 |
IMC Toys Spiderman Radio Alarm Clock Figure
by Decanus
For better or worse, my son and daughter are being dragged into the world of superheroes, due mainly to their amazingly huge interest....or the fact their dad is giving them no choice. Can't remember which...
As a consequence of this, family and friends are buying things along those lines, and one of these was the Spiderman Radio ... Alarm Clock Figure, from IMC Toys. It seems to retail around the £30 mark, though this was bought on sale for half that price.
So what is it? Well, to be brutally honest, it is an average looking clock radio, with a cheapish looking Spider-Man figure slapped on top and some spider transfers slapped on the buttons. When we unboxed it we were slightly underwhelmed, but maybe our expectations were a little unrealistic in this price range!
The clock itself is in the base of the figure, and is a standard led display clock radio. The display itself allows the time to be displayed, along with the date and day. I think you can tinker a bit to change these around, we have just kept these standard settings as they suit us fine. The display is nice and bright, and the letters and figures can be seen very easily. There are six buttons on the base, which control all the functions. The buttons are all clearly marked, so you know which one you need, and again are all pretty standard - Time Select, Alarm, Set Button, Snooze, Radio - and to the side is an obvious volume 'wheel' button. The clock-radio can be plugged into the mains, or runs on batteries; we are running it on batteries, just because of where it is, but it does eat up the cheaper batteries very fast, so be warned! (2 x AA's by the way).
Instructions do come with the clock-radio as well, so you don't need to fumble around trying to work out what to do...which is what I did for 15 minutes, before taking my wife's advice and actually reading the instructions. Hey, it looked deceptively easy! The alarm function has the (again, standard) choice of radio or buzzer, and obviously volume control of either. Radio reception is fine, and the speaker is again built into the base,behind Spidey's legs. As you've probably picked up, this item just screams 'average'; it is average quality all over, on clock-radio's you pay a lot less for. So is the Spider-Man theming worth it?
In a word, no. The Spider-Man figure, at 27 cm high (8 inches), is pretty eye catching size wise and looks nice enough, the costume is captured pretty well and the plastic 'web' from his hand to the base is a nice touch, yet still looks a little cheap to me. The base has the Spider-Man logo, the buttons have spiders emblazoned on them, and webbing goes around the outside of the base. What you do get, which my son loves, is a handful of Spider-Man sound effects, which are great fun.
All in all, this is an ok product, but is a very overpriced one when paying around the £30 mark. It works perfectly fine, and looks ok, but the clock/radio itself is no better than the ones you get in cheap units, so you are overpaying for the Spidey theming. There are nicer Spider-Man clocks and radios out there.
If you buy, buy cheap.
Read the complete review |
 |
Crayola Mini Kids First Markers
by northernlovely
My daughter absolutely loves drawing and painting, and though we've bought her countless 'clean' options (aqua doodle, megasketcher, magna doodle, magic painting etc) she still loves the real thing. I wanted to get her some Crayola pens, because she is still a bit nibbly, even at the age of two, and I know that these are non toxic. They ... are also stated on the box as washable, and since she'll draw on anything, legs, arms and clothing included, I thought that was an essential!
I paid £3.59 for a set of 10 of these Crayola Mini Kids First Markers from Toys R Us, I think this is a tad on the pricey side given you can buy cheap kids' felt tip pens for under 30p in most supermarkets. But again this was before I'd tried those and it was the washable element I was going for.
Unfortunately I don't rate Crayola Mini Kids First Markers at all. The pens themselves look lovely, just like the Crayola pens of my childhood but a bit shorter and stubbier, but in use they're a bit rubbish. Because they're a rounded off, chunky marker you can't draw in any detail which is a problem if you are trying to write something in a medium size as it looks so chunky and the ink which is really watery tends to bleed out, on regular children's drawing paper. My little girl loves it when I draw a cat and cats drawn with Crayola Mini Kids First Markers look a bit chunky and a bit of a mess.
Secondly the markers though they are washable are actually pretty resilient in the wash! My daughter drew in blue on her yellow leggings so I put them straight in the wash, now I use non bio washing powder for her sensitive skin (which I am sure many parents do) and washed at 30 degrees and there was still a faint mark on them after they'd dried so I had to wash them again with a scoop of vanish, which was a bit annoying since I'd spent so much more for them to be washable (and I had hoped by that, it meant easily washable first time). Moreover, when she gets it on her skin, a regular bath won't shift the darker colours, meaning she can have faint pen marks all over her for a few days which is clearly less than ideal, I don't want people thinking I don't wash my daughter, but I don't want to scrub her poor skin either!
