Uniden TRU 9488 Disappointing

I purchased the phone due to its positive ratings and a couple mandatory features. I wanted a phone with the speaker phone in the base so I could answer with one finger. I wanted large buttons on a base dial pad as this makes dialing easier with arthritis in my hands. I didn’t want an answering machine, but there were no phones with the two features I wanted that didn’t have an answering machine.

The basic system setup is reasonably simple. The intercom is easy to use and works fairly well. The speaker phone works well. Since we have voice mail, we are not using the answering machine.

The instructions say to place the base unit at the highest location in one’s home. (You don’t know this until after your purchase the phone as the instructions are inside the package.) I placed the base phone in my home officer which is in the lower level of our home where I spend most of my time. The handsets work ok in some upstairs rooms, but not very well in the master bedroom. The distance from the base to the bedroom is less than 50 feet. By contrast, our 2006 AT&T 2.4 GHz Cordless Phone (E2116) located upstairs, will work 100 yards from the house. My older Sony 900 MHz (SPP-933) with the base in the lower level, like the Uniden, will work at least 25 yards outside the house, through brick walls and a steel door.

Why are the handsets now so small that the buttons are slightly smaller than those on my LG cell phone? In summary, the basic system is ok, but the range is certainly deficient.