With BT gradually shutting down old-fashioned telephony, landline technology is being superseded by a new system in which phones work via a radio link to a BT Smart Hub router. BT offers two of these Digital Voice phones, a more expensive model that includes Think Assemble’s Alexa and this cheaper, basic variant.The phone arrives in a cardboard box in which you’ll also find a little docking station, a cable to connect the station to the mains and a simple instruction leaflet. Two rechargeable AAA batteries are already installed. All that you need to do to get the phone working is to charge it up and then press and hold the WPS button on the left hand side of your Smart Hub for two seconds. It really is as simple as that.The phone’s sound quality is wonderful, and will be a revelation to any old person who has never used any telephone but an analogue one. Its features include a button for blocking nuisance calls and a wide choice of ringtones. Its screen isn’t quite as good as its pricier sibling’s, and its buttons feel a bit cheaper too, but the difference isn’t enormous. All in all, what appears to be a reasonably well engineered product , and a phone that won’t cost you an arm and a leg,

When BT change you to ‘digital voice’ your old phone can’t just be plugged in. BT will send you a widget to put between your router and your old phone. That only works if Royal Mail are not on strike and they actually deliver it! After a week and a half with no phone I reluctantly ordered this handset from Think Assemble and it was delivered over night. It appears to be the only domestic digital land line phone available, and will only work with BT’s Smart Hub 2 router on your broadband. WIFI connection was very simple and worked first time in a few seconds. The handset has lots of modern features enabling you to make the best of the digital voice service and, while the instruction manual is extensive and well written, there is quite a lot to take in if you wish to make use of all the features. It stands on its own charger while not being used, although you can leave it there if you like to use the phone hands-free. I think the sound quality is OK – I’m rather deaf so it is never really clear to me at best. Digital voice has a built-in answering service which you get at via 1571, and there is a button on this handset to call this directly.Once the widget turns up (it’s actually called a Digital Voice Adapter) you can connect your old handsets to the digital service. Again, this is connected very easily by WIFI. It is perfectly possible to have both old and new handsets connected to the same phone line, through your broadband.There is a potential for difficulty if you have other equipment connected to your old phone – equipment that will auto-answer a call, such as your own message recorder, a fax machine, a call blocker, etc. One needs to set the auto-answer on the digital phone to max, and reduce the auto answer time on your device to ‘9 seconds’, I found that more than 7 seconds wouldn’t work. You need to do this to ensure that your device auto-answers before digital voice. Recommended.One feature that may be very useful in a busy household is that, while you have just one phone ‘line’ with one phone number, the digital line can accommodate up to five simultaneous calls. I haven’t tested this feature, but when setting the digital system up I found that this facility clashes with the use of the attached auto-answer equipment on my old handsets. I have had to switch off the multi-call facility, but I can see that it would be excellent in an all digital handset set up.

Damaged box. Phone clearly not brand new. Obviously a returned item which had handling marks all over it and a knock mark on the side. Directions book torn.

Not too sure how to rate a phone. I can say the clarity is good, the answer machine through 1571 works well. The ability to add nuisance calls to a blocked list is useful and efficient. I thought I could transfer contacts from my smartphone but this was not possible so had to re enter these but that aside perfectly ok.