LeapFrog LeapPad2 Explorer, Green

i purchased the leappad 2 for my children for a 6 hour airplane ride. I also purchased the carrying case and the ac adapter. i have already purchased a rechargeable duracell battery system from costco so i brought that along as well. the leappad did exactly what i had hoped it would do. it is packed full of excellent apps, the art app and the pet pad keep the kids totally entertained. for our free app i downloaded rollie polly picnic and it's very cool. i really didn't want to be stuck with crazy kids on the airplane so i purchased some additional apps, honestly, i didn't really need to. after reading many reviews i purchased stretchy monkey because it is kindof like angry birds but educational and not angry, i also puchased mr. pencil saves doodleburg. from what i can tell, mr. pencil is the biggest hit but they play both. i also purchased two videos because i thought my almost 3 year old would like them but he's not really into screens at all. i purchased one e-book, the cinderella one (even though i have boys!) and they love it! the e-books are quite pricey, i felt like a bit of a fool buying it because really i should just be reading to them on the plane, but that being said i was blown away by the video quality of the book. it is also incredibly interactive... very very interesting. the whole system is very high quality, durable, the video quality is amazing. i'm so glad that i purchased this over an adult tablet or even the innotab. i've had luck with leapfrog products before, and this one certainly exceeded my expecations. i mean, if i bought my kids an adult tablet i would be concerned about them dropping it, scratching it, breaking it. the leappad is made to withstand tough kid treatment and i don't want to have to micro-manage them... kids drop things and it would be sad if a young child felt rotten and guilty for breaking an ipad or any other adult tablet. this leappad is theirs, they treat it well, it is designed to be used by young children.i am an outdoorsy hands-on mom and i set limits to screen time. i'm not big on electronics but this item certainly has a time and place and my kids are learning when they are playing. i couldn't be more pleased.

After reading these reviews had wished i had bought this sooner for my son (and even now still do) but this is the perfect device/tablet/etc... for us... I am not hugely into the whole give kids technology so they know how to use it movement (although i love technology) as i do think kids time is better used by going outside to play and interact (even if it's loud and argument leading) with their siblings! BUT have always been a huge leapfrog buyer and pretty much bought everything they have put out since my boys were little...the leaps in technology that have happened are HUGE...this is a great learning tool for our son(s) and also brought them all together to play and LEARN too! They spent the whole first day making movies and doing skits (which included their angry birds tied with curling ribbon to fly in front of the screen!) and taking photos...when i asked them why as both their kindle and ipod have cameras they said it was just easy to do and the screen was nice and big! It DOES have a touch screen (as that is one concern i had after reading the review i thought it could only be used with the pen). Overall...we are really pleased with it and the games you get free with it are enough for him, but he had gotten extra birthday money and wanted one more app...and we found his favorite music by THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS!!! So FUN! and being an engineer and having taught HS Physics last year wanted him to have fun playing with Phineas and Ferb's Physics App! He hasn't put it down and as most of the reviewers had younger children/toddlers I was worried. Highly recommend this...although wish the ebooks went up to 8&9 year old levels too right now they are great for 1st and 2nd grade even...So glad we bought this for him! OH and the rechargeable battery pack is a dream for anyone who has ever had one of these devices that doesn't naturally recharge by plugging in (you never need to even take them out to recharge...no more hurt fingers, wasteful battery purchases, etc...)!

I thought the iPad/Pod/Phone crowd were idiotic to require that people connect the device to a computer with iTunes installed back when that was still necessary to do anything. It's still aggravating to do that whenever I have to set up one of those devices, but at least the end user doesn't have to deal with that anymore.But at least when Apples updates iTunes people can still connect their devices to it.That is *not* the case with LeapFrog connect. Maybe people who are true experts with port settings and who can really dig down in their computer and make it jump through hoops could get it to work, but I couldn't after following every FAQ on the site. I have a fair amount of computer competency, I've been to device manager before, have used cmd to accomplish things, have helped countless people connect to printers and network drives.Based on the people I've helped with computers, all very smart people who just aren't quite as knowledgeable about computers as I am, most people will not be able to get their device connected if it doesn't connect the way it's supposed to. The way our device connected right out of the box. The way it connected a month after we bought it before they changed the installer program. I don't know why LeapFrog changed their Connect program. (I don't know why it didn't just prompt for an admin log-in instead of saying to log completely out of the computer and back in again either, incidentally.) I think it was an bad move on LeapFrog's part and turned a 4 star item to a 1 star item.There's a lot of potential in the device, the apps we were able to put on it before this fiasco are great, the battery life isn't that great if you're used to charging your devices (seriously, if you want a LeapPad2 get the one with the AC power pack adapter, totally worth the money even if you only ever get to download one batch of games.)