Customer Reviews

Panasonic KX-TS600W Integrated Corded Telephone System

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

It's hard to find a "standard" phone anymore, and the KX-TS600W is a good choice for a basic corded phone. The sound quality is excellent, which is expected for a corded phone. It supports caller ID and call waiting caller ID. And it does not plug into the electric outlet, which means it should work during an electric outage. The phone does not have an answering machine, which is fine for anyone who either has voicemail or another answering machine.

The biggest problem is that the display is hard to read. I would have given the phone 5 stars if the display had a backlight. Also, the phone is setup to check for voicemail by default. So whenever you hang up any phone on the line, this phone picks up the line briefly to test for the stutter tone that indicates whether you have voicemail. This is very annoying if you don't have voicemail, but it can be disabled by setting Program > VM tone detect to off.

I bought two phones for my home after reading reviews and phone product details. No place on the web(including panasonic web site), phone details talk about requiring 3-AA batteries that I found after receiving the phone. New batteries die in less than a month. Replace batteries, same problem. Display is not lighted and hard to read. I would say panasonic should have provided AC adapter or low consumption battery product. I would stay away from this phone if caller id and speaker functions important to you.

The speaker phone and caller ID only work when you have batteries in it. It takes 3 AA batteries and they last a few weeks at the most, and that is with light use. There is no way to plug in an adapter either. The sound with the handset is okay, but the speaker phone is not very good. I do not recommend this phone.

I purchased this phone for business use for conference calling - it is excellent! The sound is very clear; the microphone will pick up your voice from quite a distance without any interference. Highly recommended!

I like the buttons. Good size and feel when you press them. The display is good and clear. Speakerphone is good quality.

This phone is everything I was hoping for and more. It has good sound quality. I love the phone book. The digital read out is better than any phone that I have owned.

I bought the Panasonic KX-TS600W phone as a replacement for a similar, but 20+ year old speakerphone (without Caller ID). I figured it would be nice to have the Caller ID function built in. Well, I should have read the reviews first. The device does not have a port to connect a "wall wart" power supply, and runs off 3 "AA" batteries. Not only does the caller ID display run off the batteries, but you also cannot enter the "speakerphone" mode without batteries. But while the instructions claim you get 6 months of battery life, in practice I get 3 weeks or so at best with good Alkaline-type batteries. Since I am an experienced electronics technician, I was able to make a measurement of the current draw upon the batteries: 5 MilliAmps. At that draw, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, you have drawn about 840 mAh per week.... you do the math, you would not get more than about 3-4 weeks on typical 2500-3000 mAh capacity Alkaline batteries at that rate. So I wrote a letter to the new Chairman and CEO of Panasonic Corporation of North America, Joseph M. Taylor. He referred my letter to a liason, Steven Robinson (551-482-8024). Mr. Robinson has been extremely helpful, and even sent me a new phone that was supposedly "modified" so it would run as advertised (6 months) on batteries. But I measured the current draw, and it also draws 5 MilliAmps, so it actually has the same problem despite whatever modification was done. We are still in limbo, and in my opinion every customer who has experienced this problem should contact Mr. Robinson and let him know that Panasonic has falsely advertised a 6 month battery life (and that 3 weeks is not reasonable battery life, you'd spend about $75 a year on approximately 52 batteries a year to keep a $30 phone running, pretty ridiculous!). My older (20 years) Panasonic speakerphone does not have an LCD display, but uses batteries to backup the programmed "speed dial" numbers, and the batteries last about 1-2 years. Panasonic should have designed this phone better, so that it runs either from the power of the phone line or alternately via a "wall wart" external power supply if absolutely necessary. Call Mr. Robinson, state your case. Maybe together we can all get a good resolution to this problem!

I recently bought a panasonic ts600, and ts105 phone, as well as an at&t 993. They are somewhat similar in design however in comparison the 993 is far superior in sound quality, and overall operation, it comes with a power supply, a larger screen, and has 2 lines. I'd suggest spending a little more and buy the 993 as it is a much higher quality phone, and in my opinion a far better value.
Best!

The caller ID etc. works only when batteries are installed. Fresh batteries are drained in about a week. I gave up replacing the batteries because it's so wasteful. My opinion of Panasonic really diminished when I discovered how poorly engineered this phone is.

Consider this an OK basic phone with NO caller ID or other display functions.

The one serious issue I have with this phone is that when using the headset jack, a few seconds after you hang up, it emits a dial tone burst through the headset. This may actually be loud enough to be painful, depending on your ears, your headset, and the volume settings of the phone and the headset (if it has a volume setting). But regardless of whether it hurts, it is annoying. I am going to try to replace this phone with a Plantronics T10 due to this problem. Obviously I don't know whether this problem is just with my unit or is present in some or all other units. One other reviewer (under a different listing of the same product but in back) has reported a problem that sounds the same.