Customer Reviews

Caller ID with Phone Ring Controller

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I purchased this product for one primary reason - to block specific callers from ringing my phone. While this caller ID does have other fuctions, this was, for me, the only reason I purchased it.

Unfortunately, it failed at this job and even created other problems. Each time someone on the "blocked" list called the phone would ring for a fraction of a second. Doesn't sound bad, but it was. At times it was more jarring than having the phone ring normally. Also, at least once, one of the blocked callers got through. Not sure why that happened.

In order for this product to attempt to control who gets through and who doesn't it has to be the first thing connected to your primary phone jack. While that's logical, it also creates a problem that will be a negative for anyone with more than one phone. This caller ID blocked the ID information from being forwarded to my two phones. So the phone rings and the only way you'll know who's calling is to get up and look at the base unit that could be in another room or even on the other side of the house. Very inconvenient.

I used this caller ID for about a week and I knew it wasn't going to work. It barely did what it was supposed to and was more of a hassle than anything else. I contacted Smarthome, the Amazon distributor, and they were very courteous and took the item back and paid for the shipping back to them. I'd probably purchase from them again given how they handled the situation. But as for this product, I really can't think of anyone who would find it useful given its limitations.

First of all, buyers should be aware that there is a version 2 that became available early Jan 2010. The major upgrades over the original model include compatability with internet-based (VoIP) phones, an increase in the "reject" list from 20 to 70, and the ability to reject an entire area code (like 888) using wildcards. Although the controller has 3 lists: list "A" (always allow), list "B" (allow certain times of day) and list "R" (reject these), I only bought the controller to reject frequent annoyance callers (list "R"). The controller simply supresses the ring on numbers entered into this "R" list. Any devices installed between the "wall" and the controller - like an answering machine - will operate as before. Any devices installed "after" the controller - like your phone - will not receive the ring tone or caller ID. The caller ID will only be recorded on the controller itself. I personally do not want to hear my answering machine's greeting when receiving "rejected " calls. Therefore, I place both my phone and answering machine after the product. In this configuration, the caller will hear the phone ring until they themselves hang up. I don't hear anything.
In order to prevent your other extensions from ringing, some people turn off these ringers. That's not very useful in a larger home. I have voice over internet cable and so I simply installed the controller immediately after my modem which suppresses the ringing for rejected callers to all the phones in my house. It might be more difficult to find the entrance point for landline phone service. One limitation that I have not read before was the inability of the controller to suppress messages on a phone company or ISP-based message answering service. Even though most annoyance callers do not leave messages, their equipment seems to produce a tone which is captured by many answering machines as a brief message. So if you use a phone company or cable-based answering service, you may get alerts when you only have these false messages.
I only had the controller a short time. I first rejected 800, 866, 877 & 888 numbers. When an annoyance call comes in, I later retrieve the caller ID on the controller and set it to the "R" list. Good luck!

I use this unit as a call blocker. As such, it works well. It's connected between the wall jack and the base station on a 4-phone wireless system. I block all toll free numbers, using wild cards for the last 7 digits. It can also selectively block individual numbers. It is compatible with Vonage, which requires the country code to be entered on the unit. The phone does not ring and the answering machine does not pick up when a blocked number is calling. The ID is displayed on the unit for all calls. My only complaint is that the ID is not passed on to any of my phones, even non-blocked calls. Maybe this is not technically feasible. A workaround might be to plug your TV into a wall jack if it has caller ID display capabilities. The documentation is poorly organized but all the information is there. Just read it carefully.

I've been looking at a device such as this to block unwanted calls. With caller ID, I can see when the calls are from telemarketers, but I still have to put up with an unwanted ringing phone. I have a large-display called ID unit (Bright ID'er) that I really love as I can see it readily from across the room. I was concerned that if I place the call blocker after the caller-ID unit that it might not work. I e-mailed the company but got no response. I took a chance and bought it anyway and installed it after my calldr-ID unit. I then connected my ansering machine/phone after the caller blocker. (My answering machine has the phone built into it.) I tried it by blocking my cell phone number and then called my home phone number. Unfortunately, the phone on my answering maching rang when it shouldn't have. My other extension phone also rang, as did the phone on my fax. I did some sleuthing and was able to resolve the problem. In my original setup, my fax was the first in line after the wall connection, so I moved it after the call blocker and then plugged my answering machine/phone into the fax (EXT connection). The extenion phone still rang, so I turned off the ringer and tried calling again. This time everything worked as expected. The caller still shows on my Bright ID'er unit and on the call blocker as well. When I unblocked my cell-phone number, my answering maching came on as it normally does. The wild-card feature is great for blocking a bunch of calls from a particular area code.

