LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer Disney Princess Bundle
LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer Disney Princess Bundle Reviews
This is a nice toy, and they've made some improvements since LeapPad 1. The front and back camera option is especially nice. I was very excited to see that this bundle came with a Disney theme. But now that I've gone through setting it up and testing it out, I'm really not that impressed. With it's price tag being what it is ... in hindsight I wish I'd just bought a regular tablet for my daughter - like the Kindle fire. First, a note ... STICKERS: Like someone else mentioned, I also thought the stickers were missing and was disappointed. THE STICKERS ARE THERE! Just as I was taking all the packaging out to the recycling bin, I found them. MAN! They are hidden WELL, but they're there. There are two problems. First, the sticker "sheets" are probably much smaller than what you think you're looking for (they're only about 2"x3"-ish), and second ... they're HIDDEN! They're inside one of the many, many folded cardboard compartments and sealed up with tape. Honestly, it's a terrible place to put them - I'll bet half of parents will throw them away not knowing where to find them. But if you read this -- keep looking! They're there. Now, some issues ... 1) TOUCH SCREEN: It's not all that receptive/reactive to touch. You're better off using the stylus, but for the younger crowd, that could get a little frustrating. I was buying this for the touch-screen aspect, so this is disappointing. 2) THE CASE: Yes, the case could use a redesign. It's CUTE, but ... there's no strap or elastic for the pad, so when this thing is unzipped by little hands, the LeapPad is undoubtedly going to fall out. The other side of the case is designed for a spare stylus and cartridges. If you, like me, are going to download the apps from the app store and have no intention of using cartridges, this will be useless for you. I'd rather they included a place for headphones. Also, if you have a younger child (3), note ... the case is not super easy to zip/unzip. It's not impossible, but ... the stiff zipper might be a little tricky for tiny hands. 3) BE PREPARED - THE APPS ARE EXPENSIVE: If you're expecting $1.99 apps (like on iTunes), don't. The cheapest app I've seen was $5 and the "good" games are about $25 each. It's going to cost you some cheddar to fill this thing up. After selecting just a few apps to get started, I viewed my cart and saw I was already over $100 ... which made me wonder if I should've just sprung for an iPad mini. Also, note, with this bundle when it says you get to pick an app, you don't get to choose any app you want out of the app store. You must pick one of four specific apps. 4) LACKLUSTER VIDEO QUALITY: For $7.50 each I downloaded some video apps of Nickelodeon shows (Fresh Beat Band, Dora, etc.) I just tried them out ... ugh! I'm not pleased with the resolution / screen quality. I mean, it's okay - but ... not great. I was hoping the LeapPad 2 would be a little nicer in this area. Not so much. 5) NON-REMOVABLE ADS!?!? Okay, I bought this thing, I paid through the nose for apps ... why is there still a "Leap Frog Sneak Peaks" ADVERTISEMENT permanently on the screen for my daughter to click on??? Seems wrong. I'm annoyed by that. 6) ON THE HEAVY SIDE: I put the four AA batteries in this and ... it's pretty heavy. Not terrible, but - I have a feeling little three year old hands are going to get tired out from this. 7) CREEPY MP3 ERRORS: I got the MP3 player app so that I could load my daughter's favorite songs onto the pad. I loaded a batch of perfectly fine MP3s - all encoded the same - all of which work properly on the computer or on my own mp3 player. HOWEVER - once they got onto the LeapPad, some of them (randomly) only play SUPER slow with low low voices - like CREEPY low. Scary! Doesn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to which ones aren't playing properly. I loaded 63 songs - 22 worked okay, the other 41 have this playing slow issue. :( Also, the player leaves much to be desired. It's not graphical at all, so if your child doesn't read yet, they'll have no visual identifiers to help them find the songs they want. And even if they DO read - the screen only shows about 20 characters, so if the song title is long or shows the artist's name first, it may become impossible to identify the songs (if you've got several songs by the same artist with more than 20 characters in their name, the song titles will be pushed off the screen and you can't see them.) 8) CAN'T LOAD VIDEO? The computer interface allows you to upload mp3s (not that they actually work on the other end ... see above), but it doesn't seem to allow you to upload videos into the LeapPad. I'm guessing this is because they want to make sure you're purchasing videos from the app store. 9) SCREEN REARRANGES? I took the time to move all the tiles around so that the apps I think my daughter will like best appear on the first screen. By the way, you can't do this on the computer interface, you must move each app icon on the LeapPad itself. At any rate, I took a few minutes and did that, and about 10 minutes later (after I'd explored a few of the new apps) I noticed that some of the app tiles had rearranged themselves and moved to different screens. ? Not sure if that was a fluke. I hope it's not an ongoing thing. It's going to really confuse my daughter if the apps are moving around all the time. :( Hope that helps! Don't get me wrong, it's a nice little toy - these are just a few observations. If I had known all of this before I purchased it ... honestly, I probably would've gone with a Kindle Fire or an iPad mini instead. I think it would've been worth it in the long run, especially considering how much the leappad apps cost. C'est la vie!. this is my LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer Disney Princess Bundle reviews
LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer Disney Princess Bundle Specs
- WARNING:
- CHOKING HAZARD -- Small parts. Not for children under 3 yrs.
LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer Disney Princess Bundle Best buy
LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer Disney Princess Bundle. LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer Disney Princess Bundle will.. (Read More)
LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer Disney Princess Bundle,
No comments:
Post a Comment