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Developer: VTech
Price: $99.95
Availability: Out now
Pros: Great phone, great instant message/instant voice tool
Cons: Spare a USB port buddy?
Overall: Decent phone, does all it says with aplomb.  If you’ve got a lot of IM’ers or just want to have IM without booting up, check out this combo.

Like a product stolen right out of Spaceship Earth at Disney’s Epcot, VTech advances the lowly house phone into something from our ancesters wouldn’t have even guessed.  Our Arnold Zafra picked up this phones release a while back and expected good things from it.  After reviewing it, he was spot on.  V-tech has done a pretty good job at merging the texting fun of your cell phone into your home phone format.

The phone itself is nice, the form factor is pretty similar to a Palm.  The qwerty keypad is nicely laid out and is quite usable.  I had no issue tapping away messages or answering the phone.  What I really enjoyed about the VTech is the ringer choices.  Not only do they stock some nice ones, like you’d expect on a cell phone, but they offer the ability to download new ones.  Really nice for those of us with short attention spans.

The phone comes with software you’ll need to install on your home PC.  Once installed and running, it drops a tray icon in and your phone can now IM at will.  Connecting through the phone was as easy as hitting the Messenger button.  It can connect with MSN Messenger, Windows Live and AOL.  You can have multiple text conversations going at once, which is handy.  It also has voice chat for VOIP applications.  I didn’t get to try that.

One minor annoyance was the need for the unit to plug into an open USB slot and the phone line.  For many of us, these two things are not far apart but it would have been so nice to have this hook into WiFi.  Just saying, I am running out of USB slots and I seem to be too lazy to get a hub.  To it’s credit, the cordless phone didn’t interfere with any of the crazy things of got going on; its interference-free DECT 6.0.

In fairness, the phone and recharger can be almost anywhere in your house; it doesn’t need to be by the home base.

All in all, a great phone that can be much more, especially for your teens who hog up your computer time.  Now you can let them IM without monopolizing your computer.  Sweet.

Company site: [VTech]

In this day and age of high powered mobile phones and web based communication applications, we couldn’t help but wonder if there is still a need for a home phone. The Vtech people must have the same thought on their mind when they were conceptualizing the IS6110 cordless phone that’s why they decided to include an Instant Messaging function.

Well, it looks like Vtech might have caught onto something new. For one, their IS6110 cordless phone is the world’s first cordless phone with built-in IM features with support for MSN Messenger, Windows Live Messenger and AOL Instant Messenger. And for that, it certainly deserves some accolades. But if you think that IM is all there is in the IS6110, think again as it is packed with some nifty features too.

MORE »

VTech has announced the ip8300infoPhone, an Internet-enabled cordless landline telephone that offers a way to check e-mail, news, sports, weather and horoscopes, all without turning on a computer. The new ip8300 infoPhone is also one of VTech’s first North American products to feature the Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications (DECT) 6.0 technology.

The new ip8300 infoPhone uses the Internet to access information directly on the cordless handset’s color LCD screen, including news headlines, weather reports, horoscopes, local directory searches and more. The infoPhone has a dedicated key for one-touch access to personalized, valuable information – sports fans can see the latest scores for their favorite team and busy parents can easily check the local weather before dressing kids for school. The ip8300 is connected to the Internet via a dedicated connection in the phone system’s base station. Users can also sign into their accounts for quick access to e-mail communications, instant messages and buddy list updates.

The new ip8300 uses DECT 6.0 technology, which operates on the 1.9 GHz frequency. The Wi-Fi friendly DECT technology easily integrates into homes with Internet and Wi-Fi services, because the 1.9 GHz frequency is not used by other wireless technologies.

In addition, VTech’s wf6972 802.11 Wi-Fi phone system comes with software that allows the handset to receive information wirelessly from the PC. Using 802.11 technology, users can wirelessly access news headlines, sports scores and weather updates directly on the cordless handset, which also offers standard land-line capabilities.

The new VTech information-enabled phones will be on display at CES in Las Vegas. These phones can be purchased at major retail outlets and online at www.vtechphones.com in Spring 2007.

Read [V-Tech] Via [Digital Trends]