Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!spool.mu.edu!telecom-request From: julian%bongo.UUCP@nosc.mil (Julian Macassey) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: I Take Issue With Moderator Buying Radio Shack Phones Message-ID: Date: 1 Apr 91 06:59:08 GMT Article-I.D.: eecs.telecom11.264.4 Sender: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Reply-To: Julian Macassey Organization: The Hole in the Wall Hollywood California U.S.A. Lines: 51 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 264, Message 4 of 8 In article contact!ndallen@eecs.nwu.edu (Nigel Allen) writes: X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 243, Message 7 of 14 > Several posters have referred to some modern residential telephones, > manufactured by AT&T and other companies, as "lightweight". > Northern Telecom's Harmony telephone set, which Bell Canada and some > other companies rent but do not sell, is a modern electronic telephone > set. The working parts and plastic shell do not weigh very much, and > apparently Northern Telecom's market research with prototypes of the > phone showed that consumers equated low weight with low quality. > And *that's* why there are lead weights in a Harmony telephone. > People who want a heavy telephone will find that manufacturers will > address that demand, but perhaps in an unexpected way. There are a couple of reasons to add weight to today's modern electronic phones: 1. Give the handset enough weight so it can activate the hookswitch. The alternative to this is to use cheezy microswitches instead of decent solid multicontact switches. Yes, this is one thing that distinguishes garbage phones. 2. Give the base some weight so the damn thing doesn't keep being yanked off the desk and dropping to the floor. Cheezy, crummy, sleezy, phones that are supposed to handle today's telecommunications needs are also often lighter because they use thin wall plastic that cracks and bends easily. A good phone (and that includes Northern telecom) is made from thick wall ABS such as Monsanto Cycolac T grade. This stuff is hard to break or flex. Modern handsets, even if they are using decent G3 style handsets, often are lighter because they have an electret element rather than a carbon T1 type element. Old style phones also had metal bases and gong ringers with iron and brass in them. These weighed more than phones with Ceramic resonator disc warble units. I have always considered TIE phones to be excellant examples of cheap, nasty, crummy, cheezy phones with nasty plastic, nasty little hook switches and armies of dweebs in polyester suits peddling them door to door. They managed to move telecommunications back five decades by selling phone systems that blew fuses when Tip and Ring were shorted. Julian Macassey, n6are julian@bongo.info.com ucla-an!denwa!bongo!julian 742 1/2 North Hayworth Avenue Hollywood CA 90046-7142 voice (213) 653-4495