Panasonic KX-TGP550 SIP DECT Phone

VOIP (IP Phone) ExperienceNot to sound like a VOIP salesperson but I've been reluctant to switch for over a year since my phones are so critical to business. But I pulled the plug on cox digital cable and went to VOIP and amazed how much I saved and how great it is. I continue to use cox business for Internet ISP - been very happy with for years.I have a long-time friend in Toronto He is a piano teacher with VERY sensitive hearing for tones etc. After testing new VOIP system he says:"I just wanted to put in writing what I thought about your new phone system. The sound quality is very fine! As good as any telephone transmission I have ever experienced! It sounds as if you are very close to me, or in the same room, and crystal clear despite a slight background grainy halo. I'd grade this at 90%-95% perfect, and it's only the halo that keeps it from a mythical 100% score. But I would grade most phone calls I experience at about 75%-80%, and I've never experienced 100% sonic fidelity with telephones, so you have won big here. For comparative purposes, your prior phones according to my Toronto experience were operating down in the 60%-75% range, so this is a wild improvement. *Plus* you are saving buckets of money, so this is a great thing you've done.Bravo!Peter the finicky musician"---I note he uses DSL so the "halo" might also be introduced on his end. Only a IP-IP connection would show the IP quality without also relying on the regular phone line or cell phone at the other end. While Skype is lower quality that is because video takes a huge amount of bandwidth vs "high quality audio".We also tested range on IP/SIP DECT phone. In my far bedroom use to have deteriorated signal on old Panasonic KX-TG4500 with its remotes. With Peter not only was there no difference in far bedroom, but went outside far back with another block wall blocking (Frank Lloyd Wright like home) and quality reduced to about what was usual on prior phone. So DECT works very well to transfer from IP/SIP phone to remotes (Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications).More detailsI needed 3 lines before: Main business/rollover line if busy/fax line. Cost was about $100/month.Now each line has 3 channels - if one is busy new call will go to voice mail (or call waiting) without needing the separate rollover line which I converted to an IP personal line. My total cost for 3 lines (using MetroFax for fax) is about $25/month vs prior $100/month. I also like the feature that voicemail's or faxes can also be e-mailed to you. Phone is easy to use although initial set up a bit confusing . I needed responsive customer support ticket system help but easily solved). It has many neat features not available before.I use: CallCentric (and MetroFax) with Panasonic KX-TGP550 with 2 remotesCallCentric doesn't have the exact configurations settings for this phone as it does for many others. I was stumped for a few hours until I got solution from support which worked.

The Good:The Panasonic KX-TGP550 is a great phone to use. It's ease of switching almost seeemlessly to handsets makes it a good purchase. The call features are robust as well so you're never limited in terms of what you can do with this phone.I love that the phone has the capability to switch between so many lines and can easily move to a handset, and the fact that the phone has an abundance of features, but it's not the easiest phone to work. The Cisco SPA 303 3-Line Phone has much better functionality. However, this is a great phone to use especially since the other phones can't handle transitions to a handset as well as this one.

Great phone that seemed to be built well. Two phones for the price of one. I returned mine because it was lacking features that I required in my setup. POE was essential for me and this unit dose not have POE. I am a little OCD with wiring and standards POE devices makes for a nice clean install. I overlooked this on my order and was my fault. The second issue I had was I could not get the auto answer on page function working from my Asterisk box. This was a deal breaker for me as I use this feature for intercom and home automation announcements. The product lists this feature but if you do some googling you will find that no one is able to get it to work. If those are not important features to you I would highly recommend this phone. The vendor I used took the phone in return without question. I bought the yealink version of this and have been pleased with its performance and features. I actually preferred the feel of the Panasonic but the features were a deal breaker for me.

Junk. Only Vonage supported phone that has base and cordless handset, so I purchased but wish I hadn't. Would have returned but seller wanted to charge restocking fee and they were very difficult to deal with. Cordless works ok but if I plug in a hands free headset to the cordless you get super static. Base sounds ok with headset but does not deliver consistent call quality. Not my internet as my older yeah link works fine. Avoid unless you really need the cordless handset. Also the transfer function from cordless to base requires too many steps.

We purchased KX-TGP550 (not KX-TGP551) in November 2011 and we wanted to know how good the features are. We were interested in voicemail indicator, auto attendant, call transfer, music on hold, audio clarity, private voicemail box for each extension handset (in addition to the general mailbox for base unit), and conferencing calls. Now it turns out that every feature we had set before still works great. We could even assign a name to each handset extension and saved money on in-wall wiring.We believe this is a model that meets today's broadband society and best of all, save monthly bill a lot for 2, 3 or more lines due to using voip. It can replace past models such as KX-TG2000B (2 line model with internal voice mail box), KX-TG4000B (4 lines with internal voice mail boxes), KX-TG4500B (updated model for KX-TG4000B), KX-TG9392 and other similar 2 line or 4 line phone for small business offices. Who we are? SmileTech at [...] Thank you!

I have two major complaints (Compared to my 6 year old Linksys SPA desk phone):1) Major static/hiss (e.g., comfort noise) on both the wired desk phone and on the cordless phone. Maybe not annoying to some folks but it was immediately noticeable to me, and only on my side (parties on the line did not notice it). Comfort noise even on (locally generated) dial tone thus not a network issue.2) Speaker phone on the desk phone not up to par with other speaker phones we have utilized.On item #1, I first called my SIP provider (Vonage Business). They did some checking and there is no user configuration on comfort noise, etc. I then called Panasonic tech support. They said that there is some comfort noise and suggested that perhaps I had a bad unit. I reordered on Amazon and still have this issue - thus it is a phone issue.For reason #1 (on two different phones) I am rating this a 1 star.

I love the fact that you can do everything from the remote hand set that you can from the main phone!!!!

This model could have supported upto 6 separate incoming and outgoing calls, however Panasonic restricts it to 3 which is a shame as since it has individual keys for the 6 handsets.Some advance features might not be usable depending on you SIP/ VoIP provider. The unit I received had a faulty base hand receiver awkward static noise that was not present on the cordless handset. Setup is basic, though a help guide would have been nice. The update feature does not work when a link is inserted and does not provide feed back as to why it will not update. Contact Address book is limited and lacking for an IP phone, lame at best.In a nutshell I was looking forward to this SIP bases phone to wow me, however with the faulty base receiver, limited and restricted incoming/outgoing call options was a letdown. I was expecting an improved and expanded address book, not so with this product.It does work with various SIP/ VoIP providers, though features might be limited due to providers support. If Panasonic re-released this phone in a version 2 with 6 incoming and outgoing call support along with some inboard memory for attendant music and a much needed 21 Century Address Book, this phone would wow me and would not think twice to purchase. At present it is underwhelming.