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Southwestern Bell FM2575 Corded Speakerphone with Answering System and Caller ID (White)

Southwestern Bell FM2575 Corded Speakerphone with Answering System and Caller ID (White)

List Price: $34.99
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Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: A serious flaw
Review: The Southwestern Bell Phone Model FM2575 is of good value and works as decribed but has a serious flaw that will reduce it's value to many people. As stated in the owner's manual, to retrieve the answering system calls remotley one needs to hold each digit on the remote phone 2 seconds to enter the security code. This is no problem for land phones, but for cell phones the tones emitted are not of that duration regardless of how long the button is held in. Another answering system would be a better choice if one would be using a cell phone to retrieve messages.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Great features, easy to use
Review: This is the best phone I have ever owned, hands-down, based on my lifestyle. My job requires me to work on-call, which means there are many times I work nights and sleep during the day. The features on this phone are perfect for someone with an unpredictable schedule who works on call.

On top of the phone, there is a switch to turn the ringer loud/soft/on/off - EXCELLENT FEATURE being able to turn the ringer COMPLETELY off (many other phones merely allow you to turn it LOW which is still audible and an annoyance). On the side of the phone is a sliding volume switch for the answering machine - another great feature when you do not want to hear messages or are sleeping. There is a switch on top that can be adjusted to 2 or 4 rings or can be set up for the fax to pick up (if you have a fax). Recording a greeting is easy and retrieving messages is easy. Deleting messages is a breeze. Don't feel like listening to the message, no need to listen to the whole thing, just hit "DELETE." Don't want to listen to the computer voice, hit "STOP," a couple of times. Finally, the phone is CORDED! (It comes with a 4 foot cord, but I bought a 20 foot extension cord for the phone.) If you live with someone who never puts the cordless phone back in the charger, this phone is a "must-have!" Also, if the power goes out, cordless phones usually do not work.

THIS MAY NOT BE THE PHONE FOR EVERYONE! If you want a phone that allows you to remotely access messages, this is not the phone for you. For whatever the reason, if you require a phone with the capacity for someone to leave you a longwinded message in excess of one minute, this is not the phone for you. Messages are not always crystal-clear, but they are audible. If you write for a gossip column or run numbers, buy another phone. If you're just a guy who wants peace and quiet and a reliable phone, this is your phone. Don't forget to put in the 9-volt battery - the phone still works in a power outage, but you may lose your messages and greeting if you don't put in the back-up battery.

What do you expect for a phone under $40? The only other phones with ALL the features this phone has - (1) corded, (2) on/off ringer switch, (3) caller ID, (4) built-in answering machine, (5) sliding switch to turn down the answering machine - are usually at least double the price (over $90) of this phone and/or require you to program the features. I like the simplicity of this phone and the fact that I do not have to open the user's manual every time I use it.


Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Stay away from this product
Review: This phone comes with good features, but it performs very poorly. Answering machine messages are virtually unintelligible, and it is very difficult to hear and understand people through the handset. I wish I never bought this phone. If you think the price is too good to be true, you're right.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Avoid this phone
Review: This phone comes with good features, but it performs very poorly. Answering machine messages are virtually unintelligible, and it is very difficult to hear and understand people through the handset. I wish I never bought this phone. If you think the price is too good to be true, you're right.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Great phone for the price!
Review: This phone has so many features for the money! An answering machine, caller ID, speakerphone, large lighted keypad, makes it easy to understand and use right out of the box.I also like that it comes in white, which fits well in my kitchen. The buttons are large and light up, a plus for dark corners or older users. The speakerphone works well, allowing hands-free use in the kitchen or anywhere else. I think Southwestern Bell has always made quality products, and this is yet another one. I'm please to have spent so little and gotten so much!

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: You get what you pay for
Review: This phone is garbage. I bought it because it had speakerphone and answering machine for $30. But, I had to return it because:
1) Reception was terrible
2) Speakerphone does not really work well. When the person on the other end stops talking, there is absolute silence (rather than room noise). So, the voice is so choppy that the speakerphone feature is absolutely useless.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Perfect for when you need to talk on the phone
Review: this phone is.. fine. The big complaint is the digital answering part. My voice sounds like a crazy robot on playback, and when people leave messages they are all kind of shrill sounding (or maybe that's just my friends). The volume for the answering playback on my phone seems to be a bit touchy as well. It seems to go from quiet to loud with nothing in between. we don't use the caller id features, so I can't really comment about that.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Stay away from this product
Review: Very bad product as others have said. We've had this phone for over a year and it's been nothing but problems. Poor phone quality, frustrating anwsering machine, not able to use remote access feature. Now it has a really loud background hum. Final straw. We will replace shortly.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Inexpensive, feature-rich phone
Review: When I first saw that this $35 telephone had Caller ID and digital answering, AND was getting some pretty decent reviews from other Amazon customers, I thought I couldn't go wrong in buying it. And I was right -- sort of.

The phone is a sturdy, attractive and compact model that has an ergonomically designed handset that feels very comfortable in the hand and that should help prevent fatigue during those long telephone conversations. And it certainly meets all my requirements in a telephone. It has a "desk mount" that snaps right in and that tilts the phone up so you can easily see the display while sitting at your desk. Or you can mount it on the wall.

It's auto-redial feature will dial seven numbers in one second flat, which is a very useful feature if you're trying to get through to, say, a busy technical support line at Dell or Gateway. That's not the fastest re-dialer in the world, but it is quite acceptable for me. The caller ID window lights up when a call comes in, which is another nice feature I haven't seen in any telephone I've ever owned.

The only limitation of the digital answering system is that it can only record at most 19 messages (or 14 minutes worth, whichever is greater) before it starts scrolling them off the chip, oldest message first. That's not an issue for me, but if you regularly get more than 19 messages or so at a time before you can get around to checking them all, you'll probably want to reconsider your purchase of this telephone.

The one and only real flaw I could find in this telephone is the sound quality. It's pretty awful, in my opinion. Both speakers make a person sound as if he were speaking to you through a couple of pillows pressing down on his face. And I have good hearing! And though both speakers have adjustable volume, turning them up only makes the muffled voice at the other end of the line sound like a louder, heavily muffled voice that is no more understandable.

I find that if there is any background noise at all at my end of the line, I can barely make out what the other person is saying. Additionally, there is a noticeable amount of what sounds like line noise (humming and static) in the telephone phone that I do not notice on my other phones in the house. So it must be in the phone itself and not in the line.

Hopefully, that brilliant electronics wizard brother of mine can help me replace the speakers with speakers having better acoustic quality.

I'd happily give this phone five stars if it weren't for the speakers, and would recommend it in any event to people who are willing to give up a little acoustic quality for a fantastic deal on a nice little feature-packed phone.


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