Which Cisco phone has the best quality speakerphone?

[edgertonj]

My boss is using a 7942 currently and is unhappy with the quality of the speakerphone. I need to look for a phone that we will buy that has the best speakerphone quality in the Cisco lineup. Any suggestions?

--

Jason

[Rob Huffman]

Hi Jason,

If your boss likes to get up and walk around and talk while on a call,

then none of the combined desk phone/speakerphone models is going

to work very well. The mic's on the desk phones like the 7942 are not designed

for this type of useage

You could insatll a 7937g with external mics;

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/voicesw/ps6788/phones/ps379/ps8759/product_data_sheet0900aecd806e021a.html

Or

A better way (perhaps) is a headset like the Plantronics CS540 .

If you are using these with your 7942's you can also order the APC-40

adaptor which replaces the need for the "lifter" kit

and allows you to leverage the Headset Hookswitch Control (HHC) setting on

the new phone models to answer and disconnect calls from the headset itself

without pushing any button on the IP phone

http://www.plantronics.com/us/media/media-resources/literature/office_callcenter/cs500_productsheet_en.pdf?WT.dl=20

Just a thought here

Cheers!

Rob

"Why not help one another on the way" - Bob Marley

[edgertonj]

Thank you very much for the response Rob! I am not going to be able to get my boss to wear a headset I don't think. That would be a great solution if he would though. He doesn't get up and walk around much. He just sits at his desk and is used to answering and making calls using his speakerphone button. He has been told that his voice doesn't sound very good by a conference call of other managers while he is on speakerphone so I am now on my task for a "better" phone. I have been looking through the brochures for the 7900, 8900, and 9900 lineup and it just isn't clear to me which one has the best speakerphone or if there are even any differences in that regard.

[joe.bennett]

Hi Jason,

     The 7942/45 are considered to have very good audio quality on speakerphone. I'd be looking at environment - ensuring that the phone is aligned to pick up his voice and not noise - and codec on the call. As an alternative, whilst the 9971 (and maybe the 9951) probably doesn't have a better sounding speaker phone, you can plug in an external microphone (into the 3.5mm headset socket) which you could then use a directional microphone and even one tailored for his voice.  Once you have an external audio feed then you can plug in all sorts of toys to tailor the sound of the audio as in a recording studio, it depends how much $$$ the boss is willing to spend to "fix" his audio.

Good luck,

Joe