davep@u.washington.edu (David Ptasnik) (02/28/91)
While I have occasionally disagreed with John over a variety of issues, I find myself largely in agreement with his criticisms of AT&T Phone Systems. At this time I am a Telecommunications Analyst for the University of Washington. This is MY PERSONAL OPINION, not the University's. UW has over 300 Merlin systems installed behind Centrex from a US West 5ESS Central Office. I am one of several people who analyze the needs of different departments, order Merlin equipment, order installation, program the equipment, and train the users. I have worked extensively with the Merlin 3070 FM 3, FM 4, and FM 5, as well as the Merlin II FM 1, FM 2, and Rel 3. Before I came to the University, I was an outside sales rep for a non-utility phone system vendor. I have sold Iwatsu Omega IV and ZTD, Trillium Talk-To and Panther, various TIE systems, Panasonic VA's and KXT's, and Tadiran PBX's. With that said, I must admit that I am not fond of the Merlin systems. The University receives outstanding support from AT&T. The Merlin gets quite large for a Key System. My gripe is with the features. It is a rather old fashioned and kludgy system. It does not have Call Forward Don't Answer or Call Forward Busy for stations. This means that it does not work well with Voice Mail or a centralized message center. This includes the most recent Merlin II Release 3 software. The Iwatsu systems I was selling five years ago had these basic features. When you use the Merlin Remote Call Pickup feature, the dial pad goes dead. If you have just picked up a call that requires additional dialing, you must transfer the call to another phone first. There is a feature called Call Coverage that allows one phone to answer for another on a delayed ring basis, while this sounds like Call Forward Don't Answer, its not. Once again, the dial pad goes dead as soon as you get the call. Further, one station is only allowed to cover six others. An attendant responsible for covering seven phones is in trouble. Only the most recent software allowed paging to every phone on the system. Previous versions allowed a maximum of 15 phones to be paged simultaneously. Even the most current version will not allow you to exclude a few telephones, you are limited to fifteen phones or ALL the phones. There is lots more, but you get the point. When I was selling the Iwatsu Omegas I was always pleased with the additional things I could make it do. With the Merlin, I keep running into walls. AT&T offers many things, technological sophistication on Key Systems is not among the offerings. In most ways, I think UW chose the most appropriate system for the needs of our users. Migration from 1A2 to electronic key was very easy for most users, with system's like the Iwatsu, it's sophistication make it TOO different from what our staff was used to. For technical reasons, we had to get Key System's, not PBX's, and we needed BIG key systems. When I bought a phone system for our house, I bought a Panasonic KX-T 616. I just LOVE it. Now how can I talk the Mrs. into letting me upgrade to the new Panasonic digital DBS, hmmmmmmm.... davep@u.washington.edu