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Hello,

We have a few Snom Dect phones in our company. We mainly use the SNOM M70 and one SNOM M80. The SNOM900 is used as the base station. Now the ringing volume has suddenly become very quiet on the SNOM M80. In the settings, the full volume (number 6) is set. You can only hear the ringing when you hold the handset to your ear. There is no visible external damage. What could be the reason for this?

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Markus Ploner

End user

Joined: 27.06.2022

8 Comments

  1. Snom Gianmaria Tononi

    Hi,

    This usually happens if the handsets are being used in a dusty environment, the dust can get into the speaker and avoid the ringtone to play loudly.

    If that is the case, even using the handset on speakerphone would result in a similar issue, could you please try?

    Thank you

  2. End user Markus Ploner

    Ciao Gianmaria,

    Thank you for the feedback. Yes, even in speaker mode you can only hear very softly. I thought dust shouldn't be a problem for the M80? 

  3. End user Markus Ploner

    Hello Gianmaria,

    After your suggestion that it must be the speaker itself, I managed to fix the problem. I have opened the unit.
    The problem is as follows: Metal dust comes through the holes in the area of the speaker up to the protective fleece, which is on the inside of the cabinet between the speaker and the shell. This fleece is glued to the shell and has an additional seal on the speaker side. If there are enough metal chips on the protective fleece, the fleece presses against the speaker itself due to the speaker magnet. The bonding of the fleece shifts. This affects the loudspeaker. After carefully cleaning the speaker and removing the metal dust, the function of the speaker is restored.

    I still see this as a design error, as I expect something like this in a ruggedised model like the SNOM M80. On top of that, this Dect device has only been in use for 3 months. This should be improved for future model variants.

    1. End user Larry McIntyre

      Gianmaria Tononi

      We use M80's, and this has been trending as an issue for us. At first, I had a couple of this kind of issue trickle in, but now it seems like I'm getting more and more of this.

      In a CNC shop, we deal with lots of the same type of metallic dust. This is exactly what's happening. The "external" speaker is very low in volume, and sounds likes it's "shorting" or obstructed.

      I almost wonder if these things should be built with some sort of screen mesh to help a bit.  In our old Dect System (Spectralink) issues like this would happen every now and then... but way less.. maybe a couple a year.. So far this month, I've changed out 4 of them.


      1. End user Markus Ploner

        @Larry McIntyre

        See my answer above

        1. End user Larry McIntyre

          Mark, Thanks so much!

          I've been trying to research anything that can help. I even started going down the road with some sort of thin protective dust/vent . 

          I saw some information that Gore some protective vent membranes, sealable etc (Gore has something called their Gore Adhesive Vent Series)

          The information is limited to basic brochure kind of information and no online sales to purchase products very easy) – I'll still continue to dig on options of being able

          to cover that area to add an additional layer of protection (but it has to allow sound and not muffle it very much etc)


          Like you, I killed the warranty of one of the M80s to get a closer look at what was going on and saw the same things that you wrote.  

          I would love to have the name of the online retailer you mentioned for parts. I mean, it would be nice once these are out of warranty etc anyways to be able to buy parts like the external speaker, microphones etc... I'm drawing a blank of the retailer with a river like name lol

  4. Snom Gianmaria Tononi

    Hi,

    This is because even if the handset is by itself IP65, that only counts for the internal parts and circuits, and not the speaker which is an external component basically and attracts metal dust due to the magnet.

    I will of course report this to our product manager to see if there is room for improvements in the future, thank you for the detailed report back.

    Have a nice day

  5. End user Markus Ploner

    Good morning.

    We have found a workaround to mitigate the speaker issue as follows:
    Via a well-known online retailer with a river-like name, we ordered similar replacement speakers (see attached screenshot). While these do not match the original SNOM speakers in terms of maximum volume, they are equipped with a small metal protection plate.

    We removed these plates from the replacement speakers and carefully attached them to the original SNOM speakers—on the inner side, of course. This required disassembling the device and removing the speaker from the casing. Although the devices are now out of warranty, this modification has significantly improved their durability in our environment.

    Given the simplicity of this adjustment, we believe SNOM could implement a similar improvement directly at the manufacturing stage. For a device with IP certification, we would also expect better shielding of the speaker unit against dust and debris.

    I hope it is acceptable to share such a workaround here in the official forum, as it may be of help to others experiencing similar issues.