LeapFrog Clickstart My First Computer
by LeapFrog
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List Price: Our Price: $44.28 You Save: $0.71 (2%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $14.81 (click here) Category: Toy See more product details |
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Toys and Games Reviews of LeapFrog Clickstart My First Computer
Customer Review: Great option to learn computer and educational skills
Summary: 5 Stars
We purchased this for your 4 yr old and 2 yr old. I was worried it would be too easy for our 4 yr old since she is great at her basic stuff. From the moment I opened it the girls both loved it. My two year old loves it. She does pretty good for barely turning 2 last month. My 4 yr old loves it too. She does great playing it. She loves the fun house that is on the learning carnival game. It is similar to a video game that you have to more left, right, up, down, and jumping. The computer is great for teaching keyboard skills. It has worked great for reinforcing her abc's and letters. We purchased an extra game but you don't need to at the beginning. The games seem to be the next level for the activities on the computer itself that are already included. Plus there are coupons in with the console to get money off the games. I did purchased the adapter to avoid large numbers of batteries. I have only had it a week and so I am not sure on the long term durability yet. It seems to be great though with a solid keyboard and mouse. We have not had any issues with the keyboard recognizing anything except my 2 yr old wraps her fingers around the mouse so the mouse is lifted enough off the pad causing it to not always recognize her moving it. My only complaint is that when you type "f" it sounds like the letter name is "s". It makes the correct pronunciation but saying what the letter name is sounds incorrect. Other than that we love it and are planning on getting more games later down the road.
The advantage to this versus letting your child on your computer is they can't break anything or get anywhere but to the games that are on the system. I don't want to chance my child getting on my computer and hitting the wrong button/s and causing problems. Plus it does not have all the extra windows keys or f keys that can be confusing on the keyboard. Once they master this then they can start learning on an actually computer. I also love that there is a log in screen where you can have three separate players that will keep track of past play to allow the game to get more challenging the more they play. There is also the option to play as a guest if friends come over. I also love that I can send an email to my kids. It is a fun product. Great product for two and up.
Customer Review: Problems with Mouse
Summary: 2 Stars
When this product is working, it clearly stimulates beneficial problem solving and word recognition for my son. However, it only works a very small percentage of the time, with continuous adult supervision. The main problem is the mouse:
1) The mouse wire is too stiff and not long enough, making it nearly impossible to hold straight up and down, even for adults, and therefore skewing the direction of the mouse.
2) The mouse pad is too small, requiring users to pick up the mouse at least 3 times to move from one side of the screen to the other.
3) The mouse is prone to false feedback, and the cursor often jumps from one side of the screen to the other without any input.
4) The mouse often fails to respond to input. Obviously it works better with newer batteries, but even when everything is brand new, it often malfunctions.
5) The device appears to be a battery hog. I have a wireless keyboard and mouse at home that are used for hours every day, for months on end, before the batteries need to be replaced. In order to function properly, the mouse/keyboard batteries must be replaced every four or five uses.
The sum of these problems means that the mouse is frustrating for adults to use, and virtually impossible for children. My son is able to enjoy periods of about 5 minutes where the fascination is more powerful than the frustration. However, the frustration quickly overwhelms and he declares the toy broken and turns it off. If I purchased this mouse for my computer, I would return it for poor quality.
This is clearly an instance where the software developers got a decent budget, and the hardware developers did not. Until leapfrog invests in a working mouse, the user interface will be worthless, and this product will be unprofitable and damaging to the brand.
I recommend waiting to purchase this product until the packaging says that the mouse has been improved. A recall for existing customers would also do well to maintain customer loyalty.
Sincerely,
Michael Taylor
Customer Review: Keeps her off my computer.
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought this the second I saw it at the store. I came onto amazon to look for games and the A/C adapter that the store didn't carry. It's great to have. My daughter is two and a half, and has become very interested in my computer, mostly the mouse and keyboard, because she likes the cause and effect it creates. So I saw this and figured that she might as well learn about navigation of the computer and the mouse. She loves it! As soon as it turns on she says, "Click my name." and will navigate right to her name, not her sisters accounts, and will load the game she wants to play all by herself.
