ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

Ok so it's my lads 5th birthday and like all kids these days he wants something i know nothing about, now if it was up to me he'd get a kick up the **** and his mother with him, for the money she is spending on his party, but thats by the by.

Any how so he wants one of these new fangled contraptions called a 3DS and from what i can see the fa hook ing thing is £179.00 as a package, the other thing he wants is an mp3 player.

So her who must be obeyed has come up with the ipod package because it has games and music and can go into a docking station and it comes to similar money.

So help and advice from others who have experience of these devils work demon devices would be much appreciated.

peter zippy reid

iTrader: (25)

Google 3ds problems as some people are getting sore heads with the 3ds mate

The Zohan

I waited until my kids where 7+ to buy electronic stuff like this as i did not consider them capable of looking after it, also i think it is too young to be playing this stuff - something to consider...

Midlife......

iTrader: (2)

too young for 3DS as recommended by Nintendo ........cheaper DS or lego

Shaun

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

Unfortunatly things have moved on a bit with this newer generation kids, one of his childminding group peers has one and he is the same age, so he already knows how to play it.

I think i shall go and get him the ipad touch, having done a little research, he's off to india for a year, so i think it will be better to get him more into music than the games, and at least we won't be paying out for new games, i'm also not keen on letting him get too into gaming so want something thats more than a console.

They grow up too bloody fast...

Flaps

iTrader: (1)

If you change your mind, I'm thinking about selling my 3ds (black) with Mario Kart, Pilotwings & Streetfighter, looking for £100 & p&p

Jamescsti

I don't think the 3ds is good for young children, I played on one for 5 minutes and felt sick,
I'd have concerns about what those screeNs would do to young developing eyes.

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

I'm inclined to agree about the screens and also the games in general, we are an outdoor family, so the last thing i want is him getting into the habit of sitting in his room playing computer games like so many kids today, with him being an only child we like to keep him occupied so as to avoid him retiring into himself or mixing with the less desirable elements at school.

Off out to the shops to see what deals there are to be had, once i'v done a bit more surfing.

The Zohan

I agree with you on this, our two are allowed an hour a day on the computer/games unless it is bad weather (the only other exception being if it is homework related). Even so we make sure they are also reading, drawing, playing other games and doing craft type stuff.

We have a Wii consul and they each have DSI's and MP3 players, the MP3 and DSI tend to get used more in the car than anywhere else. Win-Win!

as i was once told by a wise man "Everything in moderation" and during the summer and winter months i like to see my kids outside socialising and playing with their friends. Being indoors and the bad weather must not bee seen as time for just computers/tv/games consuls and music players either. there are so many other things they can and should be doing.

Fortunately mu two love being out on their roller-blades and bikes, our eldest has just worn out her first set of wheels on her blades after 4 month so i think we are getting the balance about right

Dr Hu

We had a similar dilemma a few christmas's ago - we have a boy & girl.

We bought a normal DS for the boy (bit younger) as all he wanted to play was Mario stuff generally.

We bought the girl a iPod Touch, which she loved as she could play music on it too - it now has something daft like 200+ apps on it!!, we ended up getting our boy a 3rd hand original iPhone for £30 alongside his DS as he wanted a idevice too for all the little game apps.....

They use the iDevices for YouTube stuff as well, they always have Horrible Histories on or something, the kids love them.

So think carefully, a DS is great for full fat console games but £25+ per game ()
or Free/69p per game app from Apple.....

We do have to limit their time on them though, we often have 'gadget free' days if it gets silly!
My boy *would* quite happily spend ALL day playing on his!

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

Well the ipod touch won, i got it from pc world and paid an extra £32 for the 2yr no quibble exchange, with him only being 5yrs old it may well get bashed about a bit, or it could meet with a nasty accident in about 18months.

Just got to figure out how the bloody thing works now.

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

Well i must say i'm quite impressed by this ipod touch, i'm not into games ect and mostly listen to music in the car, but having had a quick play with it on a driving game what a difference in the technology from when i were a lad,

I also bought him/us a TEAC docking station/ audio player that has Apple airplay installed so we can stream music from our macbooks and have it as a bit of a home hifi out in india, even though i have not been able to play with the EQ settings yet because the cheap skates didn't include a remote battery, the sound is pretty good, nice and clean not overly bassey like the sony version, i was sat in the living room listening to it this morning on mid volume and i'm really pleased with it, it also helped that it was down from £149 to £79.

stevebt

iTrader: (8)

Get an ipod touch, our DS's just sit in the draw as the ipods get used all the time and if you buy a game it installs on all your ipods if you use the one pc