Posts Tagged ‘UT670’

Adding Exchange Support to The Panasonic KX-UT670

Posted: January 18, 2012 in IP Phone
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One of the biggest shortcomings of the Panasonic KX-UT670 is that there is no way to automatically sync your contact list and calender. (See my previous post: Link to post)
It does support IMAP and POP email but my assumption is that most users will not be sending emails from their office phone since they are sitting in front of their computer.

We use Exchange in my office so my goal was to get my contacts and calender synced to the phone.

I found a program called TouchDown from NitroDesk which is an Exchange ActiveSync client for Android.
Being that there is no Android Marketplace on the UT670 I had to navigate to NitroDesk’s website and download the .apk from from there.
Once it was downloaded and installed setup was a snap. I entered some information about my Exchange account and about five minutes later my emails, contacts, and calendar were all synced to the phone.

TouchDown includes Widgets that can be placed on the home screen. I have mine setup to show my calender and unread emails.

In my opinion this makes the UT670 worth purchasing. Without it I would have to manually sync my contacts with the SD Card which is pointless.

TouchDown is a relatively expensive app at $19.99 but without it I would not recommend purchasing the UT670.

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Review / Shortcomings of the Panasonic KX-UT670

Posted: January 17, 2012 in IP Phone
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———– Update 01/26/2012————-
Panasonic has been in contact with me regarding these issues and it seems that many of them will be addressed in firmware updates. Please see the follow up posts on the KX-UT670 at Link

The Panasonic KX-UT670 is an Android based 7″ SIP Phone.
It has all the bells and whistles you would expect of an Android phone.
The screen is bright and nice, interface is quick and snappy, and Panasonic provides a great SDK.

Here are the shortcomings I have found:
1) No Exchange support
2) No Bluetooth. Even though their site says it supports it I can not find a setting for it
3) Firmware upgrade does not work from the web admin. (The option is there but it doesn’t work)
4) Handset volume does not go loud enough
5) Screen is not dual touch (no pinch zoom) and does not scroll smoothly with light swipes
6) No marketplace
7) Can not add “Flexible Button” (BLF, speed dial, etc.) properties from the web admin
8) Officially supports only about 5 of Panasonic’s most expensive cameras (see next)
9) I can not get even the officially supported camera to work. There is an error saying that it does not support the camera’s settings but does not indicate what they should be
10) When you pickup the handset the “Check Voice mail” buttons disappears. You need to press the button and then pickup then handset
11) The sound quality is not as good as the other Panasonic IP phones. I am not sure if the handset is bad or it’s the phone
12) When you press the voice mail button and pick up the phone the dial pad disappears I then have to press the dial pad button before I can enter my password
13) Can’t make any changes without an SD card, install programs, change ring tones, etc but it doesn’t come with one
14) The touchscreen is a little off, I need to press below the key for it to register the correct key

At first looks it’s a great phone but the short coming above really limit its use.
Until at least some of these are corrected I would say stay away.