DVD player or iPod Touch?

Hi Ladies,

Jumping over here with a question for you all!

My kiddos will be two in July when we embark on a two-day drive to Montana (each way!). We are planning ahead and want to buy a portable DVD player for the trip. (Note: my kids don't watch TV right now...not really because I am against it, but mainly because they don't spend time in that room. I wonder if they will even CARE about watching TV/movies in the car when they don't have much exposure to it now??).

Nevertheless, I am looking for suggestions on the best portable DVD player for two kiddos...or if I should consider the iPod Touch instead (second note: I don't really know much about them, but they are frequently mentioned as an alternative to a DVD player!).

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated

 

BestBuy had a dual DVD player.

I wouldn't get the ipod touch for them, it'll be too small, the DVD's have a bigger screen.

 

Well my guys aren't 2 yet, but I wanted to share that we had to go on a long car trip this past weekend for a funeral, and I bought a dual-screen DVD player for the car. It was the best parenting decision I made all week! They were totally miserable the entire weekend, except for the time they spent in the car watching videos.

My boys don't watch a lot of TV, and I think this was part of the success. TV is a novelty so they were happy watching hours of videos!

I got mine at Target (7" screens and mounting kits) for about $130. My only dislikes of the units I bought are the fact that the power and volume are not controllable with the remote. It's rather annoying to have to climb into the back seat to turn the sound down or turn the DVD off. Otherwise it was a rousing success!

 

I doubt toddlers that age would be able to use an iTouch. Were you planning to sit between them and use it for them? Or is there some way to disable the touchscreen so all they could do is hold it and watch?

Between those two, I'd recommend the DVD player. However, I have to say that we were in the same situation when I took my first plane trip with one of the girls (23 months, had never seen much TV) and she barely watched it at all. I think I got 15 minutes' distraction out of it, which was not worth it for the weight it added to my bag.

 

Thanks for the comments on the iTouch...you are right, it wouldn't work for us right now.

And hopefully for us, "novel" = "successful!"

I appreciate your helpful feedback, ladies

 

We have DVD players in our car, and it has been wonderful on long car trips. Honestly, I can't imagine driving any extended distance without them!

 

Definitely DVD player. Ipod touch is too small for a ride like that and you have to hold it in order to watch it, and if they touch the screen, the movie will stop or do something funky. My girls can navigate the ipod touch fine, but they often fight over who is going to hold it. Plus, it takes a really long time to download a movie and you have to purchase them from itunes.

We bought a magnavox (10.5 in screen) from target and it was great. We have a van, so we set up a cooler in front of the captains seats and set it on top of that when we traveled. It was great and the girls could see it just fine.

 

I bought these and they work great. I got them at Target but it looks like they no longer carry them.

 

Definately a dual screen DVD player! That has been a life saver for us on long car trips. I wouldn't leave home without it. ardon:

 

Yep, another vote for the DVD player. We had one installed in our Sienna when we bought it and it died about 2 months ago. It took me about 2 weeks to decide to go have another one installed :lol: It is a MUST have for us!!

 

Do you have a laptop? We have just used that in the car for longer trips. We have an SUV and can pile enough stuff in the middle to rest the laptop on. All we had to do was to buy the converter cord so that it could be plugged into the cigarette lighter and voila - instant entertainment. We were already bringing our laptop wherever we go anyway. With the lap top we have the option of DVDs, but we also have the option of playing pictures/videos that I take of them. The love watching themselves on the computer!

Good luck with your decision...

 

I bought iPod Touches for my boys when they were just about 2 years old, in anticipation of an upcoming airplane trip. They have been a tremendous investment in our family's sanity. I only use them for big trips or for riding in the jogging stroller, but they are virtually guaranteed to give me calm, happy, quiet kids for hours on end. We did not have the same luck with the DVD player, which was just one big disaster - they wanted to play with the DVDs and fought over what to watch. Plus, the iPod Touches are great in that you just have to carry the small devices - no juggling DVDs, etc.

There was a slight learning curve, but my boys are pretty technologically savvy (they liked to play with my iPhone for some time before we got the iPod Touches), so they picked up on it really quickly!

