Radio Shack 43-140

The Radio Shack 43-140 is praised as a niche product: a cordless phone that's specially designed for users who have impaired hearing or vision. It comes with corded and cordless handsets that have blinking red lights when a call is incoming. Ringer and earpiece volume are adjustable, and large backlit buttons are easier to see than buttons on most modern phones. There are also audible and visual caller-ID features, as well as audible and visual message indicators for the answering machine. This phone operates on the older 5.8 GHz frequency, which is more prone to interference than the 1.9 GHz frequency most new phones use, and lacks Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications (DECT) technology. Users don't complain about interference, although a few say this phone still isn't loud or clear enough for them. Still, reviews praise this phone more consistently than other phones for the hearing/sight impaired. Note that you can't add more handsets to this phone, unlike two other Best Reviewed phones, the corded/cordless AT&T CL84209 (*Est. $110) and the cordless-only Panasonic KX-TG5612 (*Est. $60).

We found only two sources of user reviews for this proprietary brand from Radio Shack: RadioShack.com and Epinions.com. Still, reviews are more consistently positive for this phone than for other phones designed for the hearing/sight impaired -- especially when you consider that it appears to be exactly the same phone as the discontinued Uniden CEZAI998, which had a long history of good user reviews.