Dialog Phone
reviewed by Daniel MacKenzie
Miglia Technology Ltd The Old Silk Mill Brook Street Tring HP23 5EF United Kingdom +44 (0)870 747 2988 Fax: +44 (0)870 199 1289 http://www.miglia.com/products/communication/dialogphone/index.html (watch the Quickclip). $79 USD, $90 CND, 42.54 BGP, 63 Euro. Comes with: Dialog Phone, USB dongle, CD, Soft case. Requirements: Mac OS X 10.4.0 or later; USB 2.0 Port, Internet, Skype, MSN, or iChat AV. Windows XP with Pentium III or later and other requirements as the Mac. Strengths: Small, compact phone that you just plug it in and use it. Weaknesses: Pricey, poor audio quality, no rechargeable battery. |
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When I took this phone out of the box, it looked like a very cool phone. It’s sleek and stylish and looks a lot like a Mac product. But after I started using it my opinion changed a bit.
The Dialog Phone is from Miglia which costs $90 CND, $79
USD, 42.54 pounds and 63 euros. It comes with the phone itself, a USB receiver,
a soft carrying case and a CD with the Dialog software on it. Personally, I
don’t think that the Dialog software was needed, because you can use the phone
directly through Skype or iChat. Now, like it says on the box, you can call
anywhere in the world for free. That’s true in some ways. You can call any
computer with this phone anywhere in the
world for free. Regular land line phones are different. Skype has something on
their website which says that you can call any phone in the US or Canada for
free until the end of the year. So please consider this before you buy it. Calling
regular phones anywhere else with Skype will cost you.
Dialog Software
It’s a plain box that has all of your skype and iChat
contacts bunched together. You can click on one of the contacts and press the
button on the top right corner of the phone and it will call them. I just think
it wasn’t necessary since you need Skype installed to use it anyway.
The sound quality was worse than a regular phone. I left a message on someone's answering machine and they said that they couldn’t understand what I was saying. The power source is two AAA batteries so you can’t just charge it. I would just rather plug in my microphone and call with that.
But still, it does what it says it does. You can call anywhere in the world, but it’s not always free. I just think there are better alternatives than this. Miglia has come out with a Dialog+ which might be better. I also find it too expensive for what it is.