Overall I just can't recommend Crayola Mini Kids First Markers, nice as they look they are a pain to draw with and an absolute nightmare to remove from skin and fabrics. Since then I've used the cheap 30p pens from supermarkets and they're much easier to draw with and actually wash a lot better!
The Crayola Mini Kids First Markers have actually gone in the bin, less than 3 months after purchase, I just got fed up of them. Nothing wrong with Crayola pencils and crayons but these pens are too much of a pain and I can only award them 1 star out of 5 (I'd award them less if I could!!)
Read the complete review |
 |
InnoTab 2
by perrywinkle9
Lewis, my son is three years old and my mum has three foster kids at the moment, one who is four (but was three at Christmas.) one who is five and the other is seven. Mum had heard good things about the 'tablets' for kids, After having a look at them in 'Toys 'R' Us' she decided to get the Innotab 2 for the three youngest children and ... the Leappad 2 for the seven year old. Mum spent a bit of time looking online and on the high street for the best deal and managed to find both devices for under £50.
Lew was really excited about the Innotab when he opened it and the other boys were really happy to have their tablets. I was given the job of setting them all up which was really easy. First I set all the boys up on their Innotabs and got them to take pictures of themselves for their profile pictures. We left them all getting to grips with them while I started to set each of the Innotabs up with their SD cards and getting their free apps ( the Innotab 2 comes with 2 free apps).
Setting the Innotab up on the computer is also as easy as it could be. There was a CD in the box and it only took a few minutes to install the software. I let the boys choose their free apps and stuck a couple of movies and songs on for each of them.
I didn't have any trouble putting videos or songs on the Innotab as most of my files are AVI (for video.) or MP3 (for Audio.) but since have found a couple of videos that are either WMV or MP4 which have had to be converted. Free video format conversion tools are available online, just use google to find a program if you need one, but file conversion is a process that takes some time.
The internal storage space on both the Innotab 2 and Leappad 2 is somewhat limited but with the Innotab 2 you have the option of using an SD card to increase the capacity. We bought three 16GB SD cards for £8 each from amazon. I have spoken to some parents at pre-school who resent having to pay extra for additional storage space but I would rather have the option of being able to expand.
I was really surprised by the decent quality of the video playback and if Meg and I fancy watching something on TV while Lew is up and wants to watch a film (rare but it does happen occasionally.) we just stick a film on the Innotab and put the headphones on him. There is a stand on the back of the Innotab and it can be stood up either landscape or portrait. The stand is fairly sturdy but has come off a couple of times, it is easy to reattach and hasn't suffered any permanent damage yet!
As well as the Video and music player the Innotab comes with a games cartridge that has a game, book and activity on it. These are all great fun but Lew has spent a lot more time playing with the Toy story cartridge that another family member bought for him, new cartridges cost around £20.
There are some pre-installed apps on the Innotab other than the music and video player which are; an E-reader, camera, video recorder, calendar, notepad, art studio and calculator. Lew hasn't used the pre-installed apps much but as his reading skills improve I am sure he will as they all seem to work very well. The Camera quality is a little poor for taking photo's and recording video but we weren't expecting it to be super high quality.
Lew chose 'Keyboard Jam' and 'Finger Artist' for his free apps. Keyboard Jam is a fairly simple two octave keyboard with either Piano or Accordion sounds, Lew hasn't used this very much but the other kids enjoy playing with it. Finger Artist lets you colour in and save pictures of different animals and is great fun. Lewis has spent a lot of time playing it and I would recommend it even as a paid for app. New apps cost around three quid which isn't unreasonable but I would try and find a review of them first as the quality can vary from app to app.
The Innotab eats batteries at a fair rate so it is worth getting some rechargeables. Lew's Innotab sometimes has a problem that if it gets knocked the batteries come slightly out of position and have to be taken out and put back in before it will work, I have only seen this happen to Lew's so he may have done something to it. The Innotab came with a spare stylus which is handy as he has lost his first one. You can buy a new stylus online and they don't cost much if you do lose the second one.
The Innotab 2 looks a lot sturdier than the Leappad 2 but it also looks slightly more childish. After having seen both in action I would say that the Innotab is much more suited to younger children (3-5.) and the Leappad slightly older (5-8). Being able to play your own music and video files is a major plus for the Innotab over the Leappad and means that the oldest of mum's foster kids often borrows an Innotab to watch a film.
Read the complete review |
