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37 of 38 people found the following review helpful.
Solid Proof of Concept
By Serge A. Vecher
Being one of the first Wi-Fi VoIP (SIP) phones on the market, ZyXEL Prestige 2000W is a solid proof of concept that is deemed by many to see explosive growth. With this unit, ZyXEL seems to be targeting two markets - a cordless phone for corporate SIP environments and residential broadband VoIP services (like Vonage). The unit gets 3 stars for actually working in one deployment scenario, but lacking many required features. We have received several units from ZyXEL in October to investigate a deployment scenario with Asterisk PBX as a SIP server. The phone picked up a signal of our internal 802.11b/g wireless network with no problems. However, the initial attempt to register with Asterisk server was unsuccessful. Upgrading firmware to version 'f' solved the registration problem and now we could successfully move on to evalute phone's functionality.Positive impressions:1. Reception of Wi-Fi signal is good and is on par with other wireless devices (we compared to notebooks with WiFi cards).2. Sound quality is very good and is comparable to your average cellphone.3. Battery life is decent and will handle several hours of talktime. Standby mode is not as effective as with your modern cellphone, therefore the phone has to be charged every night.4. Unit is fairly compact and lightweight (about the size of an older Nokia cellphone).Unfortunateluly, this is where the positive impressions end. To give ZyXEL some credit, core technology seems be in good shape and the unit lacks any serious drawbacks. However, many important features one would expect in a cordless communication device are underimplemented or not implemented at all:1. Phone looks and feels old, like one of the cellphones from the 90's. Screen is tiny and only has four lines.2. Handsfree - both speakerphone and headset ports exist, but are not functional.3. Battery compartment is very hard to open. Not that one should have to take out the battery that often, but this is the only way to reboot the phone when it occasionally locks up.4. Only one incoming line is implemented.5. Phone registers to a SIP server only upon bootup. Therefore, if the connection to the server is lost during normal operation, the phone will have to be rebooted.6. Hold, transfer, and conference buttons are not implemented. As is the MWI (Message Waiting Indicator).7. Wireless security is underimplemented. On paper, WEP up to 128 bits is possible, in reality that means you will have to punch in the keys manually (use the web interface for that) and quality of sound will deteriorate. WEP keys are easy to break anyways, so that leaves you with MAC Address filtering - wait, that's easy to spoof also. So do not bother yourself with security on this phone.8. You have to know your SSID to access the wireless AP. No autodiscovery and no ability to store several SSIDs and to connect to whichever one is found first.9. The lists for missed and dialed calls exist, but are out of order (at least chronological one). Plus, no details are offered.10. Ringtones are godawful and cannot be changed.In summary:1. Corporate clients will be turned off by the lack of multiple lines, transfer and hold functionality, and lack of security.2. Service providers, like Vonage, seem to prefer analog adapters to end devices that talk native VoIP protocols. In the case of Vonage, one may be able use Prestige 2000W on their network using credentials issued for the SoftPhone service. But given the extra charge for the service as well as the premium price of Prestige 2000W itself, the economics are against such scenario. It is much more economical for residential customer to purchase an analog or digital cordless phone in 900Mhz or 5.8Ghz spectrum and use it through VoIP provider's telephone adapter.Unless you have an extra $250 laying around and like your technology raw, patience will be rewarded. New and improved WiFi SIP Phones are starting to show up. For example, Hitachi Cable's IP-5000 looks more modern and supports advanced security features like WPA and EAP-TLS (there are reports, however, of poor firmware design and incompatibility). Cisco 7920 seems to be dominant in the large corporate sector and may capture small and medium-business markets if they finally release SIP firmware and work on lowering the $500+ price-tag.Motorola is releasing a CN620, which as a hybrid GSM/WiFi SIP phone for the corporate market.There is a lot of development in this area and kudos to ZyXEL for braving the turbulent waters. Hopefully, they can improve on hardware design, add more firmware features and turn the ugly duckling that Prestige 2000W is into a beatiful swan.(...)
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful.
Great Product if you select the right service
By A. Oguz
4 stars for having an ugly design and a high price but no alternative (as of know). I have no opinion on battery life. I shall see.I ordered the product from Amazon yesterday with Ground UPS, and received it today. There goes an applause to Amazon!About the product: It is very simple, but seems to serve the purpose: send and receive calls. the sound quality is excellent. entering the information to access the service provider took approximately one minute. After you have a connection between the phone and the router, you then need to enter the rest of the information by accessing the phone's settings from your computer's browser.I live in a Manhattan apartment building where I share a wireless connection. The router is located on the 6th floor. I live on the 8th floor. The quality is not exactly the same as using the phone next to the wifi router, but still acceptable. I will solve that problem by adding a signal booster to the router.I signed up with BroadVoice, which only offers SIP based VOIP services. This phone only works on SIP based systems. Major VOIP providers provide SIP as an additional service that costs you more over your regular VOIP service fee, and comes with limited minutes. There are many other companies that are out there offering SIP, just google "sip providers" and you will find a lot.I could use a free software phone to access these servers, but I really appreaciated talking on a real phone and hear the difference in quality of sound, instead of having to wear a headset and stare at the computer screen. Believe me, it makes a way lot of difference.I'm originally from Turkey, currently living in the US. It costs me to call Turkey around 45 cents a minute from my cell. These services cost you from 10 cents to 20 cents, depending on whether you call a landline or a cell number. Although the phone is pricey, I will be saving a lot in a few months by lowering my cellphone plan and using the 2000W for national and international calls. I still get call waiting, rejecting a blocked number, voice mail and so forth. I was even able to get a (212) area code number, which has become a rarity. I will pay about $21 for calling unlimited national and 21 international countries (no Turkey is not one of them, useless for now, but you never know).Initial charge to signup with the service cost $32.04 including that $21.00. So there is no reason to complain, even the service fails once in a while (not yet happened). Let me be ridiculous and assume that I call turkey 20 hours a month. It would cost me $540 with cell carrier, and $120 with this one.If you ask, why didn't you go for one of the major VOIP providers, my answer will be, I do not want to see any more bulky devices on the floor. Also, I would be required to install a converter in order to be able to use a regular phone. In addition to all of these issues, I would have to buy a high end cordless phone to have a clear sound upstairs. At the end the cost would be much higher.I think this product is really good for a starter. I am pretty sure that many others will enter the market in the near future, as Vonage is planning on releasing their own wifi phones.I can also take this phone with me whereever there is a wireless hotspot available. The only problem is that some places such as Starbucks use TMobile hotspot, which requires you to download a piece of software that connects you to their network. In that circumstance I do not think that this phone will be usable. But, since there are a lot of people who do not secure their wifi connections, I am sure you will find a place in your area to enjoy this phone and call your friends and family as if you are calling them from your cellphone.
7 of 9 people found the following review helpful.
This is real phone
By GadgetMan
For those who may be confused about Voice over IP services, this is real phone that can dial and receive calls with any other real phone in the Word unlike PC to PC voice connections that can only be placed between PC clients. And as for any VoIP connection, it requires service provider to provide connection with phone networks. Vonage soft phone plan cost about $12 per month with free local calls and cheap international calls, and for that price you get full phone service just like you would get from cell phone or land line company. And the best part - you can use the same service (and the same number) from any wireless internet Access Point in the world. Imagine that you live in NY and can make and receive the same free unlimited local calls with your NY number while traveling to London, Paris or Beijing from any Wi-Fi internet connection.That is the theory anyway, in reality customization of the pone and understanding of IP networking may be required to set up the phone for different locations.
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