More on the TMobile@Home Service - the VTECH DECT 6 Phone They Sell/Recommend

Tonight I picked up the VTECH phone set that TMobile sells/recommends for use with the @Home service. Actually, each of the sales reps are quick to say you can use any modern wireless phone, and you can (I initially used an older 5.8ghz VTECH that I had sitting in a box of ‘old electronics’ and it worked fine, just like a regular phone).

The VTECH phone that TMobile sells is the DECT 6.0 model TM3111-2. It’s the same as the DS-3111 I believe, and probably some other variants. The price from TMobile is $59, which is a little pricier than I’m sure I could get it for online but I wanted to have it asap so I could test it for another day and make sure I want to keep the @Home service. Since there is only a 14 day return policy with the service/phones, and its ~10 days for the phone # porting to be completed, I am waiting one more day and, if all goes well tonight/tomorrow, I will call up TMobile customer service to initiate the process of porting over my landline phone #. Based on everything so far, I’m happy with the service.

So…on with it….why did I spend $59 for one DECT6.0 phone with one handset? Particularly a fairly cheap-feeling one like the one TMobile sells? Well…think about this:

The base has to be hooked up to either the TMobile router directly, or indirectly. I had no way to do that without spending an evening fishing phone wiring through my walls, and there was no way I was doing that. So here it is:

For now anyway. I’ll eventually get it situated in a better spot. The main reason I bought *this* particular model is because, after verifying with TMobile’s customer service (the phone # rep, as my local store rep was clueless), it turns out that this phone has a the little orange ‘voicemail’ indicator/button on the bottom left (you can see it in the pic I’m sure). Whenever someone leaves a voicemail for me/my wife, that button flashes not only on the base but on each handset. So, it doesn’t matter if the base is in my family room/basement. As soon as we walk in the front door (a floor above), we can glance over and see if there are any messages. I’m not aware of any other phone that does this and works with TMobile’s service, but I’m sure there may be others.

It was easy setting up the phone and the one separate handset it comes with. TMobile stores are NOT selling additional/optional handsets, which is terrible. They should be selling those. I know I need one. But fortunately VTECH is selling them direct at this link for $29.99.

The phones work good. It took me a while to figure out how the voicemail indicator worked. Turned out I just needed to be patient - it takes a few minutes before the voicemail flashing light goes on, after someone leaves a voicemail. Ideally it should be faster (the router’s flashing voicemail indicator (yes, it has a flashing blue light to tell you a vm was left) flashes almost instantly once a vm is left). It takes anywhere from 3 to 10 minutes for the light to come on, which is a bit long in my opinion. If I had just missed an important call, to have to wait 10 minutes before knowing a critical vm is left is kind of a drag. Hopefully this is improved or perhaps there is a setting on the phone/service/router I haven’t figured out yet?

So far….so good. The ringer options on the VTECH are nice, and it otherwise has the usual assortment of buttons like skipping to the next vm message, deleting, etc. It seems to work fairly flawlessly with TMobile’s vm service so far. The speakerphone, which is an option on the handsets as well, works well - nice and loud. I haven’t much explored all of the features of the phone itself yet, but those are the basics/important stuff I think. The handsets are very light. So light I’m concerned they may break easily if dropped. We’ll see.