Cordless phones

seven-day-weekend

Please someone help me urgently.

I know nothing about cordless phones. Someone has told me all you ned to do is 'just plug it in'.

Now does this mean that you plug it into the phone jack, a power socket or both?

Need to know asap!

Idiophreak

normally the base plugs into both both..

Fifer

All cordless phones need a mains supply (there isn't enough power available from the telephone line supply to charge the battery). At least one phone in the house also needs to plug into the telephone jack. If you buy (for example) a four pck of DECT phones, three don't need a phone connection (only power) but one needs to have both.

theallpowerful

One word of caution, most cordless phones are incapable of making phonecalls if the power is turned off, since the base unit has to have a power supply to function which is a very real safety issue. For example, your house catches fire and (as often happens) the fuse box goes bang. How're you going to phone 999?

Make sure you have a corded phone somewhere convenient for just such an emergency (it'll probably never happen, but why risk it when you can probably pick a corded phone up off of freecycle?)

seven-day-weekend

Thanks for your replies. Yes, we do have an 'ordinary' phone - it's just that the extension wire on the phone that my son has into his bedroom has broken so we were thinking of getting cordless for this purpose.

So if we keep our corded phone as it is and plug the cordless into the same jack using an adaptor, and then into the mains, that would be OK?

And presumably you have the same telephone number?

What's a DECT phone please?

(Told you I knew nothing)!

theallpowerful

Yes, they can both be plugged into the same socket and work fine, and yes, that would overcome the problem of the cordless phone not working after power cuts the corded one doesn't rely on the base unit, and draws its power from the phone line, so it would be fine)

Telephone number would remain the same...

DECT = Digital Enhanced (formerly European) Cordless Telecommunications -
Basically just saying that this is a digital cordless phone that uses a digital rather than an analogue signal to improve sound quality... More info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DECT

Fifer

Sorry about the jargon. DECT stands for Digitally Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications. Almost all cordless phones sold these days are DECT phones. The standard allows several phones in a house to communicate through one (base) phone which is the only one needing a connection to the phone jack.

Yes, you can plug the cordless phone base into the same jack as your corded phone using an adaptor. They will both share the same phone number (yours) and will both ring when someone calls you. Your son can take the cordless handset to his bedroom but it will have to be returned to the base to charge the battery periodically.

seven-day-weekend

Thanks all for your help - my knowledge of cordless phones has ben considerably increased!

grammargirl_2

Thanks, I was pleased to find this helpful thread!

Is it possible to get a base unit to jack into the phone socket, which doesn't include a phone handset?

I have just moved into a new house which has one phone socket in the lounge. I want to be able to use a cordless phone upstairs without having a handset/phone that rings downstairs (it's a work phone and I only want it to ring in the room where I work, not be used by other people in the house).

Hope that makes sense (I'm also new to the world of cordless phones) and thanks in advance for any advice.

wannabemedic

I'm looking for a new home phone (corded) along with a cordless phone - both I'd like to have caller display and hansfree speaker phone (well if every company insists on keeping you on hold I'm not going to clamp the phone on my ear!)

I found one in Argos for £49 which is a binatone - I don't need an answering maching - not sure where to look for this and hope someone here can help!