I am a big fan of all the leapstart products. My daughter can sing the abc's, tell you ALL the phonetics that go w/ them, and has begun working on letter and number recognition. This helps teach all the skills she is working on, while re-enforcing the ones she already has. Her big sisters are a bit to old for the console, they just turned 7, but they actually have fun playing w/ it too. They have it set to a higher level and use it to help w/ their keyboarding skills. We don't have any other game consoles in the house because I'd prefer they stick w/ educational toys, and I'm just beginning to really let them explore on my PC, so the console is a ready break for them.
There are several different games available for them. Each cartridge works on specific items. We've bought most all of them, but so far have only used two. They are really into Nemo and Dora at the moment. The Dora game helps alot w/ learning to navigate using arrow keys, it's more complex for level two, sorting patterns and such. Nemo works alot on keyboarding and mouse skills. There are four games built right into the console as well.
It is pretty durable. I keep the console up higher, but the keyboard gets bashed around a bit and has had no problems. It shuts off on it's own provided you don't move the mouse or press any keys, and there is a place on the back of the keyboard to clip mouse onto when not in use.
Customer Review: Bad mouse and too many batteries are required
Summary: 3 Stars
Purchased the click start for my 4 year old daughter who still hasn't gotten the hang of using a mouse and clicking it at the appropriate place and thought this would be the perfect solution. Had some issues however,
1. You need batteries for the remote console (4 -AA) and the unit that connects to the TV (4-C), you can purchase the AC adapter for a $9.99 fee but that only resolves the issue with the unit that connects to the TV, you still need the 4-AA batteries for the remote console.
2. The remote console is supposed to power down within a certain amount of time if there is no activity; I still needed to remove the batteries after 30 minutes of non use. I saw that the leds in the front of the remote console was continually flashing to the main unit and the led on the bottom of the mouse to be still illuminating. Even though led's usually don't draw too much current to drain the batteries, they are still being wasted, and the remote console didn't seem like it was going to go to automatically power down as stated..
3. The mouse and mouse pad were horrible, the cord is placed in a bad position, and the mouse pad is very slippery so the mouse just slides off. It is very hard to get the mouse arrow in the proper position because of the mouse pad and sometimes the arrow just doesn't where you are moving the mouse, it seems to get stuck. This was extremely frustrating for my daughter. We tried using the hardwood floor and it did work a little better and I will be trying to use the mouse with a real mouse pad, hopefully it will improve. I called Leap Frog about the crappy mouse, who mentioned that there weren't any other complaints even though I see one here on Amazon and they are going to send me a new mouse which will hopefully work better.
Other than those issues, my daughter likes this product and I like it because it's Leap Frog, also personally think it's a great concept. If the mouse issue doesn't improve however I will be returning it.
Customer Review: This is a must have for preschoolers
Summary: 5 Stars
We bought this for our 2 1/2 year old, because she kept wanting to play with our laptop computers. We figured this was a better option for her, so she would not break our laptops.
She loved it from the minute we hooked it up, and has played it everyday for the past three weeks. She has not gotten tired of it at all since the more you play the more challenging the games get. We are still using the original set of batteries and the keyboard does actually turn itself off after 5 minutes of non-use. (Note...buy the AC adapter, so you can skip having to use batteries in the console unit)LeapFrog ClickStart™ My First Computer Adapter
We give it 5 stars for fun due to the fact that she wakes up each morning still looking forward to playing with Scout, and the Typing Tree. Not many toys can entertain and teach the ever important skills of keyboarding and mouse control to a 2 1/2 year old.
We give it 5 stars for educational value because she at 2 1/2 now has enough eye hand control to use not ony her little mouse accurately, but she can use a real computer mouse with percision. Counting, letter recognition, color recognition, following directions, phonics as well as nurturing are all addressed in the 4 games that are preloaded. The ability to add more games also merits 5 stars.
Durabiity gets 5 stars because she is two, has played with it everyday for three weeks and it still works! :-) She is not super tough on her toys, but has on several occasions carried the entire keyboard by the mouse cord. I was concerned that that mouse would stop working if the cord became loose, however, it is attached to the keyboard very securely behind a screwed in plate that kids cannot access, and you can actually replace it yourself with the replacement mouse offered by Leap Frog.
Again, this is a GREAT product!