Customer Reviews

Belkin F1PP010EN-SK Desktop Internet Phone for Skype (Black)

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(45)
3 star:		(19)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(21)

 

 

Skype is a popular online network which is known for its voice chat and low rate calling to traditional landline and mobile phones. While it has traditionally been limited to use on desktop computers (and accessories plugged into desktop computers), more and more standalone "no computer required" devices are coming to market. Many of them have been WiFi enabled handsets in the shape of a traditional cell phone. The Belkin Desktop Internet Phone for Skype extends the Skype experience to your desk or wall without having to deal with setting up audio or USB devices with your PC.

Hardware: The Belkin Desktop Internet Phone for Skype looks like an office desk phone, perhaps a bit smaller than average. You have your numeric keypad, volume control, hold, redial, mute, and speakerphone buttons, as well as mobile phone-like Answer and Hang Up buttons. There are only three ports on the phone: AC Power, Ethernet, and the connector for the handset (which uses a standard handset cord like you'd fine on any corded phone, which may be good if you currently own a device such as a voice recorder or headset adapter).

The phone does not slide around on a solid wood desk, it stays firm even when picking up and hanging up the receiver. There are also holes on the back if you'd prefer to wall-mount the phone. The screen, while small, is very bright and easy to read.

The speaker phone function is very loud and does not seem to suffer from echo or other audio quality problems like many speaker phones are known for. The handset, while not the most comfortable I've ever used, is very loud and clear, and lightweight.

Software: The phone Software is a straight port of the Skype firmware commonly found on the portable Wifi units, which means it has the same limitations you'll find on those devices. You'll also know you're not working with a regular desktop phone, as there is no dialtone when you pick up the receiver. And when you're placing a SkypeOut (landline/mobile phone) call, you must always dial your country code (example, +1 or 001 for North America) - there is no way to configure a default. This is very annoying for when you want to call someone not in your contact list.

Also, when you dial "00" very fast (for example 1-800, or a 555-1200) your 00 is replaced with the international "+" symbol automatically. The only workaround for this is to dial 0, then wait about half a second, and then press 0 again. There is no way to configure this behavior.

The contact list does not allow you to store multiple numbers per person. If you want to add someone's home, mobile, and office number, you will have to make three separate contacts. This will cause you to use up more available blocks (500 contacts can be stored, according to the specs) and you'll also have to scroll through duplicates on the small screen.

Speaking of limitations - don't expect this to be a replacement for your desktop Skype software. While you don't need to be signed in to Skype on your computer, you can't send instant messages or SMS from the phone hardware. To me, this is a major oversight, as the capability to enter text is there with the keypad. It seems as if this is something that could be enabled with a future software update, but I have yet to hear of this in any other review or Skype hardware device on the market.

The main menu of the Skype software shows your login name, the local time (you can configure whether you prefer 24 or 12 hour clocks in the settings), your status (online, away, dnd, etc - this can be changed via the phone) and your Skype balance. However, the balance is something that is not important to me as I have a North American unlimited plan. If you get under a $1 (local currency), an alert icon shows up on the home screen which is really annoying as you cannot disable it. I can see this being useful for those without a subscription plan, but I have no need to keep a dollar balance on my account and don't want a constant reminder.

While the interface is a bit clunky, it's not much worse than your average mobile phone. You navigate through menus using the round 4 way "circle" (up, down, left, right, and center select). To input text, you use the letters on top of the keys the same way you enter text on a mobile phone keypad. In this respect, it is a bit less advanced than modern phones as you must cycle through 3 options to change case each time (Upper Case, Lower Case, Numbers). So to add the word "Mom", you must switch to upper case, then switch to lower case (having to click through the numbers input option, back to the lower case).

Also, keep in mind than you can't dial all landline numbers - there is no 911 (or 999), and 1-900 numbers are blocked. So don't give this to someone as a replacement for their landline unless you explain all the downsides and make sure they have a way to contact emergency services. (Also, keep in mind this phone has no battery, so it msut have constant power, as well as your modem and networking hardware)

For the average person, this phone could easily be a home landline replacement. You can have virtually unlimited North American outgoing calling for less than $3 per month, and unlimited incoming calling for less than $60 a year. If you already have a cell phone (important in case you do need to make a 911 call) but get poor reception at home, or just hate having long conversations on a mobile device, I'd highly recommend spending the money on this phone. While it has it's (mostly software related) downsides, it still does what is advertised, and is really easy to use and get set up. Plus, we can keep our fingers crossed for a future firmware update with enhanced functionality.

Skype has become my landline, it's 1/10th the cost of the phone company and 1/5 the cost of the cable phone service or Vonage. The technology is still new so the Skype phones available are few and not without bugs.

