Comments on: Advice Sought: Baby Monitors

By: Dadified

Dadified — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 04:39:12 +0000

We’ve had a First Years 900 mhz unit that we bought four years ago when our son was born. (Like Rhonda, our room configuration makes it possible for him to do some serious crying without us hearing it across the house in our room.) The base unit never gets turned off, so it’s probably been on solid the entire four years. We use the parent unit all night everynight and a couple hours a day during nap time. (I freely confess to being the paranoid half of the parent team. I’m the one who absolutely MUST be able to hear what’s going on in his room. I assume this obsession will continue for another few years until all I can hear at night is the 2020 equivalent of Pink Floyd blasting from his room’s stereo system.) The parent unit still works great and you can still hear his breathing at night as well as you ever could. We gave up keeping fresh AAA batteries in it years ago. My problem now is that the power cord for the parent unit has been going. Over the last year I’ve been able to scotch tape the end that plugs into the unit in a variety of positions that will keep it on, but every couple of weeks, the cord stops working and I have to get the tape and scissors and try cementing a slightly varied bend in the cord until I get an angle that will keep the power flowing. I finally got exasperated enough with that to get online and search for a replacement cord. The blog entry and subsequent posts here made me realize what a lucky man I am to have a unit worth jerry-rigging. My new plan is just to whisper a prayer of thanks every two weeks while I’m taping the h*** out of the cord in some new twisted angle, trying to get the green light to stay lit while it’s plugged in…

By: Christy

Christy — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 04:27:45 +0000

Hey AJ! I just came across this post when I was searching for a new power cord for my 3 year old Sony BabyCall Monitor. It actually came up pretty close to the top of my Google Search!

I find it interesting that I could write almost the same exact review of this monitor. It was fantastic when we first purchased it, but over time, I noticed that it wasn’t as sensitive to our daughter’s “noises” as it once was.

Though I’ve already replaced the monitor (a new Summer Infant Video Monitor), I was hoping to find a cheap replacement power cord for this one. No luck though. Incidentally, I wonder how I ever lived without a video monitor before!

By: Amy

Amy — Wed, 27 Dec 2006 01:30:10 +0000

We have a Fisher Price Sounds n Lights monitor, 18 mos old and going strong. It does NOT have a rechargeable parent receiver, but I’ve changed the batteries once in 18 mos, using battery power when my daughter naps and before I go to bed (maybe using batteries 3-4 hours per day) and keeping it plugged in on the AC adapter during the night. No problem at all with interference, multiple channels in case you have a problem (and we have wireless speakers, wireless modem, cell and cordless phones; all kinds of potential interference). It does not have a low battery alarm, but I notice if the light is off when I’m using batteries (during the day) and it’s plugged in when I’m sleeping. Never a hassle, it has great reviews from other parents, too. I highly recommend it. Plus you can get one with dual receivers, keeping one plugged in at your bedside and one plugged in downstairs/main family living area. I have kept the volume on exactly the same setting since my daughter was born without sound loss. I can hear her breathing with the sound set at only 1/2.

By: John

John — Sat, 01 Jul 2006 13:05:00 +0000

We use “The First Years” monitor, and we HATE IT. We live on a busy street, and every time a tractor-trailer goes by, or worse, some punk with his window-rattling bass booming on his stereo, the alarm goes off. Any quick fix, or do we have to get another? Anybody else experience this?

By: Rhonda

Rhonda — Thu, 26 Jan 2006 21:22:43 +0000

We have had to buy a new monitor each year for our daughter and she is about to turn 4. I can’t seem to find one that is with a reasonable price but yet will work for more than 12 months. Each one will work great for 8-9 months…I so great that we would know it was on by hearing the gentle tick of our daughter clock in her room. However…with each one…which we have done “First Years” then 2 “Safety First” by the 10th or 11th month the interference gets so bad that we are unable to hear her screaming from nightmares with the volume all the way up. I know that my duaghter should be able to sleep without a monitor on…however our bedroom is on one side of the house and her’s is on the other…which means it is very hard to hear when she has woke up and came out of her room without a monitor. She has alot of nightmares it seems because she still wakes up frequently crying and scared. It takes me laying in bed with her to comfort her before she will drift back to sleep.
If anyone has some tips for us or if they might know why our monitors are dying so fast…I would love to hear it! We always leave the parent unit plugged in to the wall. It seems when we bought the second “Safety First” unit (it was a different model then the first) we could actually still use the old parent monitors…which makes me think it is the child unit that keeps going out.

