@ About, Build Quality @

These phones come as a trio and have chargers as bases, normally when they are on charge they will light up with a red LED and make a long "beep" noise. They will also make a fast two beep noise when they are getting low on battery - unfortunately they make this noise when you're on the phone too, and it's quite loud andy our ear and the person on the other end of the line can hear this.

The phones are made from solid plastic and the buttons are rubber. At the back of the phone there is a battery compartment which takes two batteries. For some reason there is also a foam pad on the back of the battery case, and it takes quite a bit of effort to get the case off to change the batteries. Still, you can leave rechargeable batteries in for several months on end as I have done, and they will still only need recharging for about 2 hours to get an hours use out of them. It depends on which batteries you want to use in order to get the most life out of them. with brand new rechargeable batteries in they can call for up to 600 minutes.

I typically get about 35m out of range before I start to notice is drop in signal quality, and this is usually breaking up of a call line, reduced sound quality and a crackling phone line. The phones do however show what signal quality you have in the top left corner of the screen. The screen itself is a greenish tint and has clear digital text on the front reading which hand set is in use. It also has a battery bar on the right which is not accurate when the battery gets low. I often find that half the battery drains in 40 minutes and then when the batteries are getting really low, the bar drops much faster.

@ Sound / Call Quality @

When the phones ring they make a three tone beeping noise twice in quick succession. Then there is a pause before they do this again. They are quite loud and can be heard through thick wooden doors a couple rooms away, but they are not ear piercing - Three of them going off at the same time is loud but again, won't be painful when you pick the phone up.

On loud speaker audio quality is reduced and there is a strain on the speaker at high volume. The loud speaker is about as loud as the ringing but the other persons voice becomes more muffled and hard to hear. On the regular speaker at a quiet volume sound quality is ok, but people who speak closer to the microphone can sometimes be muffled and unclear. Don't forget these do have adjustable volume controls but I normally have them on full volume which is not uncomfortable.

@ Overall @

These phones are average. They have good build quality and dropping them wont smash them to smithereens but equally their sound and call quality could be improved. I would recommend these if they are at the top of your budget but if you can spare the extra few quid and pay more, get something of better quality.