The Belkin phone isn't bad. You can plug it directly into your Ethernet port and after it's set up you have a working desktop phone that, by using Skype's service, is super cheap and good quality. The unit has a clear speakerphone, a decent color display and works reliably.

Still, there are drawbacks to the design of this phone. As others have commented, the phone is very light and uses cheap plastic, etc. The handset (besides not being very ergonomic) doesn't firmly sit in the cradle very well, the slightest bump and it will pop out. Other drawbacks are missing features as compared to using Skype through your computer such as the inability to make a conference call (although this may change through possible future software upgrades).

The manual is sparse and doesn't clearly explain features. The initial setup and login requires entering letters on a strictly numeric keyboard with no obvious input method. It took a while for me to figure it out and is cumbersome. Another annoying aspect is it's requirement to dial "00" before the "1" on any call, even domestic- plus, if you dial the two zero's too quickly- it's recognized it as a different symbol and you have to start over again. Thus, for every call you are unable to dial quickly- a very annoying thing in the 21st century. Overall the interface is not the most user friendly.

To sum up, for the price it's a decent device to make Skype calls without having to use your computer. At the same time, my guess is future Skype phones will be much more robust, comfortable and practical in their interface and design (at which point the local, nickel and diming phone companies will have a big problem on their hands :).

I have used this phone for a couple of days now and it works. Easy to set up. Easy to use.

My only complaint so far is, it doesn't have a default country code that you can set up. So every time you want to call someone, you have to enter +1 then the area code. They should have a feature that defaults to a country code if one isn't entered. Small oversight and hopefully something that can be fixed with a software update.

Overall, very happy with this phone. It gets me that much needed second line into the house without costing an arm and a leg.

I wish there had been some more reviews of this product when I bought it. I just noticed that someone else posted a new review on July 24th with the exact same issue that I have. This phone dials phone numbers just fine. But if the number you dialed has a computer requesting your pin, passcode, or any other key inputs the phone does not function correctly. I work from home and use the phone a lot for conference calls and that sort of thing. The conference calls require a passcode to join the calls. I find that I have to dial the phone number over and over again trying to get the conference center to accept my passcode. Sometimes it works OK, but I am finding many times it does not. This is really very disappointing and a very expensive lesson. So now I am off to find a Skype adapter that I can just plug a regular phone into.

So if you ever plan on using this phone to call your bank, or credit card company, or anyone that prompts you for additional data this phone will likely prove to be problematic. I do not recommend this product in it's current state.

I bought this product with caution, aware that not all of the reviews for it were positive.

To me, the major complaints seemed exaggerated.

Some reviews complained of cheap plastic, but it seems sturdy to me, even if it's not solid polycarbonate.

Other reviews complained of problems with the handset being hard to place on the unit. This also seems unsubstantiated to me; I have had no such difficulties.

I called my mom on speaker phone, and I had a 15 minute conversations at varying distances from the phone (up to 10 feet away) without any loss of clarity for her. So, I'm not sure why some complained about the speaker phone experience.

You do have to press 00 before every call, unless you're dialing a contact, but this wasn't a major drawback in my opinion.

In summary, this phone does exactly what I wanted it to do: it acts as a simple, cheap land-line replacement that doesn't need to be connected to my computer.

*** The call quality is amazing ***

My review is basically a qualitative and subjective comparison of audio quality of regular POTS phone , vonage/ooma and Skype modems(Vosky Call Center and Yealink B3G and B2K)

My setup:
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a) I have charter cable connection with 5mb download and 1mb(bits?) upload speed; the upload speed really slows down during the evenings and using my Linksys router's graph, it is sometimes less than 56kbytes/sec which is close to dial-up connection. Qos enabled for the VOIP and skype using the MAC address of the devices.
b) I have Vonage which I am porting to Ooma VOIP. Vonage calls get broken, specially during the evening hours, despite setting to 64kb upload speed. But Ooma just works great with 64kb upload speed(upload speed can be set by accessing the vonage and ooma hub/router).
c)I have a very basic SBC/AT&T POTS telephone service - best call quality.
d)I have Vosky Call center v2.2 and Yealink (B3G and B2K - very low but constant hum) skype modems. Vosky, US product, in XP is much superior than Yealink.

Findings:
---------
I must say the audio quality of Belkin F1PP is EXCELLENT ! Followed by Ooma, Vosky,Vonage and Yealink. When my friends complained that my voice was breaking in Vonage, I called them using Belkin phone(this phone), they said call quality was excellent almost like my SBC. No echo. No extra sound, hum etc.
I also have Skype outgoing unlimited call ($3/month) to USA-Canada and was able to call 1-800 of my Bank,Credit card,etc and was able to input my CC numbers, account number, etc using the keypads. So the touch tone feature works great.
My mother, who lives abroad(Indian sub-continent) said it seemed I was talking from the next door.