By: Jessica

Jessica — Thu, 22 Sep 2005 09:02:42 +0000

We have The First Years 2.4 GHz Ultra-Range Monitor #3969. The 'parent unit' is supposed to charge 24 hours then be able to be unplugged from the wall and the batteries should be charged enough to take it around. Since we've had this monitor the only way it works is if the parent unit stays plugged in. We haven't tried new batteries yet. This product is great for hearing baby's quietest sounds, but it also picks up house machines noises in other rooms. It also occasionally picks up a hard to describe tap/tick like sound that creeps me out. Personally, getting warmed up to the idea of a strange monitors sound after seeing 'Signs' was hard.

I agree there are not enough good USA made baby products (cars or cell phones) compared to England.

By: Aaron

Aaron — Mon, 12 Sep 2005 16:42:38 +0000

Philips makes the best baby monitors, but they are hard to find. You do not always have to go to the UK and pay over$80. You can get one for around 20 or under. The one I bought was at drugstore.com and rechargable base and room temp indicator. But I cannot find that one anymore anywhere. Drugstore.com does have some philips babycare electronics but not baby monitors at this time. Here are some places here and in the UK with a couple monitors.

http://joystores.com/product_info.php/products_id/1946
$12

UK:
http://www.dealclick.co.uk/product/164/PHILIPS-SBCSC365.php
$69

Ebay has a good selection:
http://search.ebay.com/search/search.dll?cgiurl=http%3A%2F%2Fcgi.ebay.com%2Fws%2F&fkr=1&from=R8&satitle=philips+baby+monitor&category0=

By: Simple Dad

Simple Dad — Sun, 11 Sep 2005 01:15:02 +0000

You could try a less conventional route.

Around our house, we have a Uniden Cordless phone system that allows for expansion to up to 10 phones or so. Included in our system is a phone-to-phone room monitor link. The phones are excellent and allow for a double use when you don't need the monitor. Additionally, you can place them anywhere in the house with ease. If Little Miss is napping on the floor in the living room, just leave a phone in the living room while you go in the bedroom. Each phone comes with it's own charging base which you can put anywhere in the house.

The good: Great phones, multiple uses, highly portable, Can turn off the ringer for the "baby phone", should last far more than six months.

The bad: Expensive for cordless phones, phones may not be loud enough on the parent end so you'd have to keep them close by. I'll do some tests and see what I think.

By: tod

tod — Fri, 09 Sep 2005 18:33:03 +0000

I just looked at ours, it’s a “the first years” model 3806, but it must be old enough (2 years) that they don’t sell it anymore.

By: Just a Dad

Just a Dad — Thu, 08 Sep 2005 22:26:40 +0000

Thingamadad, I posted a bit on the Sony at Blogging Baby as well. We have 2 of the Sony’s in use, 1 at Grandmas and one at our house. The one at Grandmas is 2 years old. Ours is about 1 year old. Perhaps you got a slightly shoddy one? We get some of the annoying out of range beeping, but not too much, and certainly not to the point where I’d describe it as very touchy. There has been a slight drop in it’s ability to pick up our kid’s noises, but not to the point where it’s become a problem. Like you, I was startled to learn that the receiver wouldn’t function if plugged in during a power outage. Now I just unplug when I think there might be one (thunderstorms, etc.). If you liked it so much, perhaps see if you can exchange it for a new one and you’ll get a better one.