I didn't give this product a five-star rating because of the lack of product support. I tried numerous times to call the manufacaturer but no one answered the phone. I could have save myself a lot of trouble and experimenting if I could have made contact with the manufacturer initially.

I think JF monitors these postings so I want to make a suggestion for the next version of this product: give it additional modes for handling blocked calls. Right now, version 2 of the device simply controls the ringing of phones connected to the controller. Blocked calls are allowed to continue ringing, but the ringing is not passed through to the connected phone. Phones not connected through the controller continue to ring as usual. That behavior is a lot better than nothing, but it would be more useful to have an operating mode where the controller would IMMEDIATELY disconnect blocked calls. Look at the call blocking behavior of the Uniden DECT2188 cordless phone system. In some ways, the Uniden's call blocking abilities are inferior to the "Caller ID with Ring Controller" unit. The Uniden has no wildcarding and no whitelisting capabilities. The call block list of the Uniden is only 20 numbers deep. But when the Uniden does block a call, it sends some sort of short tone then immediately disconnects. When I first installed the Uniden system, it was like day and night. I had been getting vast numbers of junk calls from three separate numbers. When the Uniden started blocking the calls, for a period of about two weeks, the calls completely stopped! It was like the autodialers of the scammers/telemarketers just kicked my number out. Although the calls eventually started up again, they are much less frequent. If the next version of the "Caller ID with Ring Controller" would imitate the Uniden's call blocking behavior (while keeping the wildcards and whitelists and deep call block memory), I think it would be a better product.

It works as I understood it to work. It intercepts the call, compares it to the list you store in it, and reacts accordingly. I have not tested all the functions, however. I use the reject list and allow all other calls to pass.
Two things to be aware of.
Caller ID on phones controlled by the controller will not have a functional Caller ID.
Because the controller has to intercept and direct the call, the caller will hear about 1 or 2 rings before you hear the first ring. You may have to adjust your answering machine pick up accordingly depending on how many rings you want the caller to hear before it picks up.

I haven't experienced the problems mentioned in other reviews (a short ring before blocking calls, eg). Perhaps I have the newer model that has been mentioned, or I just lucky with this unit. For the record, yes, it is true that this machine will only block the phone or base stations that are plugged AFTER the unit, but that makes perfect sense to me--I mean how could it do otherwise? If you want it to block all your phone lines, then of course you will have to do some poking around the outside of your house to find the main line coming in. Alternately, you could just use one base station with multiple phone sub-sets or just buy two of these units. This machine does exactly what I hoped it would. It will not allow numbers you have designated to get through to your phone and cause it to ring. Instead, it will just keep the caller ringing--either until they get bored and hang up, or until your answering machine silently handles the call for you. Or you can plug your answering machine also AFTER the unit and get no messages from blocked-listed callers. Yes, you can use wild-cards and block entire groups of numbers like: 1-8xx, or 1-415.xxx, etc, etc. The interface is a bit confusing and lame, but overall this things rocks as far as my needs are concerned. Thumbs up I say.

Not your ordinary Caller ID display. This is my second purchase of this device. I've had the first one for more than 12 months and that one is still in service.

"They" finally found my second phone number is the reason I bought the second one.

Also has a Ring controller that regulates when someone is permitted to make your phone ring.
I bought this for the Ring Controller aspect of this device.

I get tired of signing up to be on the Do Not Call (DNC) lists. Invariably some charity or other organization that exempt from the DNC lists will get your number and keep calling you. Why is it they always call when you just sit down for dinner or when you just started watching a really good movie?