 

I would go with the DVD player. Mine never watched TV at home (they now watch about a 1/2 hour on the weekends), but they still loved videos in the car. We do lots of Elmo and classic Sesame Street and other "educational" DVDs, and they sit back there and obviously learn. It's cute!

I have an iPhone, and DH has an iPod Touch. I love them both, but I wouldn't buy either to entertain 2 year olds. I have some kid apps on my phone (5 Little Monkeys, Sesame Street TV, a pretend phone), and they enjoy them occasionally, but they both have to crowd around me to see, and then they fight over wanting to hold them, and then they push the home button and cancel out of the app altogether, and it's a pain. (Wow, that was a run-on sentence.)

So, I'd go with the DVD player, and I think it will be a big hit!

 

Wow Erin, I'm impressed. Maybe I'm not giving my kids enough credit? On my phone, I'm always worried they will make a call. Do your boys know how to get into apps and everything? That's awesome.

 

We drove from Boston to North Carolina last summer and borrowed a dual screen DVD player. It worked out great!!



As for the Ipod touch...my kids can't have one until I get one!!! :rofl:

 

Follow-up question:

The dual screen player that I am looking at requires a power source as it doesn't have a stand alone battery. It would NOT work on a plane ride or anywhere that doesn't have an outlet/cigarette lighter. (Granted, a plane ride with the kiddos is not something we plan to try for a very long time!) It does have all the other features I want including a remote control that adjusts the volume. The price looks good, so I am really thinking about it...the only drawback is the lack of internal battery.

A friend suggested getting TWO individual players...but that doesn't seem like it would work in the car unless they had headphones on?? And we have a Sienna and I am not sure if we could just do one player in there very well...I don't know where we would mount it that would make it easy for both kiddos to see.

Do you all have dual screens or a single player?

 

IMO dvd player. We have 3 iphones between my mom my sister and me. The girls do lone to play on them but they are too fragile for 2 year olds. My 4 year old who knows better stuck my last iphone in a glass of water. A $200 piece of electronics is just too much to trust a 2 year old with. I would do the double dvd player

 

We have the single and I love it. I chose a single because I could get a larger screen for the money. We can charge it up and it will last for several hours. There are times that the girls will want to watch a movie and we want to watch the TV so I will just set it up on their table in the living room and let them watch the DVD player. I really prefer it to the dual because I can take it out of the van and use it in the house.

 

One afternoon a few months ago, Jack was talking about wanting to call my dad. I told him he was at work, and tried to distract him with a game on my phone. He scrolled through, found a photo of my dad, and I turned around to find him talking to my dad on the phone! I couldn't believe it. So, your fear of them making calls is very valid! :lol:

We have about 15-20 apps that are kid-oriented, as well as a few different songs and free kid-focused podcasts that I downloaded. Not to brag, but I'm astonished at how well they navigate them. It's adorable to watch them start an app, hit the home button when they get bored, scroll through screens to find the next app to use, and smile proudly when they've found it! They do matching, counting, puzzle games... all kinds of great educational stuff, and it's awesome for fine motor development, too! Jackson picked up on it much more quickly than Jacob in the beginning. I had to "rescue" Jacob a lot when we first got them, but now they're both old pros! The only down-side is taking them away because they throw colossal tantrums. They still freak out, although it's much better at 2y9m than it was at almost-2. I bet you'd be surprised at how quickly your kids caught on!

 

That was a concern I had when I bought ours. I would think at that age, it would confuse them if you had two seperate players playing two different dvd's especially since they don't watch tv. What I love about the RCA dual player are the straps that connect them to the headrest. When I first bought them they were only 20 months old and there was no way they would of been able to hold their own player for a long road trip.

They are 26 months and right now the only trip I have planned is Disney World when they are 4 1/2. By then, I can buy them their own player or whatever the latest and greatest thing is at that time.

 

We have a dual system in the car. We also have a portable DVD player that someone gave to us. And we have an Archos, on which I can put recorded TV shows (normally I use that at the gym, but we can also put cartoons on it).

So at your kiddos' age, I'd go with the DVD player, dual if possible. My girls are really into games on DH and my iPhone, but they really weren't too into that until they were 3.

We took a really long car trip last summer and between the DVD player and their Leapsters, they did well. We took our first plane trip a couple months ago and we took the portable DVD player and the Archos. They did awesome on the plane too.