Well, we had to give up on our trusty old Siemens Gigaset multi-line 2.4Ghz phonesystem last week. For those of you that haven‘t used one, these things are basically like a mini-PBX in a desktop unit…2 lines, 4 voice mail boxes, intercom, call transfer, etc, etc.
Siemens got a lot of things right with that system, it used standard AA batteries (recharchable), so they were easily field-replacable and upgradable, the more advanced features were easy to navigate, the cordless handsets were stylish and had a decent speakerphone, and the range was decent (my wife could take the phone to our neighbor‘s house, two houses away and still take calls).
Unfortunately, someone in our neighborhood has recently acquired a very "noisy" WLAN or other 2.4Ghz toy that the frequency-hopping-spread-spectrum system in that phone couldn't deal with. We never had problems with this system with our 2 WLANs in the house or the microwave. I even tested whether it was our network by removing power to all of our access points, and the interference was still present :(
So off I went to Office Depot to find something that was similar that used 5.8Ghz to avoid the interference issues.
Unfortunately, it seems that Siemens has settled on DECT to avoid WLAN interference, rather than offer 5.8Ghz models (in the US at least), because there is no WLAN-interference-free frequency band for DECT here in the states. My first preference would‘ve been a new 5.8Ghz Siemens system if such a thing was offered :p
Weighing the pros-and-cons, I first settled on a Motorola multi-line 5.8Ghz system that also had a wired handset on the base.
After a week of testing it, it went right back to the store. Some features were great (for example, a “shared“ phonebook that all phones had access to without sending it around by-hand to all other handsets, like the Siemens units required), and day/night ringers (great for a household w/ napping children). Unfortunately the ringers were all obnoxious, and the range was absolutely horrible. I could barely leave our back door before the handset started complaining about being out-of-range. I expected shortened range, since from experience I knew that 802.11a (which operates in the same frequency band) had issues at our house with range, compared to 802.11b. The unit also had a lot of analog “noise” in the speaker, which appeared to be due to the way the phone‘s amplifier worked (it was definitely not related to interference on the 5.8Ghz circuit).
So, based on some online recommendations, I ended up buying a Panasonic KX-TG6500 system. For the features that matter to us it's almost perfect, multi-handset, 5.8Ghz, speakerphones on the handset, and the range is fantastic, even exceeding our old 2.4Ghz phone. I still wish the unit had a "shared" phone book and day/night ringers like the Motorola, but the features the phone does have work as advertised (and in some cases even exceeding expectations!). My only real issue with the phone is the 1980's styling, but I suppose I can live with that (I was just soooo spoiled with our old Siemens gear).
