Customer Reviews

Polycom SoundPoint Pro SE-225 Phone Power Supply Included

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(13)

 

 

Due to the less than glowing reviews about this phone on this site, I hesitated from buying this phone. All my research indicated that this phone would perfectly suit my needs, but I passed over it and searched for more suitable alternatives. However, I found nothing comparable -especially at this price. I called Polycom's tech support department and asked about the kind of problems they received regarding this phone and what potential concerns customers typically express.

Well, I ordered the phone and set it up. It exceeded my expectations in every way. I work from home managing collaboration for nationally distributed sales and operations teams -thank goodness for the Internet. I spend much of my day on conference calls. With this phone and three way calling from my local phone company on each line, I can call instantly arrange conference calls with up to four locations.

This phone is very well designed for the person who uses the speakerphone. I almost exclusively use the speakerphone. No one has ever complained about the quality. It allows means to speak softly or not. I have walked into the room adjacent to my office and maintained a conversation. I can work with my back to the phone and continue my conversations.

The phone permits extensive user customization to suit her work style. This includes setting separate ring volumes and ring styles for each line. Separate handset, speakerphone and headset volumes. Stores 99 incoming, 99 outgoing call histories and 99 speed dial numbers. Many more options that indicate that Polycom spent some time thinking about the features that improve productivity.

The handset does not seem of any lesser quality than more expensive phones from Avaya, Meridian or Nortel. I do not consider the inability to lower the keypad volume problematic. I don't consider warmth generated by the phone abnormal or problematic. My home office permits me to work without disturbing anyone. I plug my phone into a battery up, so that I can use it even in a power outage. I have my entire office equipment on battery backup. My role does not accommodate downtime.

If you want a two-line phone with a terrific speakerphone, I do not believe you will find a better one -especially at this price. I recommend this phone without reservations.

August 10 Update:

Originally, when I submitted this review -two weeks ago, I said that I wished that the phone had a voicemail waiting indicator. Well, it does!!! I had to call my phone company, Qwest, and ask them to activitate "Visual Messaging Waiting Notification". Now, when I have a message, a red light on the button of the corresponding line -line 1 or 2, flashes. What a wonderful surprise!! So, now and after an additional two weeks of use, I do not have a single complaint or wish for this phone - perhaps a Qwerty keypad for entering contacts or bluetooth synchronization with Microsoft Outlook and my PalmOne Treo. :)

december 2011 update:

6 1/2 years later, i still use and love this phone! absolutely no issues. still sounds great. i use a headset with it much more than i used to. headset negates traffic noise from outside. also, a few years ago, i purchased a second phone for use in the kitchen. still highly recommended. not compatible with voip. fine with me. i don't use voip.

I've been shopping for a good home-office phone for a couple of months and was about to give up. I've purchased at least 3 phones including the ATT 4-line; AT&T 2-Line; and one other brand - none of them gave me the features and quality I was looking for. So when I found the Polycom, I was very anxious to receive it until I started reading the reviews.

I'm not sure if I have a newer version of the SE-225, but it's terrific. I say that after opening the box with an extremely pessimistic pre-disposition, ready to pack it up and return another phone based on the negative comments. In two days of very active use, I have NOT been disappointed.

Some specifics:

Speed-dial: Too easy to use, 2-touch dialing for your top 10, with room for 99 (total) searchable by letter (like your cellphone)

Handfree: The volume is excellent, and the callers I've polled said it sounds great (I haven't been on the otherside of a call yet)

Footprint: It's not overly large, and the Console Cable that's included means only 1 cord snaked across the desk!

Quality: In no way do I feel like this phone is not worth the price. It's exactly what I expected from Polycom.

Cool features:

Primary Line: Allows you to designate which of the 2 lines is the main one you use, so it selects that line when you pick up the receiver, headset, etc.

Distintive Rings: Pick a ring and a volume for each line.

And just so it doesn't seem like I work for Polycom, the one thing I don't like is that you can't program Pauses into the speed-dial. It doesn't have a call-waiting light, but that's a small sacrifice considering what you get.

All in all, being the picky techno-geek I am, I am not seeing any of the negative points mentioned in some reviews. But given the dates that they were submitted, this may be an improved version of this phone. No matter, I highly recommend it!

pas

With some trepidation I bought the PolyCom SoundPoint Pro #225 but it turns out to be just fine *for the price*. I suspect that a lot of the disappointment comes from making a direct comparison of this phone with the high end PolyCom equipment found in so many office conference environments. I think it's unrealistic to expect this desk top phone (...) to be as good as PolyCom's conference phones selling for three to four times as much.

