Officially announced today and scheduled to be available by mid-12/2011, the snom 720 and snom 760 are the two newest VoIP phones from snom. They also launch the newest series of snom phones, the snom 7xx series.

First Glance

At first glance these new snom phones look quite similar to the snom 8xx but the two most noticeable differences are the new gray color scheme and the quantity of programmable LED function keys. The snom 720 has 3 rows of 6 for a total of 18 while the snom 760 has 2 rows of 6 for a total 12.  

The keys can be used for shared line appearances, busy lamp field, transferring calls and many more functions. While this may seem a bit quaint and old fashioned to have this many LED keys, for people who are new to VoIP phones they will provide a sense of familiarity, making the transition a little easier. I think this is important as more and more people migrate to VoIP systems.

In addition to the standard telephony features both the snom 720 and snom 760 support HD Voice, have dual Gigabit LAN ports, built in full duplex speaker phones, USB ports for the snom USB wireless dongle or Bluetooth headsets, and have 4 variable function keys in addition to the programmable LED keys.  As with other snom VoIP phones they will work with most SIP based systems and are Unified Communications ready.

Both phones also feature snoms’ new audio subsystem that “was designed for excellent performance in office environments” and “supports a large range of codecs, wideband audio, handset and hands-free operation according to TIA-920 standard.”

Features and Functions

The snom 720 has the smaller display of the two models with a 4-line black and white display. It appears to be more of the entry level of the two models and its main features are:

• 4-line B/W display
• 18 LED function keys
• 12 identities
• Wideband audio
• Hands-free operation
• Power over Ethernet (PoE)
• WLAN / Bluetooth Headset ready
• VLAN
• 2 x Gigabit LAN ports

The snom 760 has a high resolution 3.5” color display and 2 USB ports compared to the single one on the 720. This makes it targeted more towards mangers or executives and its main features are:

• High-resolution 3.5”color display
• 12 LED function keys
• LED function keys
• Wideband audio
• Hands-free operation
• Power over Ethernet (PoE)
• WLAN ready
• VLAN
• 2 x USB (Type A)
• 2 Gigabit LAN ports

The snom 720 has an MSRP of $219, while the MSRP for the snom 760 comes in at $329. While these prices aren’t astronomical they could be a bit of stumbling block when they come head to head with some of the more budget phones with similar features.

An Attractive Option

Personally I like the new color scheme and design of the phones. I think the addition of the programmable keys is a smart move much like the Gigabit ports and USB ports. When it comes to overall user ability they both offer a lot of features which will make them an attractive option. snom usually seems to release progressive phones and I think these new models will follow in that tradition.

The one thing that really bothered me in their literature was a one line description of their phone, “The snom 760 comes in a dark grey color that fits the typical office dress code and makes usage traces less obvious than lighter colors.” I read this as “Our phone is drab and boring and will leave no record that you ever used it let alone existed.” Come on snom get excited, you just released two new phones that look pretty good.