PhoneValet Message Center Version 4.0.3 –The "Perfect" Telco Hub and Phone Assistant

reviewed by Robert Pritchett

If you are interested in having an auto-answer solution to incoming calls, you couldnÕt do better than using ParliantÕs PhoneValet Message Center. Watch the QuickTime video linked above. That page also links to an interview of Kevin Ford on Business TV News.

We reviewed this product twice before over the years and now PhoneValet Message Center 4.0 is pretty much battle-hardened and bullet-proof. We listed other reviews above, but this is such a great product, someone actually generated a Wikipedia entry for it at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PhoneValet_Message_Center

What I like about this release is that I can have any phone conversations going out or coming in recorded automatically. This is proving invaluable, as I continue to get Scammers online from "anonymous" and now their voices are getting recorded through my Vonage connection. And speaking of Vonage, the Parliant device comes with a 3-way splitter, so that I can plug in the device to the Vonage Phone 1 jack and reconnect the analog phone unit to the splitter, so the functionality is enhanced rather than hobbled. I attempted to get the "PC" jack to work between the iMac G5 and the Vonage device and I got dead space with no signal at all. The splitter thoughtfully provided by Parliant made all the difference.

Tim Robertson wrote up his review back in November 2005 on the PhoneValet because of his interest in the recording feature as used for podcasting. His review is at http://www.mymac.com/showarticle.php?id=2148 and discusses version 3. Since then, Parliant has also updated a software app for podcasters.

For more on the Phone Assistant, click here: http://www.parliant.com/phonevalet/?l=pptxt

For more on the Podcast function, click here: http://www.parliant.com/phonevalet/podcast/?l=pptxt

The podcast bundle of the PhoneValet Message Center includes SoundSoap 2 from Bias-Inc at http://www.bias-inc.com/products/soundsoap/ for scrubbing phone interviews and the standalone price is $99 USD. Jim Perry did a review back in 2003 located at http://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/review_soundsoap.html

Peak Express LE 5 for optimizing audio for Podcast streaming at http://www.bias-inc.com/special/peakExpress/ This version of the PhoneValet Message Center runs around $250 USD because of the two additional licenses for these two apps.

The PhoneValet Podcast bundle saves about $150 USD if the items were purchased separately. Andrew Kantor wrote a bit about it back in September 2005 over at All About This Particular Mac at http://www.atpm.com/11.09/phonevalet.shtml

For another $80 USD, you can also get PhoneValet Anywhere so you can call in from anywhere and pick up messages remotely using the Internet; http://www.parliant.com/phonevalet/anywhere/index.html

Any or all apps from Parliant have clients that are cross-platform as well as being Ubinaried, essentially making this a "true" universal app.

If you've stayed with us through the years, you know I've been a certified Computer Telephony Engineer, worked in a Voice Over IP Lab back in Connecticut and have been patiently waiting for the "perfect" Apple app for telephony. This was going to require some kind of computer dongle and external connectivity solution to the telco networks or over the Internet. Well, Parliant has the "Cadillac" system right here, right now and it is affordable for anyone who is a small home office environment that needs an Òalways-onÓ office assistant. This rev is the best yet, now that conversations can be recorded automatically.

The app comes with "voices" to choose from, but I reviewed some voices from Cepstral and used one of them to read a script I gave the program to "speak" when answering the phone. I just as easily could have created my own voice recording with the program and used that instead.

The only "downside" is that Skype hasn't been interfaced with the PhoneValet yet. Telephony engineers being what they are, I think because it is a challenge, the gauntlet has been dropped and Parliant may take up that challenge as well.

I highly recommend the PhoneValet Message Center and give it a "5". It really is that good! We shipped one out as part of our 4^th Anniversary Celebration last month to a lucky subscriber and podcast listener.