EASI DOES IT ...... (BT Easicom1000)

Member Name: broksababe

Product:	BT Easicom1000
Date:	02/03/02 (1039 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Excellent Range Of Features, Low Price,Attractive, Easy To Set Up And Use.

Disadvantages: Costly Email And Fax Charges, No Light Up On Display.

You can all breathe a sigh of relief, as this is the last of my new gadget opinions for the time being!

This time it is the turn of my new emailer phone the BT Easi com 1000.
Now the reason for this particular purchase was the price, I am a sucker for a bargain and this one really was worth it, if you want the price you will have to read on won’t you.

THE PHONE
¤~¤~¤~¤~¤~

The phone itself is quite stylish looking, dark grey with a good sized interactive screen, various buttons which we will also look at, and a pull out qwerty keyboard, this enables the phone to have a range of functions you wouldn’t get on you’re average telephone.

FEATURES
¤~¤~¤~¤~¤

Email
======

Well this is one of the major features I guess when purchasing this particular item, the Easi com can send and receive email and fax messages, and will allow you to register up to 5 email addresses per household.
It is capable of storing up to 70 messages at any one time.

Firstly you will need to register in order to use either of these functions, the email is courtesy of BT click, and when first selecting email you will be prompted to dial their server number, you then register your accounts via the hands free option as you will need to type your user information and password if you opt to use one.
This is also the same procedure for registering in order to send a fax message, enter the fax server number in the instruction booklet, follow the on screen instructions and then dial the international fax server and that’s it, you are then ready to email or fax from your telephone.

To send an email or fax couldn’t be easier, compose your mail or fax, then when done hit send and receive.
Any mail/fax you want to send at a later time can be stored until you actually manually hit send and receive, there is an option available to set how often you would like your
account checking but I personally wouldn’t advise this as it could be costly if you receive a lot of mail.

Again to receive any mails or faxes, simply hit send and receive, you can of course reply or forward any of these as you can on your PC email accounts.

Email Notification
===================

If you choose to subscribe to BT’s caller display you will automatically be notified when there is new mail of any kind waiting to be collected, a red light on the top of the phone will alert you, and a message on screen will show new calls received.

Calls Menu
===========

To benefit from this telephone you really need to subscribe to caller display otherwise it will limit the functions greatly. This is currently £4.50 a quarter so not to bad and worth it if you purchase this model.
Once you have this you will benefit from the following:

• 1.The time, date and caller number of all incoming and outgoing calls.
• 2. New calls received will be displayed by a red light on the top of the phone and again with all the relevant details, this includes calls missed.
• 3. Reminder alarm, here you can set your telephone for a set date and time, daily or monthly or as a one off, this will alert you with a tone when it reaches the given time, so in other words it could even wake you up in the morning if that’s what you want!.

Caller Display Text Messages
============================

The Easi com will also display calls with text to enable more information on incoming calls, this will tell you if it is a withheld number, operator, payphone, unavailable or a ring back call.

Personal Directory
===================

This will store up to 150 entries, very useful indeed, you can add the name, number, mobile, work number and email for instant access, this again is entered with the little pull out keyboard, very easy for anyone
and even easier for us computer users!, just follow the onscreen prompts and hit store and that’s it.
This allows you to search for a number or person by scrolling or entering the first few letters, then merely hit dial.

The fun factor here for me is the 9 dialling tones, when you enter a new number you get the choice of assigning a tone numbered from 1-9, this means family and friends calls can easily be identified simply by the varying ringer, this I really like.....

Town Centre
============


Town centre button could save you money but unlikely, simply select a street from the alphabetical listings and you will see the online retailers available, if you wish to use one, you will be connected and you can order online so to speak, not a vast selection but they do say it will be updated regularly.

Classified
===========

Another button to offer you various online services that may be of interest or may not as in my case, not exactly useful for me but I suppose it could be to someone.

Assistant
==========

This holds all the other functions available and gives you help

Calendar
=========

Once you select this option you can also pre set it to remind you of any important dates such as birthdays.

Calculator
============

Your everyday calculator with a bit extra, 4 modes on this one that perform the following:

• 1.Simple Calculations
• 2.Tabulation
• 3.Currency conversion
• 4.Unit conversion

Notepad
========

This is your very own little notepad, here you can type reminders for yourself, notes about anything and keep them stored on the phone itself.

World Pad
==========

Once opened you can easily view the time in absolutely any country in the world and again, set a world clock reminder if you fancy.


OTHER INFO
>¤~¤~¤~¤~¤~¤

Those are all the main button features this telephone has to offer, of course you can alter it by changing the screen contrast, the font size, loudness and even contact BT directly at the touch of a button to hear the latest BT offers and news.

A hands free button gives you the option of talking directly into the phone or perfect for calls requiring on screen instructions where tying may be needed.

One thing you must remember is that this phone requires 4 AA batteries, not for the phone itself as it plugs in to the mains but as a back up in case of power loss as all your stored information would be lost at this time.
If the power supply should go off, you can still use it as a normal phone but most of the features will not work.


VERDICT
¤~¤~¤~¤~¤

The phone looks great, but how does it perform?
Well I found it extremely simple to set up and operate, entering information to be stored was also very easy indeed.
I liked the varying ring tones a lot and found this a major plus in the phones favour.
The address book is also very handy indeed as if your anything like me then you will always be losing numbers or having to look them up.
The notepad and calculator are a good feature too that I have used many times.
Now when I come in I can see at a glance if I have missed any calls and all the numbers, no more wondering…

Now the thumbs down and isn’t there always something to moan about? The first is the screen, it is on the dark side and although you can see all the various listings it is still too dark for my liking, I would have liked a light of some kind.

The email/fax facility is the second, yes it does work perfectly but here it is the cost factor that is the worry, at 12p an email and I was quoted £1.50 a minute for using it as a fax, this could prove very costly indeed if you only had this as your main emailer.

So no thank yo
u I will not be using it for these services, however the fax option is handy if I ever needed to send one, and anyone who does not have access to a computer would find this superb for sending and receiving the odd email.

So my final verdict then, thumbs up to the phone, even without using all the range of features it is still far superior to any standard home phone, having the time, date all your calls etc displayed makes it a worthwhile purchase as far as I am concerned, so you want to know the price then, well if you have a Boyes store at the moment you can get hold of this for a mere £19.99, yes very reasonable indeed and Argos did have it on offer at £39.99.So a very affordable telephone and a welcome addition to any home.
© Ana 2002

Summary: