Topic 'Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?' in forum 'VOIP Tech Chat' - dslreports.com

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Fri, 07 Dec 2012 05:07:26 EDT

sarahportman posted :

Are they the best? They're the best for my applications. You'll need to make your own decision based upon your framework of priorities and sensibilities.

If the choice of phone is really important just buy one to try. You can't beat laying hands on, even showing it to your co-workers, to generate consensus of opinion. If it's not suitable you can always resell it on Ebay.

I think you are right the best depends on the objectives you want to achieve for the phone and there are some cases like the most convenient for others is not for some. I think it all depends on the perspective of people. Thank you for that.

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Thu, 06 Dec 2012 11:53:59 EDT

mgraves1 posted :

said by sarahportman:

I also have the same concern since my boss wants this kind of phone and its features are said to be great when it comes to calls. I've read a lot of choice from this forum and a someone has to say about what they are using. So what is really the best?

What's the best car? Boat? Motorcycle? There are too many aspects to be considered to say that any one make/model is the best for everyone.

I like Polycom SIP phones. I used a Polycom Soundpoint IP650 for years. More recently I use a Polycom VVX-600. They are not the cheapest, but they work very, very well, are well supported, have a ton of features. Heck, they even feel good in the hand.

Are they the best? They're the best for my applications. You'll need to make your own decision based upon your framework of priorities and sensibilities.

If the choice of phone is really important just buy one to try. You can't beat laying hands on, even showing it to your co-workers, to generate consensus of opinion. If it's not suitable you can always resell it on Ebay.
--
Michael Graves
Houston TX
»www.mgraves.org

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Thu, 06 Dec 2012 05:16:04 EDT

sarahportman posted :

said by Takamurasan :

In terms of quality/price (with an emphasis on price)?

I have an asterisk box so I don't need any fancy features like call transfer or hold. It's for the home.

I heard also that it was easy to change Cisco Phones to SIP phones, I have more free time then I have money so I don't mind it at all if I have to make adjustments.

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Thu, 06 Dec 2012 01:44:42 EDT

hardly posted : Maybe

»www.amazon.com/Panasonic-KXTGP50···2SUCOQI/

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Thu, 06 Dec 2012 01:39:15 EDT

OmagicQ posted : Can anyone recommend a good voip phone that doesn't look like it belongs in an office?
--
...Who, What, When, Where, How... Why? Why Not?

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Wed, 05 Dec 2012 20:23:39 EDT

SayNoToPOTS posted : I have had great experiences with

Panasonic KX-TGP550 (if you need a cordless + base set)

Grandstream IP Phones (affordable, cheap pricing (particularly if looking for a phone with full color screen), and most importantly they just work)

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 19:38:23 EDT

lifespeed posted :

said by RobThompson:

Please pardon my ignorance but are you people talking about phones which are not android phones that use SIP accounts?

The reason that I ask is that when I use my Anveo SIP account on my Samsung Galaxy SII to make calls, I find that the voice quality & reception is really bad.

Do the SIP phones that you are talking about provide a better quality experience?

Thanks,

I have a corded Yealink SIP T-26P. It works great, but who wants to use a corded phone these days? It's life is spent mostly is a loud telephone ringer, alerting my wife and I to pick up our Galaxy Nexus Android phones running Bria over wifi.

I have seen many times on this forum the comment that wifi VoIP phones are not good. I think what this actually means is the persons wifi network is not good. I have had excellent results using VoIP over smartphone wifi for more than three years. Voice quality is excellent, and on G722 calls is nothing short of amazing.

I don't get dropped packets or any other wifi inadequacies unless I go some distance outside the house. Here a SIP DECT phone would probably have superior range. But it is hard to justify buying a $120 phone just so I can walk down the street making a VoIP call. Under all reasonable circumstances, within the house, reception is very good.

All I did to set up a decent wifi network is install an Engenius EAP350 high-power access point in the ceiling in the middle of the house, and implement QoS on my network, both incoming and outgoing. Problem solved. I will also mention I had a standard-power Engenius EAP9550 at the same location before the introduction of the high power version. It worked almost as well, but that extra power is nice.

So don't be afraid of VoIP over wifi. If you already have a smartphone, install Bria and try it out. If you get dropouts, fix up your wifi network. A quality wireless access point costs the same as a SIP DECT phone, but improves ALL your wireless devices. An average size house without tons of metal in the walls should do fine with a centrally located access MIMO access point, especially with high power.
--
Lifespeed

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 09:28:30 EDT

mdavenport posted : Howdy,

No worries :)

Cheers

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 04:41:22 EDT

steve1111 posted : I bought a Cisco SPA301 for $55 before tax. I use it at home. It is a simple corded one-line Voip phone. It is built well and it works well. I think it is good value for money.

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Mon, 03 Dec 2012 17:36:22 EDT

jimk posted :

said by mdavenport:

Howdy,

Digium's phones are not made by Yealink. They're not OEMs of some other vendor's existing phone.

Cheers

My mistake. They had some visual design similarities, and there was a press release a while back about the companies working together, so I was going based on that.

