A Wireless Carrier Offers a Different Inducement to Drop the Landline

The Hub home phone from Verizon Wireless has a 800-by-480-pixel screen that can display a menu of applications, among other uses.

Here’s news you won’t see too often from a wireless carrier: Last week Verizon unveiled a new phone that is not a mobile device। Rather, the Verizon Hub is a home phone system that the company claims is a giant leap forward from traditional landline phones.

The reality? The Hub is indeed a leap, and for Verizon subscribers who have important add-on services, lots of friends and family members using Verizon and $250 or so in disposable income, it will be a worthwhile upgrade. Whether it is enough of a leap forward for others is far less certain.

For starters, you can’t even use a Hub unless you already have an account with Verizon Wireless, which immediately knocks about 70 percent of the American population out of the running. Beyond that, the device is similar to a phone you might see on an executive’s desk. The device, measuring about 6 inches by 11 inches, has a wireless handset and a seven-inch LCD display with a readable 800-by-480-pixel resolution.

But the Hub is different in many ways from the typical phone/speakerphone/dock combination, and not just because it’s more expensive than most ($250 before a $50 mail-in rebate, plus $35 a month for the service, which includes unlimited calls in the United States and Canada).

First, calls are carried over the Internet, not the Verizon Wireless network. For many users, this means venturing for the first time into the world of voice over Internet protocol, or VoIP, calling. But in this case, it’s a mostly meaningless distinction, since Hub calls are as clear as landline calls. The only reason it’s worth mentioning is that Verizon won’t sell you a Hub unless you live in an Enhanced 911 service area, where 911 calls to emergency services from VoIP phones can be identified by address.

The bigger difference between this and other phones is what the Hub’s little screen can do. In Relay mode, it is a desktop SMS device, on which you can receive, compose and send text messages and picture messages. But you can do this only as long as you’re communicating with other Verizon users — which, again, limits the Hub’s utility.

The Hub is one of the first home phone systems with visual voice mail. It gives the phone number and sometimes the name of the person who left the message. That means you can skip to the important voice mail first. You can also quickly program the device to send an e-mail message when you have voice mail waiting or to only send messages marked urgent.

The Do Not Disturb function will send every incoming call directly to voice mail without ringing the phone — a nice feature if your children, like mine, try to flee the dinner table every time the phone rings. And you can program the service to ring three separate phone numbers — your cellphones, for instance, if you don’t want to miss an important call.

Other Hub features increase the usefulness of services that previously had been available only on the Web. Those who use Verizon’s Chaperone service, for instance, can use the Hub to quickly check a child’s location on a map, and change the settings so the service sends an alert when the child moves a certain distance from a location. The Hub can also be used to send directions to a Verizon phone, assuming the recipient subscribes to the carrier’s VZ Navigator service.

In some cases, the Hub comes close to getting it right, but doesn’t quite make it. Instead of using a laptop or the Yellow Pages, you can search the Hub’s directory for people or businesses, then type in a phone number and get directions. But the directory itself has a major flaw. You can’t simply type “pizza” and “10036” and get results, unless 10036 is your home ZIP code. Rather, you have to create a location for every ZIP code you intend to search outside your home area, then select that location and start your search.

Even the Hub’s vast video library, courtesy of Verizon’s V Cast service, included some puzzlers. Among more useful videos, like one on how to make a daiquiri and previews of scheduled cable TV shows, were those offering “Christmas Food and Fashion” tips.

Of the hundreds of videos available on V Cast, I didn’t find any that convinced me the service offers anything better than what is on the Web. If you’re not great at navigating the Web, this could be useful in much the same way that AOL was helpful to Internet newbies years ago. Otherwise, it probably won’t get much use on your Hub.

Much better — and, thankfully, more up to date — were the movie listings, which included trailers you can watch on the Hub. And it was easy enough, from the Web page dedicated to my Hub, to add photos and turn the device into a digital photo frame.

So much for what the Hub can do. What it can’t do is perhaps just as important. So far, you can’t surf the open Internet with this, nor can you check e-mail. Verizon says it may add these services later, along with software refinements that will correct some of the flaws I noted.

In the device’s current incarnation, though, is it worth it? If you’ve got a Verizon subscription with multiple lines and unlimited data service (for all your intrafamily texting) and if you use the Chaperone and VZ Navigator services often, it is indeed worth considering. If not, this device isn’t worth switching for — at least not yet.

QUICK CALLS Verizon said this week it was on the verge of cutting its “New Every Two” phone discounts for subscribers who renew their contracts. Those with monthly plans of $35 to $80 will receive a $30 discount instead of the old discount of $50. Those with monthly plans of $80 or more will receive a $50 credit, instead of $100. ... A new T-Mobile phone, the Samsung Memoir, is a photographic specialist, with an eight-megapixel camera and a 16X digital zoom. This touchscreen phone will be on sale soon, at a price to be determined. ... Bank of America recently introduced a mobile app for BlackBerry users to help its customers quickly track their bank balances and find A.T.M.’s. The company has similar apps for iPhones, iPod Touches and phones using Google’s Android operating system, like T-Mobile’s G1, with other devices to follow.