VTech DM221 Audio Baby Monitor with up to 1,000 ft of Range, Vibrating Sound-Alert, Talk Back Intercom & Night Light Loop, White/Silver

My mom had cancer surgery and was in bed for several days. I stayed over at my folks house to help with her recovery. I decided to purchase these as the unit for the baby is wireless, which means she could keep it next to her in bed instead of the nightstand, which she could not reach due to surgery pain. It also has a nice nighlight on the baby unit made her feel comfortable after waking up in the middle of the night, a bit disoriented. The unit allowed us to keep her bedroom door closed so that she would not be woken and could rest and recover. If she needed anything, she would just have to speak and we could hear her over the parent unit.

Everything is great about this monitor except the battery life. You pretty much have to constantly charge it. The other features are great though, I love that you can choose the level of sound that it will start making noise at. The sound is clear even from across the room. The nightlight is nice, but not super bright so it is hard to use it for a diaper change, but still good

We use this for travel! I feel kinda like the parent unit is almost always dead and needs to be plugged in. Maybe that is user error because we don’t use it constantly so the batter dies when it isn’t in use? That is frustrating to be honest since it takes a while to charge up when it’s dead. BUT when I have the foresight to plug it in as soon as we get somewhere a couple hours before we need it… it’s great! A classic.

I have been using this for over 5 years to monitor my child, who is prone to seizures, but gets an aura or warning before they escalate. It has literally been a life saver. The only issue I have had is with the charging cord. Over time, they are prone to fray near the plugs. Anyone who recalls the old chargeable calculators back in the day might remember this issue. If you move your receiver often, your cord will eventually fray. Its not an if, its a when. In order to hopefully prevent this on my new unit, I purchased a set of Cable Protector Spiral Phone Charge Cable Savers for $5.99 here on Amazon. As you see from the pic, the fit seems nice and it should prevent the cord from bending near the plug. Hopefully these work. Also in the spirit of keeping your unit for multiple kids/grand kids, the batteries are replaceable and are the same as in portable land-line phones, naturally also available on Amazon.

So I’ve had this monitor for a few months now, it’s got great sound but that’s not to say you can leave it in another room and expect to hear it very well. You can adjust the sensitivity for how much sound you want it to pick up. I have mine set to the highest sensitivity so if I leave my fan running in the room my baby is in, I can hear the fan but I also can hear baby just as much. You can talk through the parent monitor and the sound comes out of the baby monitor so you can talk to your baby if they are into that. Baby monitor does need to be plugged in in order for it to turn on but the cord is long enough so it shouldn’t be a problem. I do recommend that as soon as you start setting it up, first thing you want to do is turn off the parent advisory speech it gives the parent monitor every time it gets powered on. I didn’t mind it during the day but when I’d go to work at 6am and turn it on for my mom, I would try lowering it down when it came to that part but it was quiet during that time which made the speech it gave still be loud. It took me a good few days to turn off the speech, the instructions are a little confusing on how to turn it off but I figured it out somehow. Overall it’s a good baby monitor for the price and it’s both have been dropped on the floor multiple times and they still work without problems. They are very durable.

Actually, I dont use this product to monitor a baby; I use it to monitor my dogs. With all the fans running in the bedroom at night this hot, humid summer, it would be difficult to hear their warning cries if they had to make an emergency trip outside. This monitor remedies that problem. We have a second one of these monitors also--the version with two parent units--and we use that one to monitor my wifes 87-year-old mother who sleeps downstairs. If she ever needs help in the middle of the night, well know about it. All of the components work great. The volume & sensitivity are adjustable. There are a number of other features, too (that I dont use myself), including a night light in the transmitters handle that can be turned on & off manually or can operate in an automatic mode. As far as durability, I have to admit that I have knocked the parent units off the nightstand onto a hardwood floor on more than one occasion, and have let them slip from my hand and drop about four feet, and theyre still working. The parent units hold a charge reasonably well, but it takes a while to fully recharge them again. Of course, you can charge/use them simultaneously with the included A/C adapter. [FYI: The transmitter does not have a battery option and must be plugged in to use.] There is a hook on the back of each parent unit, so you can roam around the house while still monitoring your child. If there was one thing Id change about this product to make it perfect, it would be to add user-selectable channels to the components. As I mentioned, we have two units. They dont interefere with each other--which is a good thing--but what if they had both been using the same frequency? It would be nice if we could select the channel used by each transmitter & receiver. From a business perspective, this would also allow VTech to sell additional parent & transmitter units separately (e.g. to replace a broken one or add additional monitoring capabilities), and then the end-user could just match the new component with the already-existing one. Anyway, wish list aside, this is a great product that allows you to remotely monitor a baby, the elderly, pets, or whatever you else you might need to monitor. It has proven to be a reliable product. ============= Update 10-15-17 Gotta reduce my rating. Ive had far too many sleepless nights because the parent unit loses its link with the transmitter. When this happens, the parent unit starts beeping about once per second. Its like an alarm clock. Now I dont really mind that... in concept... because certainly I want to know when the connection is broken and I need to manually check on whatever Im monitoring; but what I _DO_ mind is the frequency with which the connection is lost. This is a common problem, based on online research, and the consensus is that this occurs when you reduce the sensitivity of the microphone in the transmitter unit. Really? The sensitivity of the microphone should be completely separate from the power of the transmitter. Key word is should; but apparently that is not the case. So if, for example, theres a table fan running in the room being monitored, you have to listen to the drone of the fan all night because you have to keep the sensitivity set to the max. If you turn the sensitivity down, then you have to deal with the link lost alarm. Pick your poison... either way the result is the same, i.e. you dont sleep at night. This is a problem that VTech needs to address.

We’ve been using these monitors since our child was born four years ago… we only just now needed to buy a replacement bc the parent unit sound would go in and out (regardless of being plugged in or not, or fully charged). Great monitors! Works well and has longevity.

Perfect to help me know if my older Mom needs help at night or simply falls.

The baby monitor allows me to head my child for almost a block away. It has great sound quality but the second unit has to be charged everyday.

I use this to listen for my son, it is even better now that he has started to talk. He speaks to us through the monitor and will continue talking for a while until we get him or he gives up and falls asleep.