Safety 1st High-Def Digital Video Monitor

Although this particular model comes at a comparably hefty ticket price, it's well worth the investment for the quality you receive. Setting up the monitor and handset is a breeze even if you need to move the unit to another location in the house. The camera is impressively versatile and the zoom is pretty good. The only minor complaints I have about the product are 1) there's no battery life indicator on the parent handset and 2) night vision sometimes comes in a little fuzzy. Overall, however, it's a fantastic product; great for home use and travel.

This monitor is awesome. It is our 4th monitor, and we finally got it right. Digital makes all the difference, both in video and sound quality. Going from the other 3 very popular video monitors, all bought from amazon, to this one, is no comparison. It is like going from betamax to DVD. We had bad interference with all of the other ones, but none with this. This has virtually no interference. It is easy to use, and included rechargeable batteries last a good while. Picture quality is better than the others, too.

We sleep better at night because we got this monitor, so who cares that it costs $30-40 more than the others? It is worth $100 more. If anybody gives this a negative review, i think it is because they have not experienced some of the other SH%* that is out there. Buy this one and sleep better at night. end of story.

I recently purchased this video monitor for use in our home, to replace the Summer Infant Handheld video monitor we were NOT happy with. I spent hours reading reviews of all the monitors I could find online. I am happy with my purchase. I believe this monitor was a good choice, although it's not perfect. Here's my review:

1. PICTURE. This monitor has by far the best picture of any baby video monitor I have seen. That being said, it is NOT "high-def" to the standards of a high-def television. It is high def compared to other monitors currently available. 5 STARS.

2. SOUND. The sound quality is very good. There is a soft "whoosh" of interference that is constantly in the background when the receiver is on. I have never seen a monitor that didn't have that interference, and this is better than most. The microphone appears to be very sensitive and picks up my child's smallest sounds. 4 STARS.

3. RECEPTION. The reception is unparalleled in my opinion. There is only an occasional blip of interference on one side of the picture that resolves quickly. We walked three houses away on either side of our house before we lost reception. Needless to say the reception inside our home and in our yard is flawless. Even several houses away the reception didn't degrade in quality - it was perfect until it was lost, displaying a lost connection symbol. A few steps back toward our house restored perfect reception again. Additionally, the monitor does not appear to conflict with our wireless internet in any way. 5 STARS.

4. PAN/TILT. This monitor advertises the ability to pan and tilt. If you are picturing being able to remotely control the camera to move in any direction, that's not what it does. From the remote parent unit, you can zoom in on the picture 2X to 4X. While in a zoomed view, you can move right, left, up or down within the picture, just as you would if you zoomed in on a picture from your digital camera. You're not actually seeing anything outside the original view, and the camera is not actually moving. The zoom feature does produce fairly clear images, however, and for us we like being able to see both our kids in their bunk beds in the zoomed out view, and then zoom in on each one individually. I find it slightly irritating that to move within the zoomed view you have to keep pushing the right, left, up or down buttons repeatedly, moving only slightly with each push. I wish you could hold down the button and have it move smoothly until you released the button or reached the edge of the picture. 4 STARS.

5. TIME OUT and OTHER FEATURES. This monitor has an on-screen menu that allows you to set your preferences for the Time Out feature, AUTO level, Night vision (infrared) and adding other cameras. TIME OUT allows you to set how long your want the screen to be on before it automatically shuts off to save battery life - 5 seconds, 15 secs, 25 secs, or OFF which leaves it on until you turn it off. I really like this feature because you can hit the view button to see the picture and then just set it down and it will turn itself off. The sound continues after the screen turns off unless you have set the AUTO LEVEL, which turns the sound off and then turns it on if there is a sound in the room. You can set this to OFF, which keeps the sound on until you turn the unit off, or to level 1, 2 or 3 which makes it more or less sensitive to sound, i.e., it will turn the sound on for smaller noises on level 1 or wait for bigger noises on level 2 or 3. I like this a lot because then you don't have to listen to the "whoosh" of background noise, but you know if your child starts to stir it will turn back on. I am satisfied with how sensitive it is with my 3 year old, I will wait and see how I feel with the baby coming soon, knowing I'll be more paranoid about every noise with him. But so far I like how this works. For NIGHT vision you can turn the infrared on, off, or to auto. I don't know why you would use anything other than auto but I guess it's nice to have the choice. I only have one camera so the part about adding other cameras is not something I can comment on. I will say the menu was only partially intuitive for me, but it didn't hurt me to read the instructions for once and all my questions were answered there. 5 STARS.

6. OTHER. In the area of nit-pickiness, there is a Safety 1st screen that comes on every time you turn the screen on, as if it shows while the unit is booting up. Whether this is necessary or not I don't know, and it does bug a little, but it's only on there for 1 second so it's not that big of a deal. The screen does return to the view you had before, like if you were zoomed in on a certain spot it returns to that, which is nice. You don't have to find the view you want all over again. The screen is pretty small, smaller than our old one, but the picture is so much better it makes up for it. I would rather have a smaller, but better picture than a bigger crappy one. I do like that the handheld receiver is small and portable, easy to carry in your pocket or use the clip provided. Finally, the power button on the camera blinks brightly when the camera is on, which can be annoying in the dark. I taped tin foil over it to cover it up.

Overall, I would recommend this monitor to family and friends without hesitation. I am sure that future models with improve upon this one, and there are some things I would change if I could, but I am convinced this is among the best if not the best baby monitor available today. I love it. Shop around for the best price.

We love this baby monitor. We had an audio monitor for the first 7 months, and I found it frustrating to not be able to see my daughter in her crib--- especially once she became more mobile because she would wake up and stand up in her crib without making much noise. The video monitor has been really helpful- we can see if she's standing or sitting or lying down--- if she's still or moving. The screen is so small that I'm not sure if the high definition feature makes any difference. However, I love that the monitor is small and light enough to slip into my pocket while I move around the house. The rechargable battery works well. I plug it in every night when we are in bed, and I try to plug it in when I'm not using it, but it seems to be able to run on battery power the whole day, even if I don't--- by nighttime it needs to be plugged back in again to recharge, but that works fine for us. There is NO feedback on the audio--- the sound is MUCH better than it was on our audio only monitor. We love this purchase--- my only regrest is that I didn't by this sooner!

So far this has worked as promised. Have not noticed any interference despite multiple wireless devices in my home. It is expensive, but if you only want one that works well this would be it. The only negative would be the small screen size, though this also makes it portable.