My 5 year old twins wantd "iPods" for their birthday - like their big brother. We got them each these - they LOVE them and so do we. We broused through the thousands of music files on our computer - and burned their favorites to a CD - then it was very easy to get them to the fp format. They use it a lot and are thrilled with their "iPods" - my only complaint is the foam padding on the headphones falls off a lot - we finally had to superglue them on - otherwise it is awesome!
- Traci M. Vedros
My kids received this item as a gift for their birthday. They loved the preloaded songs and stories so I thought I would download so more songs off the Fisher Price website and install the software. Unfortunately, this was not an easy task. I ended up spending 3 hours on the phone with customer service and not getting any answers. Customer service ended up sending me another FP3 player that had the same problems as the first one.Pros:DurableFunEducationalCons:Software would not recognize FP3 player (saying device not connected)Software kept giving me the error message (G:/access denied)Software would not recognize internet connection but I could use the internet just fine.A month later, I finally figured it all out and got the software to work after reinstalling the software numerous times, etc. I found out that the administrator name on your computer has to be EXACTLY the same as the user name you put in when you install the software. Find out what your administrator name is in XP by clicking on start>control panel>user accounts. This is one reason the software would not work.The second is that when you plug in the device, your computer will pop up the device with several FP3 icons, playlist icon, and readme file. If you delete all the FP3 icons located in the popup, the device will run fine. Who would have thought of this, but it works! Customer service was very nice but did not offer much for solutions.Overall the kids love the player but Fisher Price needs to work out the bugs in the software, with headphones not being durable, and FP3 format. They could also improve the troubleshooting section in their website. My Ipod isn't even this difficult!
- jamie009 "jamie009"
I bought this for my 4 year old daughter for Christmas. She loved it. I read the reviews about how difficult the software was and took the time to transfer her favorite songs to it before she received it on Christmas morning.The software is annoying. It does seem unnecessary to make you do a fp3 format. I think that may be so you can't use the songs/stories you download from their store with other programs.I bought two stories and a song from their store so my daughter would have some stories she was familiar with when she first opened it. I was disappointed at the lack of selection. Their site might have about 50 stories. I had not heard of many of them. They also had about 40-50 albums and you have to click on each album to see if it has the song you are looking for. I did not see a way to search for a song.I was then annoyed they have a minimum order of $4.95. Songs are .99 each and books were 2.99 each. Albums were typically $9.99 each. The download was VERY fast. Although, you did have to download each item separately.I did not use the picture editor. I expected it would be more trouble than it was worth. I found the folder with the icon pictures in it in the programs directory and am quite certain you could just move files there if you wanted to add images you already had. I didn't have time before Christmas to test it out.The stories and songs you buy from their site come with their own preset images that are appropriate.It is frustrating that it will only convert music from a CD. You can write music to a cd and then read it back into the program. I put about 20 songs on a cd and it could only only convert about half of them. I didn't take time to investigate.Finally, getting to my point. Christmas morning my daughter was tickled to get up and put on the headphone and hit two buttons and heard her favorites song (Brown Eyed Girl). How did Santa know?Anyway, after opening all of her gifts, she made the full circle and went back to play more songs and it would not play. The play button just ceased to work. I replaced the batteries and turned it on and off a few times. I reconnected it to my pc and could play the songs directly off the player through the software. I could hear the click when I would page through the songs so I know the sound on the player was working. I double checked the volume was turned all the way up. Nothing happened. After fiddling with it for a minute, the forward button quit working.I'm returning it. I have not yet decided if I want to exchange it or just buy an inexpensive full mp3 player. The ONLY reason I would consider exchanging it is the icons make it easier for children that cannot yet read to pick a song. However, I'm really worried the next one would break again and this time it would be just after when I could return it.The other reason I am leaning toward a MP3 player is that it irks me that you cannot buy a power supply for it. Since you can purchase speakers for it, I had planned to put it in my daughter's room. We play music for her when she goes to bed every night. I wouldn't want to replace the batteries (or recharge them) multiple times a week.Of course, if I return it, I'll probably be stuck with the purchase made from fisher price for the stories and song.One last note - the user manual says to only use alkaline batteries
- Clarissa R. Knight
My wife is repackaging this failed christmas gift as I type. The unit is cute, but the software to make it work is nothing but miserable and ultimately completely nonfunctional.For starters, let me say that both my wife and I are experienced MP3 player users from multiple manufacturers. We know how to use these things. Our computers are new.The software provided with the unit is miserable.The "store" where you can buy FP3's online is only accessible after you download and install the software update. It took 10 tries to complete the download, which would just lock up and fail each time - and because you are accessing the downloads through their software rather than a web site, it cannot be refreshed, and does not pick up where it left off in the case of an interruption. The computer has to be restarted and the whole process starts over.When that was finally finished, my wife bought three stories. Only 1 was able to be downloaded. A confirmation email was sent that we had bought 3 stories, and that we could download them up to 5 times, but nowhere did it say where to go if all the items purchased did not download as whey should have. Only after lengthy consultations over the phone with a very nice customer rep did we go to a totally separate company website (nothing related to Fisher Price) to get the missing items we had paid for.Shortly after this, the player spontaneously erased itself. Great.This morning, we plugged it in to put more music on it, and the software recognizes it as a new player only, which needs to be registered. The registration file on the FP3 player cannot be found, probably because it is already registered!! And thus, we cannot ever add more songs to it.Also the software has provisions for playlists, but the player cannot access them as discrete, selectable playlists.
