?

*Bluetooth that only works with base, not any handsets, and must be re-paired every time you turn on the bluetooth headset – FAIL

*Call screening on all handsets – all handsets now use speakerphone when caller leaves a message. I do like this.

That’s all I can think of. I’m not disappointed enough to send it back, but I wish they hadn’t removed so many features and just upgraded the network band only.

Review by DXNJ:

I received the phone today so below are only my initial thoughts. I ordered the phone on Monday and received it Tuesday. Talk about fast shipping via Amazon directly (not a third party seller)!

Looks: The phone looks great. No antennas sticking out on the base nor phone. Very light-weight and the phone comes with a belt clip (one for each hand set) that is actually easy to attach.

Ringer: Personally I find the ringer options lacking. There is no standard phone ring. Yes, they’re roughly 8 to choose from, but none are your “good old” standard sounding ringer.

Headphone Jack: There is a place so you can use a corded head phone. However, the plastic which covers the input is going to be a potential problem as it doesn’t move completely out of the way unless you force it. You can also use BLUETOOTH! I have yet sync my bluetooth headset but hopefully it works great.

Caller ID: I’m not sure why they changed the set up from the other panasonic phones I’ve owned. You can not simply see the caller ID by pushing down on the directional arrow keypad. You now have to select menu then view caller ID. I HATE the way they changed this. It may only be a simple push of a button, but it is much more convenient to access your caller ID without having to press a menu button.

Voice mail: The phone advertises that you can check your “phone company” voice mail from the phone. Well yes you can, but you still have to dial your access number so I’m not sure how this is any different than any other phone. I was under the impression the phone would show how many voice mails you have and give you a way to access them easily. I think it simply shows you have voicemails messages. Yet, most phone companies alert you via a tone or 3 short dial tone sounds so not sure what the point is here. I initially thought I could simply press a button and access my voice mail and I could see how many messages I have. So far I don’t think that is the case. That was actually something I was looking forward to.

Unless I’m missing something, then this feature shouldn’t be mentioned because it isn’t a feature! Someone correct me if I’m wrong T

Answering Machine: I have to test this out some more but the one message I did hear seemed a little low. I listened rather quickly and promptly deleted the message because I was in the middle of doing something else. Thus, I didn’t get a good feel on how well the message played back.

Head Set Volume: So far it seems plenty loud. I’ve only had few conversations since the phone still needed to be charged.

Charging: Let the phone charge for 7 hours. This is the suggested time.

Night Feature: I love the fact you can program the phone so it doesn’t ring at night. For instance, you can program it so at 10pm you don’t hear the ringer and so at 6am it starts ringing again. The only downside is you can’t set different times for different days of the week (i.e the work week you may want the ringer to not ring earlier in the night, opposed to the weekends when you may be up later. Same applies for the morning, you may wake up earlier during the week and later on the weekend). That really should have been an option.

I will post and or edit as I am able to use the phone more tomorrow!

I hope others chime in as well.

Review by TVSteve:

Bought this phone from a local “big box” office supply store after considerable research, etc. to replace a dying Uniden 2.8GHz model. Features, range, sound quality, and so forth are OK. Even the curiously slow dial tone sequencing is tolerable; HOWEVER, cordless “talk time” is ridiculously short (

Review by Beula:

This phone is a decent choice for a 2-line cordless phone. The corded base station is a nice plus and sound quality is excellent. Range is pretty good too.

However, for me, the negatives of this phone were a deal-beaker. The phonebook has no speed dial numbers and it takes multiple keystrokes to get into the menu to look up numbers to dial. Likewise, accessing the caller ID log takes multiple keystrokes to see the log. Both should be single key access from the idle mode.

The voicemail indicator is via text on the screen, not the light on the top of the phone so I often missed seeing waiting messages. It also seemed the VM detect was flakey as I often had messages and the phone did not display them.

The ringer sounds and volumes are poor. I use this in a office environment and the softest ringer is quite loud and there is only one normal electronic ring sound (bad design for a 2-line phone!)

Finally the biggest problem of all – the cordless handsets will randomly go “dead”. After speaking about this with Panasonic they told me there may be a problem with iPhones or other GSM cellphones interfering with the handsets and making them go dead. They said there were other reports on the internet of this being a problem but had not concluded their study. Since I’m an iPhone user, I guess I won’t be a Panasonic phone user.

Here’s a video clip so you can see for yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZU2Q516VFY

Review by The Engineer:

I am running a business with 2 phone lines for many years now and phones have always been a problem for me. I found that all cordless phones degrade or stop working after a couple of years, so I went through several different brands and models which I can repport here for you. My comment on the VTech is the last paragraph.

