BT Glide home phone

Bluetooth home blower... that blows

BT is trying to drop-kick the home phone into the 21st century with this handset, which communicates with its base station via Bluetooth.

That 'toothiness also means you can easily sync it with the contacts from your mobile. Setting up a connection is child's play, and a Nokia 8800 zipped around 100 contacts to the phone in under five seconds. The option to use it with a Bluetooth headset is also there, if you fancy schlepping around your house looking like a big idiot.

All these added features are nice, of course, but the Glide's dirty secret is that its call quality is not great. Incoming calls sound fine, but phone someone yourself and you often get interference.

The menu system is easy to use and it has T9 predictive text - unusual for a home phone. However, the colour screen is dark and murky, the handset is about twice as thick as a normal DECT phone, and people will think you're phoning them from Venus. Even with the cool Bluetooth bits, that makes this over-priced behemoth hard to love.