Home > Consumer Reviews > Philips CD2351S/05 - Cordless Phone Answer Machine

Do not buy this phone. The handset is ok, but the answerphone facility is useless. The odd message records ok, but in the majority the caller is cut off either almost immediately, or after a few seconds of speaking. Six messages yesterday, none of them recorded. I contacted Philips with this problem and they suggested unplugging the unit, taking the batteries out of the handset, then restarting. To no avail. The problem persists. I went back to them but they haven't replied. Terrible product and terrible customer service. I thought they could have at least offered a replacement or money back. It cost me about £40 new. It's just out of it's guarantee, but I've only been using the answerphone for a few months. This problem is featured in the FAQ's of the troubleshooting section of the Philips website for this model, so it's something they obviously know about, and which is probably common to the model. More reason for them to take more interest. You have been warned. Don't even think about it.

A neat product which I have had for a couple of weeks. Nice handset to use and answerphone is clear and easy to use. Very pleased with product.

Looks good but.........First major problem is the damn thing is too quiet, the mic rubbish and the speaker too which sort of renders the tool ie a phone to be 100% useless. Plus if you have a power cut then errrrr no phone, what would have been nice is to have battery back up in the base unit too :-) Had mine from argos £23 for two in a sale, but not worth a £5 in my books very disapointed :-(

I received this as a gift in 2006 (when it cost twice as much as it does in 2008!). Unfortunately, it is so bad that I would have taken it back if I had had the receipt.

The telephone handset works perfectly well - the menus are fairly intuitive and the call quality through the handset's earpiece is fine. The speaker function (which is on the handset, not the base) works moderately well, but struggles when both callers talk simultaneously. Reception away from the base station seems good. The polyphonic ring-tones are fun, if a little tacky (there is however a vaguely convincing 'ring ring' option). The styling may not be to all tastes, comprising rather a lot of shiny white plastic.

The big let down, however, is the answerphone. Given the positive comments of another reviewer, perhaps mine is faulty. Recorded messages fluctuate in volume every few seconds, frequently to the point of driving the built-in speaker to distortion, and are often so badly compressed that the words are an indistinct, incomprehensible blur (this seems to be particularly bad when the caller is using a mobile phone). Unfortunately there is no facility to listen to messages through the handset.

Perhaps mine is faulty, but I certainly won't be buying from Philips in future. Very disappointing.