The speaker phone is equally great.

Belkin used around 5~8kbytes/sec and Ooma around 52kbytes/sec and Vonage more than 68kbytes/sec when I called to my SBC-ATT POTS phone. This is from my router's graph.
[Is there a way to post the graphs ?]

My understanding is that the algorithm that Belkin aka skype uses is extremely robust(G729 ~ 6.4kb) and can fall back to slow speeds. I doubt if vonage can use G729 at all, seems to stuck at G726. Ooma is much better than vonage. And using the graphs from my Linksys router (WRT54G on dd-wrt v24 firmware,Qos enabled), the bandwidth requirement of Belkin 1FFP is much much smaller than Vonage.


I do run another test which most user will not find very useful -- coupling my Pocketmail Composer(PM33)'s acoustic modem to check the delays in transmission(TX,RX),audio compression, etc(gives a very basic idea). SBC works the best, more than 95% of the time. Ooma half of the time. And Belkin F1PP did not work at all.

My conclusion:
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After SBC/Att aka POTS this is the best one for 24 hours outgoing call when the outgoing Bandwidth of cable connection varies. Please note that DSL is a dedicated connection and if (if, because distance from phone company exchange, line quality, etc.) you have a good upload speed, it should work equally well in DSL connection. Once I have DSL, I shall add my experience here.

In order of my preference for call quality:
POTS phone > Belkin 1FPP > Ooma > Vosky > Vonage > Yealink B3G-B2K

This is a subjective,qualitative preference. Only quantitative data is from graph

Other findings:
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It hanged couple of times in the last one month, re-booted itself most of the time. The handset is awkward and very light. I am not into conference call using skype, using Google voice one can use SBC-ATT land phone (POTS) to connect to a conference call within USA with no long distance charge at all.

And you also get the source code in tarball format on the CD.

This is a great product at this price with EXCELLENT audio quality.

I'm very disappointed with this phone. I'm trying to make a switch from regular phone service to VoIP to save some money. Keeping in mind that Skype service is not intended to be a replacement for a permanent telephone, this phone's performance is unacceptable in any respect. And I really tried to like it, too. It just didn't like me. First of all, a few complaints regarding the functionality of Skype service with this phone:

1-Skype does not support caller ID or call waiting. It will recognize numbers in the address book, and it can forward a call to another number if the line is busy, but these are by no means worthy substitutes.
2-*SEE UPDATE 1/4/09 AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS REVIEW* This phone does not output DTMF tones (the sounds you hear when you hit a number). So interfacing with a call processing menu is pointless unless it has voice recognition. You can purchase a handheld device that will play the tones for you, but it's another loop to jump through just to have normal phone service. Another option is using the speaker of a second phone. I have a cordless phone with a speakerphone that works great. You don't need dialtone for this to work either.
3-You cannot dial 911
4-This phone will not work in a power outage or internet failure

Pros and cons...

+ PROS:
+ Setup was painless.
+ The handset mic works well. People can hear me loud and clear.
+ The handset is comfortable on my ear and fits well enough on my shoulder.

- CONS:
- PHONE MALFUNCTION: First and foremost, the phone simply does not work all the time. Sometimes I will not receive a call and it goes straight to voicemail. Other times, I pick up the handset to answer a call and I cannot hear anybody on the other end and the phone freezes and reboots automatically, cutting off the call. I came to find out that I could still be heard on the other end before the phone turns off. The phone has seized up on me four times in two months of use. One time I had placed a call out and about 30 seconds in to the conversation the phone just turned off and rebooted. I know for a fact this is a problem with this phone and not the Skype service through rigorous testing. I have used Skype on my Mac as well as a different Skype phone and not encountered this problem.

- SOUND QUALITY: The sound output quality is poor overall. The handset speaker is especially bad. My wife said she has to turn the volume all the way down to avoid the harsh, tinny, robotic voices coming in. The speaker on the base is cheap, too. I tested the ringer on high volume and it just about murdered my sensitive ears. I've used another Skype phone (IPEVO SOLO desktop Skype phone) and the same sounds played through it are much softer.

- DIALING: I don't like having to dial "+" before every call because to do so you have to double click on "0". This becomes a problem when you're quickly dialing a phone number with successive zeroes. So if you're trying to dial "5500" quickly, you'll get "55+" instead. This is just plain oversight.

