Graves On SOHO VoIP

Some time back the folks over at VoIP Supply posted something about a collection of new SIP Wifi handsets. Whereas in the past that would make me take notice, even catch my interest, I found myself completely disinterested. In fact, it was surprising how little appeal these gadgets had.

Over the years I’ve tried various SIP Wifi handsets and come to a very simple conclusion. That is, for my home office application they have no merit at all. The fact that I have a solid cordless SIP solution eliminates the possible interest that any of these new products might have.

In everything experiment that I’ve ever tried DECT/CATiq products soundly beat any dedicated SIP Wifi handset. Now that there are affordable SIP/DECT products from sources like Gigaset and Snom dedicated VoWifi handsets just don’t measure up for many applications.

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Here’s  a nice little tidbit for you. One of the more annoying tings about setting up a Gigaset cordless SIP/DECT phone is the sluggishness of the web interface. In the first draft of my A580 review I made specific mention of this, but it was dropped in a later revision. I curse those editors! A few people have since commented about this as well.

There’s been a long running thread about the Gigaset line over at Broadband Reports VoIP Tech Chat forum. “Jan1973″ recently posted advising that browsers other than IE or Firefox don’t exhibit this problem at all. That suggests that the matter truly isn’t the Gigaset web server, but rather how the browsers are rendering the pages. “Jan1973″ further suggests using k-meleon, which is  free download from SourceForge.

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This set of screen shots was taken from the web GUI of the Gigaset S675IP, but the web GUI for the A580IP is very similar.

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After announcements back at CES2009 in January the Gigaset line of cordless SIP/DECT are finally starting to become available in the US. The A580IP model is the entry-level system in the line-up, which we’ve been using around here for the past couple of months.

At the outset of the review process I was a little skeptical about installing an entry-level consumer cordless phone in the house. We’ve tried a lot of hardware and have some fairly clear ideas about what we need from it. However, the A580IP brings with it the possibility of wideband calling over IP into the cordless domain. That proved just too to attractive to not give it a try.

The A580IP system that we have installed consists of one DECT base and a set of three A58H handsets. A starter system comes with the base and one handset. You can add up to five additional handsets to suit your specific needs. In fact, you can mix and match handsets, using the entry level A58H, middle of the range S67H or high-end SL78H all on the same DECT base.

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Thanks to Engadget for pointing out Jabra’s latest product offerings for the uppity office dweller. OMG, these look nice! Most especially the DECT version pictured here.

As they so rightly point out, these are fairly over-the-top kinds of devices for most people. But remember that nothing succeeds like excess!

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Earlier today Michael White at E4 tweeted that he had just received his shipment of Gigaset SL78H handsets. The SL78H is the high-end handset that Gigaset is offering as an optional addition to the A580IP and S675IP basic SIP/DECT systems. I’ll be going into detail about it eventually, but not until after I’ve reviewed the two base systems.

It’s unclear if the other systems are in stock yet, but they’re due any day.

Several people have asked about the physical size of the Gigaset DECT handsets compared to other gear. Then I remembered that Michael White of E4 posted a pic on TwitPic a while back. The pic originated in a Ustream feed.

These are (left-right): Polycom Kirk 5020 in a mug, snom m3, Gigaset S67H, Gigaset A58H.

Guess which ones support wideband?

For several years, certainly as long as I have been writing this blog, I have been hunting for a better cordless IP telephony solution for my home office. Cordless mobility is increasingly a critical feature for home office and small business users. While we have a satisfactory solution in place at the moment, there’s certainly room for improvement.

Siemens, a multi-national company headquartered in Germany, has a new subsidiary called Gigaset US specifically to market some of their range of consumer electronics in North America. This new company is headquartered in Dallas, Texas.

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