Customer Reviews

MOTOROLA MD491 2.4GHz Cordless Phone Answering System

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

I thought the Motorola name meant quality products--but after using this phone I now know better. The following are a few of the problems I had with this phone:

1. What's the point of having a Caller ID phone if the caller ID information DISAPPEARS after the SECOND ring...and just says "Ïncoming Call"?

2. Sometimes the phone just does NOT ring on the cordless handset when a call is coming in...it just lights up. I can't tell you how many times I'd hear the corded base phone located in another part of my home ringing--and the handset next to me doesn't.

3. You cannot turn OFF or LOWER the volume on the ringing cordless handset or corded base if you don't want to answer a call. This is extremely annoying...and definetly NOT a phone for a home with sleeping babies or those who do not want to be disturbed.

4. You cannot listen to messages from the corded base phone PRIVATELY. It only works with the speaker phone.

5. If you want to call a name from your saved phonebook list...you have to scroll through ALL 100+ names to get to the one you want. On my previous phone all you had to do was hit the keypad number to the corresponding alphabet letter (example: #2 once for "a", twice for "b", etc) and it would automatically go to the beginning alphabet letter of the name you want to call.

If I hadn't tossed out all the packaging--I would have sent it back and gotten a refund. But now I am so fed up with it that it is going into the GARBAGE!!!

I have this phone system for about 1 month now. I have to say this phone is crystal clear. It is loud and I can really hear the call clearly. There is no comparsion to my previous Uniden and Panasonic. They are simply bad. No one can hear nothing from either the Uniden or the Panasonic in my house.

Some of the things I like about this Motorola is that I can set the ring volumn for different time of the day. So, it won't ring too loud at night. The speaker phone on the cordless handset is awesome! It is easy to use than any of my Uniden or my Panasonic.

One thing I don't like is the corded handset. It keeps falling off the base. The cord is just too close to the table making the handset hard to seat on the base.

I usually make call with my cell phone. So, I haven't had a chance to try out the answering machine or the phone book. But I don't use the phone for these much anyway.

I like this phone very much. I am planning to add a second MD41. Although I haven't had any problem with the phone. The reviews that mentioned bad keypad and dead battery are keeping me from getting the second MD41 unit.

But so far it is working very very well. And the price is pretty reasonable compared to the Uniden or the Panasonic.

If this can last for at least a year, I will definately buy another Motorola.

The phone system was easy to install and setup. It also provides you with a corded phone that has a battery backup (4 AAs)in case of a power outage, which was my main objective. It also gives the flexiblility of additinal extenstions which have many features, i.e. message indicators on the extentions, so you don't have to be at the base to receive or be alerted to a new message. The orange backlighted panel is good in all lighting conditions.

DO NOT WASTE YOUR HARD EARNED MONEY. I BOUGHT THIS PHONE THINKING THAT MOTOROLA HAS TO BE THE BEST. I CAN NOT HEAR ANYONE WITH THE CORDLESS PHONES AND YOU CAN NOT ADJUST THE EAR PIECE VOLUME. I AM LUCKY IF ANY MESSAGES COME OUT WITH THE ANSWERING MACHINE. THE NICE THINGS ARE THE CALLER ID, DIFFERENT RING TONES AND THATS IT. WASTE OF MY MONEY. SORRY MOTOROLA, JUST DIDN'T CUT IT THIS TIME AROUND.

We got this phone (base with two handsets) three years ago for close to $150. The reception was good, the base is solid. We love the walkie-talkie feature. But as many reviewers said the phonebook is annoying, no search function at all. That's not the worst, both handsets lost function of quite some buttons. One is impossible to use other than taking a call. I am not sure if Motorola is bad at this or what. I own a simple Motorola cell phone, which also has two keys lost function. In addition, the handsets had very short battery life, talking maximum 20 min. The phone including the base will not ring sometimes, I am not sure it's the problem of the phone or the phone service company (Vonage). Now we are looking to just change the handsets, not sure if other brands' handsets will work with this phone base.

after finally accepting the fact that Uniden phones are worthless, I decided to spend more money and go for a name I trusted, Motorola. But instead of getting a quality phone what I got was one of the worst phones I've ever owned. I don't even know where to start...

Sound quality wasn't great to begin with but after a few months it was mostly bad (echoes, interference, etc.).

The batteries immediately began to indicate that they were losing power as soon as they were removed from the charger. Though I noticed it immediately, I didn't think much of it at first. I assumed the phone software was just calibrated strictly to indicate loss of power. But now I'm looking at this phone that I've owned for over a year and the battery, after getting a full charge, will only last for maybe 10-20 mins!

The phonebook system is ridiculous - why didn't they just make it like a cellphone's? If you have lots of contacts, you must scroll through them all, there are no shortcuts within the phonebook system. The phone has two phonebooks (public and private), but you can't choose a default (the way the phonebook system is designed makes this 'feature' incredibly annoying).

I could go on and on... but why? Terrible reception; bad batteries; moronic phonebook interface should be enough to make anyone say 'NO'.. but believe me, it doesn't stop there.. there are numerous problems with this phone. TOTAL GARBAGE!!

This is absolutely the worst phone we've ever owned. The sound quality is terrible and the battery loses it's charge in just a few hours. Do not buy this phone. We're now looking for new phones to replace these.

This is an easy to use, reasonably well made phone but do not buy it if you want to wall mount it. It is advertised as being wall mountable but the wall mount is the cheesiest thing I've ever seen. The phone doesn't hang on the wall, it juts out about 7 inches and is really unstable. It's really awful.

Although this phone looks very sheek and had all the features we wanted it had terrible reception. No matter how close you got to the base you could hear static and you got that feedback where you can hear yourself talking. Other than the reception the phone was perfect, but since a phone is more about how it works than what it has I have to give this one only one star. By the way we tried two of this model before we moved on to the 5.8GHZ.

I purchased this phone system with 2 cordless extensions and the corded base unit. I really like this system. This system is easy to use. Volume controls are easily accessible. Answering machine can be fully accessed from the extensions, as well as the base unit. I highly recommend the purchase of this unit. You will not be sorry.