- SPEAKERPHONE MIC: The mic for the speakerphone is thoughtlessly located on the bottom of the phone, underneath a lip. So the mic is facing the flat surface the phone resting on at a 45 degree angle, hidden by this lip. I was told I could barely be heard while on the speakerphone. It only worked well when I lifted the phone up and pointed the mic toward my face. So much for hands free.

- HANDSET CORD: The phone is too light and the handset cord too short. If I attempt to talk any more than an arms length away, the phone slides on my desk. I feel confined while using the phone.

- VOICEMAIL PLAYBACK: The speaker volume cannot be altered for voicemail playback when output through the speaker on the base. It's much too loud for me. I'm forced to listen to voicemails through the handset.

- BUTTONS: The four-way directional buttons (the silver ring) and the black "OK" button in the center of them are dull. I have to press them harder than I should for them to work. The problem is the buttons click down and bottom out and then you have to push harder for them to register. Just another annoyance.

The bottom line is that this phone can save me over $500 a year on phone bills. Most of these flaws could be overlooked for this reason alone. However, frequently not being able to receive calls and having the phone freeze up on me is a deal breaker. I can't think of an application for which this phone could be well suited.

*UPDATE 1/4/09*
The phone automatically downloaded an update to the Skype software today and the phone now outputs DTMF tones, which means this phone now communicates with a call processing menu. Also, the phone has crashed and rebooted on me three more times. Once was today while I was attempting to retrieve voicemail, which has never happened before. The software has been unstable so far, but maybe this update will fix that.

The phone is a great value, once you finally get it configured!!!

HERE'S THE SOLUTION THAT BELKIN TECH SUPPORT COULD NOT FIGURE OUT. IT TOOK ME ABOUT A WEEK OF TRIAL AND ERROR, BUT I FINALLY GOT MY BELKIN PHONE TO WORK. HOPEFULLY THIS WILL SAVE YOU SOME TIME.

1. Log into your router by entering its IP address in the URL field of Internet Explorer. You can goto the command prompt (Start > Run > CMD) and type IPCONFIG to find out your IP address. Once you have this address, you can enter it in the URL area of Internet Explorer to get to your router's log-in page. Assuming that you haven't set a password on your router, try logging in with the username "Admin" and the password "password." Once logged into your router, browse the menus to find the area that allows you to configure a "static IP Address." Here's how this works - you can assign a static IP address to any item attached to your router, and the way this is done is by assigning an IP address to the MAC address of the piece of equipment that you want it to be assigned to. In the space requesting "MAC Address," you will need to enter your phone's MAC address which is on a sticker under your phone (note, more likely than not, 0's in the address are the number 0 and not the letter o). In the space for Static IP Address, use the same first three sets of numbers as your computer's IP address and the number 132 for the 4th and last set of numbers in the static IP address.

2. On the Belkin phone, go into "settings" and then "network" and select "static IP" note, this is NOT DHCP - it is below the DHCP option.

3. YOU MUST ENTER ALL OF THE FOLLOWING on the "NETWORK" Menu which is a sub-menu off of the "SETTINGS" menu on your Belkin phone.
a. Network Type: Static IP
b. IP Address (ENTER THE STATIC IP ADDRESS THAT YOU CREATED IN #1. this address will end in .132)
c. Subnet Mask (see below)
d. Default Gateway (see below)

NOTE: b. and c. can be found by doing a START > RUN in windows and typing "CMD" to get to the command prompt. From there, type IPCONFIG and this will give you the numbers for your subnet mask and default gateway.

My phone worked instantly upon entering this information, and I absolutely love the way it works!

If this phone supports DTMF, it could have been an excellent phone, earning 4 - 5 stars. This is the phone's fatal flaw.

Without DTMF support, it is only good for calling other Skype users or residential phones. If you call any phone that requires you to enter anything on the phone's keypad (for example, "Please press 1 to check account balance, 2 for transfer money, ..."), it would not work. This phone cannot send the numbers you enter on the phone's keypad correctly to the phone on the other end. Belkin's technical support blames Skype for not providing the required firmware updates.

Well, shame on both of them.

Product 4-stars, documentation and support 0-stars. Not everyone will have the same problems that I experienced but you may. Initially the phone would not connect to the internet though plugged directly into my 4-port hub/router. Belkin tech support was useless/non existant. You can't even find the product on thier support website and their support technicians were literally clueless. There suggestion was to return the product if it didn't work since they had no reference materials on the product. After searching on the web I found an article on port forwarding and after establishing a static address for the phone and enabling TCP and UDP port forwarding now have a functional phone. This was the most painful installation I have ever experienced.