- Laura Gowing "Laura G"
The actual player itself seems to be quite usable for my four year old.However, for the parent the software is crap. Here is why:1. It only runs on windows. If you have mac, linux, freebsd you are out of luck.2. The player only plays fisher price proprietary format music files. So sorry all those MP3 files you have spent years ripping from your CDs will not work. Time to re rip them into FP3 format, that is if you can still read the CDs.This is yet another example of anti-consumer lock in products that areunfortunately becoming more common.
- FreeBSD daemon
My just-turned-three-year-old loves her FP3 player! She often visits her dad who lives three hours away so I got this to provide another entertainment option in the car and on the plane. The story and song options on the website are wonderful! Classics like Goldilocks and Dr. Seuss with newer stories also such as Curious George. She loves it! The song options are great too. A lot of the pop music we hear on the radio is her favorite and Fisher Price offers a lot of those original songs with a children's choir accompaniment. It's very cute. I highly recommend this product. Expect to spend an additional $20 in the Fisher Price online store post purchase. It comes with a few songs and stories but not the selection most would choose.
- Allison Chandler "gadgetmom"
This is a solution to all the others that cannot write new songs to the device. it looks like when some of these devices were manufactured, all of the files were set with the Read only bit set on all of the files.When a song is written to the device, it adds the track, then it will update either the playlist.sng (songs) or playlist.sty (story). If these files are set to read only, then they can not update the internal playlist and the player will not know about any new tracks, and you will get the write access error.Short story to get it working with XP, Vista or whatever - When you connect it to you machine and the drive pops up; right click playlist.sng and then choose properties. Uncheck the attribute for Read only. Then do the same for playlist.sty. It should work fine for everything, and the access errors will disappear.I hope this helps some people out.PS. I was called in to resolve this problem because parents of the device could not get it working
- Mr. X "GrungeTech fer 'hire"
This player is everything it's cracked up to be. It's tough, and VERY easy to load, and I am no tech junkie. Far from it actually. So, once I got the program loaded on the computer, it was a snap to learn. My 4 yr old daughter ust loves it. She'll insist on taking it in the car whenver we're in there, and also will listen to it at home just the same. The only problem (and it's minor) is that the battery life isn't that great. I had to buy rechargable batteries for the amount of use she gives it. Totally worth the investment.
- Momma Lynn
I bought this for my 5 year-old for her birthday. She absolutely loves it and mastered the operation within minutes. Downloading stories from the website was a little tricky, but in the end was worth the time ($1.99 for most stories). Copying songs from CDs was the best feature. You can pick and delete the songs you want. You can even assign a picture to each song or to a collection of songs. For example, for High School Musical, I assigned a school bus; for the Aquamarine soundtrack, a starfish; Princess and the Pauper, a princess. Anyway, you get the idea. She also really likes the story reading function. I look forward to trying out the speaker/boom box accessory. The headphones seemed bulky to me, but my 5 year old loves how they fit and they don't slide off of her head!I gave it 5 stars even though we had to return the first one. The play/pause button didn't work consistently, even right out of the box. It is marketed as a "kid tough" design, but we may have just had a bad player, as the replacement one seems to work fine, even after dropping it a few times. I also recommend the blue case; the pink one is very pale pink and all of the ones in store were already scuffed up and dirty.
- T. Touchstone "Super mom"
Most of the features were great! It is very easy to use for my daughter and myself. Amazon is misleading, the FP3 players requires 2 "AAA", not 2 "AA" as advertised. Battery life is very short, there is no AC adapter or recharger available, such as on a Leapster. We took the FP3 on our RV trip and with all that road noise it was a blessing. The power switch on the back of the player is very sensitive, my daughter tends to like holding the player and making menu selections, and a lot of times inadvertently turns off the player. Quite frustrating.
- Be True to Thyself "Carolynn"
Fisher Price Kid Tough FP3 Song & Story Player - Pink
The Kid-Tough FP3 Player in Pink is a real digital player designed just for preschoolers. It's tough enough and easy enough for kids to use. We've also made it easy for parents to download hundreds of songs and stories onto the player from the Fisher-Price FP3 Song & Story Online Store, or from any CD. The Kid-Tough FP3 Player features: A backlit 1.4-inch LCD screen that uses icons to help kids recognize and choose their favorite songs and stories all by themselves; big buttons that make it easy to navigate; Kid-tough design that stands up to preschoolers play. Holds two hours of entertainment that's approximately 30 songs or 15 stories. Add an SD memory card to store even more. Headphones are sized just right for little ones and play at a safe volume; breakaway neck strap; six songs and two stories pre-loaded. With the software CD we've included, you can: access the Fisher-Price FP3 Song & Story Online Store; browse hundreds of kid-appropriate songs and stories, all in one place; read expert recommendations to help you choose and purchase online, anytime; copy music from CDs you already own to your player; change and manage your player's songs and stories; player software requirements: Microsoft Windows 2000 or Windows XP; Intel Pentium III 500 MHz or above; 256 MB RAM (512 MB RAM or higher recommended); 150 MB free hard-disc space for full installation; Video Graphics Card with 1024 x 768 resolution or higher; Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 with SP1 or later; Macromedia Flash plug-in; USBport; Optional for Online Store: Internet connection (broadband connection recommended). Requires 2 AAA (LR03) alkaline batteries.
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