From: utzoo!decvax!duke!mcnc!ncsu!uvacs!dwm
Newsgroups: net.misc
Title: 
Article-I.D.: uvacs.433
Posted: Sat Feb 19 22:27:24 1983
Received: Thu Feb 24 03:13:59 1983


Re: phones

I have had a Uniden Extend-a-phone for about nine months, with
mixed emotions.  As a cordless phone, it works well within about
a 50 foot range (*not* 700 feet as claimed by the ads).  Although
it has a mush-button keypad, it uses those ubiquitous pulses for
dialing.  Very slow.  The ringer produces a warbling tone when
someone is calling you;  it also warbles in thunderstorms or
occasionally when the handset is out of the charging cradle for
no apparent reason.  The legitimate ringing doesn't bother me
anymore though.  A thunderstorm last summer seems to have fried
the opto-isolator which is used to detect the ring voltage on
the phone line.  My other two phones (old-fashioned Ma Bell types)
survived intact.  This susceptibility to lightning and line
noise would probably exist on any phone which uses speaker-tone
for the bell, since a (fragile) opto-isolator is employed.
Now the good part:  I love moving from room to room without
that nasty cord following me!  It's worth it (but keep another
phone handy just in case).

Dave Methvin