BT Advanced Cordless Phones: "Z" versus regular? Also, do they have Audible Message Alerts?

[andrewilley]

Does anyone know what is the difference between the BT Advanced Cordless Phone and the BT Advanced Z Cordless Phone? Apart from the colour anyway, I know the current Z version is a rather unattractive two-tone black and silver, whereas the non-Z version looks much nicer in plain black. Specs-wise, they seem pretty much identical from the listings. This would be for plugging in to a non-BT phone line socket by the way, not linking to a Digital Voice account.

Also, could someone confirm whether this range has audible voice-message waiting alerts? The PDF manual mentions turning Alerts on or off, but not what that actually does. We want a setup with a base-unit that can beep a couple of times a minute whenever there are new incoming voicemail recordings that need to be listened to.

Thanks!

Andre

[jac_95]

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[andrewilley]

Has anyone got any thoughts on this? There is presumably some spec difference between the "Advanced" and the "Advanced Z" cordless phones, but apart from a different base layout the phones seem pretty-much identical (other than the colour). Looks-wise, I prefer the older (all black) version.

And do these phones have the option for continuing audible answerphone new-message-waiting beeps?

Thanks for any help,

Andre

[Anonymous]

Message alert is indeed what you want, so just choose whichever you can get. Although both look to be discontinued.

Even much older sets like the 8500 have the feature & can probably be picked up dirt cheap used.

[andrewilley]

Thanks, yes I assumed from the manuals that "Message Alert" would probably do this, but it isn't really described in any great detail. The manual for the newer 'Premium' handset specifically mentions audible beep alerts, so I just wanted to make sure that this was actually the same feature since most phones don't seem to support it. We don't really like the flat-face design of the current 'Premium' range though, the discrete buttons  of the 'Advanced' handsets are so much more tactile.

I still can't see any real functionality differences between the 'Advanced' and 'Advanced Z', just that the Z is a more plasticy half-silvered colour scheme and has a different button layout on the base. The 'Z' version is a bit newer, so is easier to find, but the older one isn't too hard to track down either.

Andre