AT&T 1726 Digital Answering System with 3 Mailboxes
by Advanced American Telephones

Our Price: $105.95
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Category: CE
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Digital Photo Product Details

• 40 minutes of record time
• Caller ID number announce
• 3 mailboxes
• Message transfer between mailboxes
• Audible message alert

• Bell Sonecor BE50LD Large Display Caller ID Box

Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of AT&T 1726 Digital Answering System with 3 Mailboxes

Customer Review: Decent features, crummy documentation, mediocre sound
Summary: 2 Stars

First, the documentation is not even sufficient to explain fully how to record the greeting. As another reviewer mentioned, after selecting the greeting one wishes to record, you have to sit and wait about 15-20 seconds before the unit will go into a state that allows you to record. The manual does not mention this waiting period at all, it implies you can record immediately. This model has been out quite a while, plenty of time for AT&T to have updated/corrected the documentation. Thanks to reviewer T B Curtz, without the info provided in his review, I'd still be fumbling around trying to get this unit to record the greeting. I'm good at following instructions, and technically-minded (engineer), so I'm not accustomed to being baffled by a simple piece of consumer equipment.

The sound quality of the recorded outgoing message is poor. It sounds as if it was recorded underwater, with uneven volume, and cuts off with a burst of static. I've only listened to one incoming message, which sounded better than the outgoing recording, but still had a muffled, filtered quality.

When replaying a message, you can skip back to the beginning of the message, but there does not appear to be a "partial skip" in case you want to just listen to the previous 5-10 seconds of a message. With my old tape unit, the manual rewind control was handy for this, but with the AT&T if you miss some content, you have to listen through the whole message again. This lack of a partial rewind feature may be typical for digital units, but is especially missed if the sound quality is muffled.

I don't understand why the designers of this type of equipment (not just AT&T, all answering machines) don't focus more on sound quality. Why did my 10-year-old dual-tape unit sound better than a brand new digital unit? And shouldn't there be testers who approve the documentation, to ensure that a new user following the instructions can actually operate the unit? So, in summary, I can't recommend this unit, although honestly I don't know how it compares to other digital answering machines. I believe if someone produced a sturdy analog dual-microcassete unit, in the $30-50 range, there would be huge demand.

Description of AT&T 1726 Digital Answering System with 3 Mailboxes

An extended record time of 40 minutes means you won't have to erase your messages just to have free storage space for new messages, and the device even lets you move messages between mailboxes for convenient file sharing with other household members. A two-digit message counter informs you of how many messages are currently in each mailbox.