It is the best desk top speaker phone I've used. The loud speaker perhaps emphasises the bass too much. Thus sometimes recorded voices sound "boomy" but normal conversation seems excellent. It's a bit like hearing voice programs on a high fi system designed for music. I find it definitely good to acceptable. My correspondents have reported good quality sound.

Full duplex operation is excellent *as long as the highest volume for the speaker isn't used*. This is important since at the maximum volume full duplex seems to break down a bit. I suspect that some of the disappointment comes from trying to use this phone at the high volumes normally used for a conference phone. For normal conversations at my desk, I find setting the volume up half way is plenty loud enough and full duplex works well. Conversations are extremely natural.

All in all, I find this a good desk top speakerphone, better than anything else I know of. Yes, I would like and would pay for something better in the configuration of a desk top phone. Until I find one this phone is serving me well.

Note: I would save the money of buying the model with the second speaker. I never use it. This is not a true conference phone. Buy a high end PolyCom phone for that. You won't be disappointed.

As a speakerphone, I like the phone. No problems.

Three minor issues -- (1) There is a dataport connector on the back of the phone. This would be good if you wanted to daisy chain your fax machine or modem off the phone, you would expect most people to do this with "line 2", but the data port is "line 1". (2) There is a volume control, but even if you change the speakerphone volume to really low, the touch tones ARE STILL LOUD AS NORMAL (waking up the family). (3) The handset seems too cheap to me and as a very hollow sound.

Otherwise, like the phone. Speakphone is good quality, I purchased the unit becuase I am sitting on conferences calls listening to people pontificate.

The smallest things irk me so don't be too put off. Have had this one for 2 wks, been looking and trying misc brands for 6 months. Would buy Polycom again. It's a well made phone that performs admirably, esp in speakerphone. The 225 is the same as the 220 except it has more (99 vs 10?) memory number storage. Only 10 are true 2-key speed-dial though (a 2-button process, press the "speed dial" button then a number 0-9. You can scroll thru your 99 stored entries then hit speed dial button but that's not really speed dialing, ie there are no memory registers 11-99. In addition the 225 has a single cable to the phone that incorporates power and a single 4-wire L1+L2 connector...nice.

The good:

=Line in use by you is green, by another is red. Flashing red means message waiting on the Ma-bell or VOIP answering service. Easy to quickly see and discern what's what.

= We have a VOIP line and a Verizon landline; it works fine on both. Volume and all else is equal.

= No need to press line1/2 to get dial tone before dialing. Just start dialing digits and phone automatically activates the line. This is a love-hate thing. If you make a mistake dialing you can't go back 1 digit to correct and when ready then press Line1 to activate and dial like the Siemens gigaset (junk quality and 2.4GHz which is bad btw but that's another rant)

= Speakerphone quality great - people say they didn't know they were on one until I asked them.

= Timer to know duration of call as it progresses. Does not save call's elapsed time after you hang up and review past call list tho.

= Ring tones are great - nice selection and the ability to choose something that isn't jolting. The ring volume can be lowered to quite a nice low setting (or off for each line) which makes the key-beep/speakerphone volume minimum setting problem that much more apparent. see below.

The bad:

= I wish I could lower the volume of the key-beep when dialing, as well as the speakerphone itself. While not obnoxious, in a quiet home office near a sleeping room, you'd wish for a lower minimum setting. I have yet to find a way to disable the key beep - not sure you can.

= The LCD screen is a tad too flatly positioned. Anything more than 2 ft away from you and you'll have trouble reading it. Not a deal-breaker, you can see fine in a traditional setting, but worth a mention.

= Keypad and other function buttons not backlit.

= No speed-dial template to write down who is on the list. I taped a skinny piece of paper to the handset with my 1-10 entries.

*note not in manual: when formatting numbers from incoming calls before adding to speed dial list, press the # key enough times and you will see an option to strip the (1) prefix from a 10-digit number...a handy thing for VOIP users.

I read all the reviews as did everyone else and I was caught between a home phone with a lot of features like the uniden or panasonic (needed 2 line) and a professional phone like Polycom. Even though this unit is the little brother of the bigger conference room speakerphones it is undeniably a solid performing small business / home office phone. You won't get the features of a home phone - yes the non tilting LCD is annoying and you can't download Brittney's latest masterpiece as a ring tone. But what matters for me - searchable and indexed phone book (type in the letters and it goes right to the name), as well as an excellent speakerphone. I don't know about other reviews knocking the speakerphone, but for me it is excellent. There is *no* static or clipping for me whatsoever. I rareley ever use the handset and sit 2-3 feet away form the phone and no on eever complains. So I felt compelled to through in my two cents - excellent phone, just what I was looking for for home office, excellent handset / speakerphone / call transfer and conference abilities, etc.