This is my last line of defense at preventing my phone from ringing by unwanted callers and works quite well once you get used to it.

On the plus side, it has 3 classifications for numbers, A, B and R. Any number programed into R is intended never to allow your phone to Ring (which can be overridden if you like - Up to 70 numbers). A & B are for priority callers (up to 100 numbers each)

To get the most out of this device, all the numbers you would like to permit or restrict will need to be added to one of the three lists.

Now the caveats.

Keying in a number by hand is not what you call relaxing. Button response is sluggish and can be prone to errors when done by hand.

By far the easiest way to program is to add numbers directly from the caller ID display directly, but the caveat is that the person you want to block will have needed to have already called you after you have set this up.

Setting up the Time of day feature for each list is actually quite easy, but you need to remember what list is permitted to ring your phone for each hour of the day (All 24 of them for all three lists)

For example:
I set my A list to permit ringing my phone 24 hours a day
My B list (which also includes any number not previously entered or saved) to ring from 9am to 5pm.
My R list is never permitted to ring my phone.

The way this works will keep your handsets caller ID display from being able to display the current incoming caller because it intercepts the first ring it also prevents the Caller ID information from being displayed on the telephone handsets. You will need to go to this device if you need to screen your calls manually.

I've gotten to the point that I don't need to see the Caller ID because I have this device programmed far enough that it is already pre-screening all of my calls well enough that I know that it is a number I've already approved or it is a new number I am about to block anyway. :)

You can also program using wild cards so that you can block an entire area code (866, 877, etc.) if you wanted to, but that is not particularly self explanatory until you have done one or two of these. (RTM)

You can also program it to block calls when the number was not passed or was passed as 000-000-0000.

Doesn't play nice with Call Waiting. If two or more people car calling you at the same time, some squirrliness can occur. The phone might ring for a blocked number, but only because a previous call was in progress and the caller ID hadn't been received yet for the new caller. Call Waiting doesn't always play nice with this device but only because it is not aware of the second incoming call during the first call.

This device must be the first thing that connects to the telephone service as it only protects the telephones or extensions that are wired in downstream of it.

If any device is wired in parallel, those devices will still ring for each and every call until they give up and finally hang up. Which can be an irritation if you can still hear that phone ringing.

In my case, I have it wired in just before the telephone's base stations and will protect all of the wireless handset for each base station.

If you lose power all calls pass through unfiltered. There is no battery backup. But the device doesn't need to be reprogrammed as it appears that all of your programming is saved to EEPROM or nonvolatile memory. (unconfirmed).

I wish you could program it via USB to get away from programming it by using the on board buttons. Those really aggravate the heck out of me, but on the plus side, you almost never need to use them again after it has been programmed. So that part is a wash for me. I don't like them, but it really doesn't matter now. :)

No more calls from 800, 866, 877, 888 numbers; no more daily calls from debt collectors hunting Melanie (I am not Melanie and do not know Melanie). The instructions are a little unclear at times, but I programmed numbers in my reject list first (easiest since I was blocking area codes only using the wildcard option). Entering the entire number of callers I want to receive proved to be more time-consuming, so I decided to just add them to the accept/reject list as calls come in. Most friends and family call my cell so this is not as important to me as being able to block unwanted calls which this product does 100%. That in itself is worth the price of this item.

This device contains a whitelist and a no-ring blacklist. Adding any number in the Caller ID log to either list is a breeze. Any number on the blacklist will not ring downstream phones. Say goodbye and good riddance to robots. A pity the service providers will not offer such a simple service - but then, every call is a penny in their pocket, even if it is a torment to you.

Sadly, this device blocks all Caller ID info, including the time sync, from all downstream devices. IMHO, this is nothing more than a matter of careless design. Ergonomically the device is an enigma. The design of this box would have benefited greatly from the services of a decent product design engineer. It appears to have been built by a lab tech.

Yes, as others have indicated, the docs are a train wreck. This is another area where a professional touch would have been valuable.

It is hard to understand why this product, which performs a valuable function reliably albeit amateurishly, has no competition at all. Since I bought the device a year or so ago the price has gone up substantially without any improvements being made at all.

If a better product was available I would buy it.