Netgear SPH200W Wi-Fi Skype Phone
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I bought this phone at the beginning of April 2008. My intention was to use this phone solely for home use since I have broadband at home. So far I have been satisfied. But not totally! Here’s my review after using it for about three weeks.
I have connected to an unsecured, WEP, and WPA2-PSK access points.
Yes, it does take some time to connect from 5 - 20 mins. Frustrating at times. At home it takes about ten minutes. The best thing to do is fully charge the phone and then turn it on. I have a DLINK DIR-625 router and use WPA2-PSK encryption.
I have found that once you connect to an access point and its saved to your preferred network. You will have to pull the battery and reset it in order to connect to another access point. The reason is because it will cycle through from the last connection you made but not to the one you want to connect. I have no clue why this is but it works.
Note: You must have a T-mobile account to utilize it at Starbucks.
You must be familiar as to how wifi access points work and accurate in entering the key or passphrase. No butterfingers. For example, WPA2-PSK generates a 63 character passphrase. One mistake and you must enter the key again. Double check before continuing.
Also try to connect manually by inputting the information by hand.
As a last resort, you can try entering your wifi phone’s MAC address into your routers homepage setup under Network Filters. You will find this under Menu/Settings/About.
You must familiarized yourself with all its functions. Which means fiddling with it to get to know it better.
I have made domestic and international calls utilizing all three access points. Some calls at the other end sounded tinny and others were great. This was reported by the person at the other end. There was no problem at the wifi phone end. I don’t think its the phone but rather the Skype connection. I am not sure what they use, landlines?, satellite?, fiber optics? connections but some calls were hit and miss. I have a Skype Pro subscription.
The phone locks up at times and does not allow you to utilize the menu or cancel functions to get out of the freeze mode. The only option is to reset the phone by pulling the battery.
The phone can be charged either through the cradle or directly from the charger.
There is no headset that can be found that works with this phone. Even though Netgear stated on its webpage to use a 4-pin segment. Netgear has since pulled the webpage where they stated two headsets that worked with this wifi phone. Plantronics M133-N1 and M206-N1. These headsets have been discontinued by Plantronics and there is no place that sells them. Note that the N1 designator is for Nokia phones. Bluetooth would be very much appreciated.
Perhaps the firmware needs to be updated/upgraded to include Bluetooth.
As of right now my firmware version is 1.2.0.2 dated 04/07/2007.
Don’t dispair. It does work but since its an initial product expect it to have some glitches. Yes, the headset glitch is a big one. Not sure why they included a headset jack, if there is none that work with it. I mean ear pieces and mic.
Source: KanSkype at Netgear forums.