My grandmother used to have one with a switch. Of course it also had a nonreplacable NiCd battery that had poor performance after a year or so.
It's possible that the standby current the phone draws is insignificant compared to battery leakage (self discharge with no load). That would be a possible experiment. See how long a filly-charged battery works in the phone, and disconnected.
My old Radio Shack spread-spectrum will take me nearly down to the next block (about 200 feet). I guess they don't make 'em like they used ta.
That's what you're doing wrong. My old Radio Shack (at least 5 years, not sure how much more) is still on its original batteries (4 handsets). I put them in the charging stands before I go to bed and take them out when I get out of bed. The only times I've ever run out of battery were on really long conversations (over two hours) and only when I forgot to charge the phone over the previous night.
I bought a great wired phone at the Goodwill. Works great and built like a tank. I don't much care for the rotary dial though.
cm
I have an old spread-spectrum model that goes 1000ft in the open, really wonderful on a farm ;)
Pay attention, Terry- us old farts were rambling about REAL phones. Corded, weigh several pounds, say Ma Bell on the bottom? Like your parents probably had? I have no idea what a cordless phone can do to the dialtone- never had one, never plan to.
aem sends...
No. His old-fashioned CORDED phones slowed his dialup speed.
I proved this phenomenon in my home, prior to converting to broadband.
To ensure ideal conditions for dialup service, the telephone line/pair should be "dedicated" to the modem: It should run directly from the demarc to the modem input. From there it can be distributed.
For a while, I depended on the "Phone" output jack (relay) on the back of the modem to isolate the stuff beyond when off-hooking and surfing but even THAT was insufficient to achieve maximum connection speed. I created a DPST, surface-mounted toggle switch that physically/electrically opened the pair beyond the modem. This resulted in a DRAMATIC improvement in connection speed.
Remember: In telephony, if installing a switch, it must open/close BOTH sides of the pair to maintain circuit "balance". Failing to do this will silence the equipment beyond the switch but will create an audible hum on the line. The hum increases with the "lopsidedness" of the pair.
Simply removing ALL other equipment from a dialup connection may make a noticeable improvement in connection speed. Your mileage may vary. Always wear a helmet. Professional modemer on a closed circuit. This space for rent.
I've never hooked up a landline in my house. (been there for 18months or so). The cost to have a land line every month was the same as getting a family plan on cell phones, but the cell's get free long distance and we can talk to anyone else with the same cell phone company (including each other) without dipping into our bucket of minutes.
My inexpensive phone (as cells go) has a 1000mah battery that lasts for about 4 hours of talk time without being plugged in... Not to mention it works anywhere and everywhere, comes with call waiting and all of us have our own personal answering machine called voicemail.
Cordless phones and land lines in general are becoming obsolete for the residential customer. My opinion.
How about internet phone service?
To some degrees. Except where I live (south Florida) I have to keep a land line in case of power outage from summer hurricanes. Most times power is out the phone (not cordless but the traditional kind) still works without power.
And of course, not all of us are fortunate enough to live in an area with affordable broadband. The landlines will be around for many, many years....
aem sends....
And sometimes a storm damages landlines, but a cell phone may still work. I heard of that happening with hurricane Katrina last year.
It's true.
My company (ILEC) is deploying DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) high-speed internet as quickly as possible, but it's not quickly enough for those still beyond the reach of DSL.
You'll notice the big cable (CATV) companies have absolutely NO interest in connecting to most would-be customers that live in sparsely populated areas. I consider it fortunate that "we" are "required" to provide at least dialtone to those poor, rural "slobs" - on their million-dollar acreages, rental farmhouses or little cabins on the river.
Many of them are mad at us because we are STILL the "only" choice for landline connectivity, nevermind DSL. Without knowing the politics of WHY that monster cable TV company that serves the nearby, big city, doesn't (and won't) compete with us out in the sticks, they blame the ILEC (Incumbent Local Exchange Carrier) that still provides them service - and their neighbor 1/2-mile down the road - for not doing more, sooner, to deliver broadband.
Do the math: Twenty customers along a one-BLOCK stretch of cable; or Two customers along a one-MILE stretch of cable.
Without the SUBSIDY of the high-density subscribers in the city, many rural customers would be paying $300/month for what it cost to build and maintain the infrastructure JUST to serve them - and they'd never get it paid off.
Yes, they will.
Whatever you can do wirelessly can be done on a wireline FASTER and more securely.
I have several customers with "standalone" DSL. They think they have no "landline" because they use only their cell phone for voice. Ah, but they DO have a "landline" - a copper pair delivering DSL to their phone jack(s). I installed one today - DSL on copper pair w/NO dialtone. I temporarily add dialtone to the pair while working it up to the new premise because it's a lot easier to listen for DT (and ID the line number) than to have to rely solely on my DSL tester and train-up at each step of the way. Once done, I return to the DSLAM and tear-down the dialtone portion of the loop.
I bought one of these Motorola sets earlier this year:
My previous phone was a Siemens Gigaset. This was the BEST phone I ever owned. It survived a full submersion in the bathtub (at the hands of a 1 year old), being left outside in a rainstorm & numerous drops. It finally died when it fell out of my toolbelt while I was standing on a 12 ft ladder. If I could have found another one of these, I would have bought it in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, I think Siemens stopped selling cordless phones in the US....
HTH, Jonathan
True.
However, the overall reliability of the land-based, public switched network still exceeds that of wireless. So far...
Remember, the cell phone network relies on LANDLINES between cells.
I wouldn't bank on it, given the horrendously INACCURATE, exaggerated and downright FALSE "news" reporting that came out of the disaster.
I suspect the cell network first began to fall apart when the hurricane killed electric service to cell sites. The standby generators eventually ran out of fuel, and that's all she wrote - for the cell sites with towers still STANDING.
Then, when everything went underwater, including telco Central Offices *AND* cell tower huts (at the base of EVERY cell tower), it broke down completely.
Wireless connectivity may be more CONVENIENT than wired, but it is certainly not more reliable overall.
If Katrina taught ONE thing, it should be: You're on your own.
Also, it taught us that, should the unthinkable happen again, there will be NO cell phone, NO landline, NO government assistance and, most importantly, the next time local officials tell you to evacuate, you'd better get your sorry @$$ out-of-town ASAP.
Quite frankly, I was pleasantly surprised that MANY more weren't killed in that disaster.
The reason NiCd batteries are so popular in things like cordless phones is they sustain a strong voltage level right up to the depletion point. The downside, as MC is finding out, is if you don't deplete the charge significantly before recharging, the chemistry of NiCd cells develop "memory" and won't last very long.
The good news is that there are companies who can break the "memory" for you by deep discharging and recharging. The bad news is, it costs, and it's often cheaper to throw the battery out and get a new one. The worse news is NiCd batteries have LOADS of toxic ingredients, and we really shouldn't be disposing of them as often as we do.
The best solution (one I wish I could convince my wife of) is to leave the phone off the base until the low battery light is lit, and then recharge it. I know, I know, but what if the handset goes kaput in the middle of a call. Them's the dangers of going cordless, baby!
I haven't seen any of the new phones with Lithium ion batteries, but know those with NiMH batteries have done reasonably not unwell in the past. Just my 2=A2 worth...
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