Starting 1999 I had a 2.4 GHz Siemes Gigaset and that was the best phone I had, it was stylish, very well organized and functioning. Unfortunately, wireless computer networking exploded shortly after and swamped this frequency band that no cordless phone at 2.4 GHz worked well any longer. Features included phone book copy amongst the different hand sets.

I had two sets of different Panasonic 5.8 GHz phones, and all were really bad. Voice quality was horrible and something stopped working in a short time. One is tempted to buy Panasonic because they have the largest selection of models. But don’t be fooled by that! I could not buy Siemens because they retracted from the 2-line analog phone market, they only offer VoIP stuff, but I am not ready for that yet.

I had a Motorola 5.8 GHz for a couple of days and let me tell you, this was the worst phone I ever had, it was even much worse than all Panasonics. There would be not enough space on the Amazon server to write down all the details

Then I had a 5.8 GHz AT&T phone and I really liked voice quality and workmanship. But all hand sets had different numbers in their phone book because you cannot transfer the phone book between them; I just could not keep up with this. Also, the functionality was not very intuitive.

Finally I got his VTech phone, and I must say that I am impressed. I wanted to have a DECT 6.0 phone because I believe this is the best frequency band for cordless phones. This phone looks great, has excellent voice quality, has an intuitive menu setup, and it has a very competative price. And what I like most which no other phone ever had: You program a number into your phone book and it is available instantaneouly in all hand sets. Only thing, they should have memory for more than 50 numbers. I have this phone and 4 hand sets since Dec 2009, and the only thing I hope is that it will be reliable. As soon as I have an issue I will update this review, so if you don’t see an update, that is more points for this phone.

Review by M. Esterle:

Easy to set up and synchronize to the base station. Shares the number directory across all handsets. Speakerphone is loud and clear. Solid phone and price is great!

Review by Sharran Greenberg:

I purchase this product after having read the reviews on same. I needed a two line cordless phone that was expandable. The ONLY thing I like about this phone is its size. The quality of the reception leaves much to be desired and it often produces very loud and annoying sounds of unknown origin while in use. I also find it very complicated to save callers’ names and phone numbers. My prior system saved the names and numbers with the press of a button and allowed call back the same way. This does not save the “1″ necessary to call back.

Review by Lowell Prescott:

This is a very high quality telephone system at a fantastic price. Admittedly, some will wish that this phone had other features, but I bought it because it matched my needs exactly:

1. Handles two lines.

2. Expandable without needing a phone jack connection for each handset.

3. No answering machine capabilities (we have, and prefer, voice mail).

4. Able to mute all ringers (handsets and base) for a sleeping baby.

Beyond this, we just needed acceptable range and sound quality — nothing extravagant.

I’m happy to report that these phones have excellent range, exceptional sound quality, and are a snap to set up. The expansion phones set themselves up by simply placing them in the base for a few seconds. It couldn’t be easier. The menu system (on each handset and the base) is very intuitive (similar to cell phones), and offers many functions we will never use — but they never get in the way of the simple things.

Plus, the price was right. This has turned out to be a very successful purchase.

Review by David Rothschild:

System Design

I’ve never owned a Uniden multi-phone system before. I started with the old Siemens stuff (utter garbage) in the 1990′s and really liked the panasonic multi line systems that I’ve used in a few locations since they released them. Enormous frustration with the user interfaces on the Panasonic Hybrid PBX system in my office lead me to flee from Panasonic to try another vendor with this system.

The low cost of the phones and the ease of registering new handsets are terrific. My favorite feature is the programmable banner on each phone. Once the banner is programmed in, you can use the intercom feature on any other handset to call another location by NAME, not handset number! Really brilliant! A great design, if only these things had the range or a way to switch like a cell system to another base location.

Reception and Range

I should have trusted my instinct when reading about the 5.8 GHZ systems. If you read carefully, you will note that they do not make a comparison to 2.4 GHZ systems EXCEPT to note that the 5.8 GHZ systems won’t interfere with most 802.11x networks. Unforutnately, when I replaced my 5 year old panasonic 2 line system with this, I noticed a significatn decrease in transmission range especially through the old stone barn walls of our house. I suspect the higher frequency just can’t penetrate the old thick walls like the 2.4 ghz systems can.

Even though this system is supposedly spread spectrum and frequency hopping, if i have a bad connection and move around the house, the connection stays bad, even if i move right next to the phone.

I would love to find a consumer version of the panasonic cordless system that offers multiple “cell” locations on an internal phone systems. The engenius systems still seem like they aren’t ready for prime time.

If you buy this system, be prepared for a decrease in range versus 2.4 ghz systems.

If I could find an alternative that’s as well designed, I’d repalce this system quickly.