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Mon, 03 Dec 2012 17:34:29 EDT

rollerblader7 posted : I've been happy with my Panasonic KX-TGP550. I have the base station handset, plus three remotes scattered around the house. I am not running any PBX though.

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Mon, 03 Dec 2012 17:22:31 EDT

mdavenport posted : Howdy,

Digium's phones are not made by Yealink. They're not OEMs of some other vendor's existing phone.

Cheers

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 21:15:37 EDT

Springbok posted : I like my Polycom SoundPoint IP 335's, one for me one for my wife (we both work at home). This is the cheapest Polcyom with HD voice. Sound quality is great and I like that Polycom actively supports the platform with regular new firmware upgrades. I downloaded and installed a FileZila FTP server for Win7. My phones point to this FileZila IP address and any new firmware I put in there gets loaded if you reboot the phone. If you run Asterix you can also create a TFTP server on the box and just point your phones to it. Fairly simple and easy.

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 21:13:23 EDT

mgraves1 posted : Just the device itself.

As to the advantages, they work absolutely reliably. And they sound great. They also don't tax you smart phone bettery.

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 21:10:51 EDT

RobThompson posted :

said by mgraves1:

said by RobThompson:

Do the SIP phones that you are talking about provide a better quality experience?

In marked contrast I have Polycom VVX series phones in my home office and Gigaset SIP/DECT cordless phones in my home. These are absolutely reliable. They work and they sound great.

Thanks mgraves1.

To use a SIP phone, like the ones you described, do you need a special setup, equipment-wise?

Also, what is the advantage of using such a phone?

Thanks,
--
Rob.
Blog: »googlevoiceforcanadians.com/

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 20:51:50 EDT

mgraves1 posted :

said by RobThompson:

Do the SIP phones that you are talking about provide a better quality experience?

Yes. SIP hard phones like those from Polycom, snom, Gigaset, Grandstream, Yealink et al are fundamentally different from a soft phone client running on a smart phone.

Since they are not reliant upon wifi or 3G/4G networks that can be much more reliable that any kind of soft phone on a smart phone.

I have a Galaxy Nexus running Bria Android edition & Skype. Also a Nexus 7 table running Bria for Android Tablet Edition and Skype. My experience with these combinations has been a mixed bag. It can be good. It can just as easily be dreadful. It's no so much about the software, wireless IP networks are just like that.

In marked contrast I have Polycom VVX series phones in my home office and Gigaset SIP/DECT cordless phones in my home. These are absolutely reliable. They work and they sound great.
--
Michael Graves
Houston TX
»www.mgraves.org

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 20:30:11 EDT

RobThompson posted : Please pardon my ignorance but are you people talking about phones which are not android phones that use SIP accounts?

The reason that I ask is that when I use my Anveo SIP account on my Samsung Galaxy SII to make calls, I find that the voice quality & reception is really bad.

Do the SIP phones that you are talking about provide a better quality experience?

Thanks,
--
Rob.
Blog: »googlevoiceforcanadians.com/

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 20:20:25 EDT

userofdsl posted : I am happy with the Yealink SIP-T22P. Good quality, good features, easy to use, relatively inexpensive. Best value I found when shopping a year or so ago.

$74 including shipping from here:

»www.telecomnationusa.com/collect···sip-t22p

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 18:49:13 EDT

jimk posted : Cisco depends on the series. The SPA small business series phones are completely different from their Unified IP phones.

Let's just say that if you're using Asterisk, you're better off using native SIP phones rather than trying to make the higher end Cisco devices work.

Digium has some new phones that easily tie into Asterisk. I have heard good things about them, but haven't tried them personally. As far as I can tell, they are actually made by Yealink and have custom firmware and different branding.

Other than that, Yealink, Grandstream, Polycom, Cisco SPA series, SNOM, and Aastra are all fairly common and have decent community support. There are also some nice cordless IP phones from Panasonic and Gigaset that are great for residential use.

Since you're not using these in an enterprise class environment, you can probably make price a large part of your decision making process. Some of the more value oriented brands used to have more firmware issues, but this seems to have improved, and most of the bugs were with features you wouldn't use in a home environment anyways.

Re: What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 16:19:16 EDT

PX Eliezer posted : Do you already [have] the CISCO phones of which you speak? If not you may want to go with someone else. CISCO conversion is sometimes a challenge.

If you are just looking at price, you may want to look at Yealink or Grandstream.

But your question is like asking, what is the best midwest state?

You need to look around a bit, get some ideas....

»www.telcodepot.com/voip-phones

»www.telephonydepot.com/Catalog/D···MERPRICE

What's the best SIP VOIP phone?

Sun, 02 Dec 2012 15:37:24 EDT

anon posted : In terms of quality/price (with an emphasis on price)?

I have an asterisk box so I don't need any fancy features like call transfer or hold. It's for the home.

I heard also that it was easy to change Cisco Phones to SIP phones, I have more free time then I have money so I don't mind it at all if I have to make adjustments.