I use this phone for my home office. Over the years, I've used everything from Panasonic to ATT to BT phones. Like many people, I knew Polycom because of their exceptional conferencing/speakerphone products. My criteria were price, quality and ease-of-use. I didn't need a lot of gee-whiz features. I've had phones with enough features and gadgetry to run the space station if you wanted, but all I ever did was use them to dial numbers and make phone calls. I do a lot of multi-tasking so being able to carry on a conversation on the speakerphone while working on the computer was absolutely necessary. I also didn't want something that felt like it was made out of cardboard.

The Polycom has delivered. The voice quality is excellent on both the handset and the speakerphone. Conversations are clear and free of phantom noise/echo. Yes, people can tell they're on a speakerphone but that's just physics at work. There is absolutely no way that moving air (with your voice) 2-4 feet from a microphone is going to sound the same as moving air inches from a microphone. If there is some way to focus sound waves like a laser beam at the microphone, I haven't found it. The LCD displays all the relevant information. The volume is adjustable in small increments, unlike many phones which seem to only have "silent" and "foghorn" levels...

Build quality is excellent. The paint and finish are very professional. Everythig feels solid, buttons are a good size and everything is clearly marked. The unit itself looks better in person than it does in the pictures.

No, this doesn't have anywhere near as many features as other $150-$200 phones. No digital answering system, no flashing LEDs, nothing. The money was spent on the sound hardware and the production (and of course Polycom's profits). So, as the title implies, it all depends on what you want from a phone. It's worked well enough for my purposes that I have bought 3 more units.

As an engineering contractor I travel to many client offices during the day and use many types of office phones. I purchased this phone for one of the desks in my small engineering office back in 2006. When this phone works it is the best office phone available at any price. Since the phone was purchased, it has been replaced 3 times during the waranty period due to severe failures. Polycom has told me these failures are due to its connection to a "digital" phone line, but my phone service provider insists that my phone lines are both analog (Qwest says that they have no digital phone lines in my area). Anyway, I am searching the web now looking for a different phone to purchase. I am also about to call Polycom to report anothher failure with this phone and have it replaced yet again under warranty.

I have just read through the reviews again for this product to see if other people have had similar experiences. I find that many people have experience the same problems that I have. Interestingly, some people report that their phones are working fine. My Polycom SE-225 also works great for about 2 to 3 months before it experiences a failure. By the way, I purchased a commercial quality uninteruptible power supply after the first failure, but the next two phones also failed even with the phone power cord and phone line protected from line surges.

The sound quality on this speakerphone is great. People on the other end can tell you are on a speakerphone, but so far no one has asked me to pick up the handset (which they often do when you are using a cheaper speakerphone.) The full-duplex feature seems to work well.

However, I am totally puzzled by why the sound quality is so poor when using the corded handset (one of the reasons I switched from a cordless to a corded phone was to get better sound quality, which I'm not sure I got). The sound is unnatural, and there is a loud omnipresent buzz (which the other party can here as well), which gets louder when you put your hand near the coiled cord (almost as if it were acting as an antenna.) Replacing the coiled cord did not help. For a $200+ phone, I expected much better handset sound quality. The phone is physically well-made and the controls are intuitive. I'm going to keep it, but mostly because its just getting really hard to find a corded phone with good sound quality -- no matter how much you spend.

Pros:

The Soundpoint Pro SE-225 is a solid analog phone. It has a pleasing shape and works as advertised. I have experienced no humming or quality issues that some of the reviewers have had.

Cons:

The speaker volume control is somewhat loud even when it is turned down all the way. It would be nice to turn down the volume to zero or mute. This product is due for a technical upgrade. It has been around for years, without any significant visible updates. A audio output would be nice to have so that I could better record some of the technical webinars I attend. The LED screen design could be significantly upgraded with color, size and resolution.

Why I didn't I just purchase a IP phone?

I work in a virtual environment, and our digital team is spread across the nation. On our daily project call, the two guys that have the worst voice quality in terms of sound level and breakups, both use IP phones. IP phones also seem to degrade webinar bandwidth as opposed to analog (even though my analog phone is on a digital line).

So, I did my research, and this seems to be one of the best analog small office phones available. The $59-$99 RCA or ATT phones just didn't have adequate sound.