Thanks to Walter who kindly brought this back from Malta for me, I set up the Children's disco set today so thought I would do a review to share. Quite a long review I'm afraid, but I have tried to cover everything.
First a view of the box
and the contents
the klickies - I like these, I think they are all new.
closer views of some of the accessories and building parts
The part with the battery compartment - it takes 4 AA 1.5v batteries
The stickers - I think it's time to get out the tweezers
what I hadn't noticed straight away was that the removable floor piece had stickers on two sides so it is reversible
Starting to put it together, I am pleased to say that there were only 16 yellow connectors in the whole set, the other pieces that clip together are moulded in place
Adding the back panel - the two oval shaped areas are where the speakers are
Attaching the side pieces and the disco ball. There are three flashing lights on each side.
and then the roof
The floor panel which is reversible can be glittery on one side, for use as a disco and has a game on the other side - I suppose for when it is the kid's club. The parts for the game and the dice are all included, no instructions, but it seems straightforward, a bit like Ludo.
One thing which I thought would have been useful is a crate to hold all the game pieces when they are not being used, so I added one - I'll look out one in a brighter colour later.
All complete - because I don't want to use it as part of a hotel set up, I left off the 'Hotel' stickers which go on the outside walls.
An ipod can be attached to the disco unit with a lead that is supplied. It connect to a socket in the side of the building
Here it is attached to the ipod and with the disco in full swing (playingThe Bieber of course
)
The controls (four buttons) for the disco unit are situated on the top, at the rear end of the roof. There are basic instructions as to what the buttons do, but I could manage to work them!
The first and from a parents view, probably the most important, is the Off button!
The second button controls the lights - press once for the disco ball and twice for the disco ball and the flashing lights on the side.
The third button is to start a pre recorded tune (percussion and computer generated sounds is the best description I can give
) press again for a different tune.
Button four controls the volume - just two settings.
I found that when the ipod lead is attched, the pre recorded tunes won't play so I had to remove the cable. I was hoping to leave it attached so that it didn't get lost.
The lights are very good, they seem to stay on for about three minutes - it looks great in the dark!
As far as I could see, the pattern of the lights at the side seem to respond to the music playing on the ipod, but not sure if it was the beat or the volume that made the difference. The sound coming through from the ipod was not as good as from the ipod itself and there was some interference if the ipod was on full volume, but from a child's point of view it probably isn't bad.
All in all I think it is quite a good toy, I found it fun and will be useful for what I want if for.
James was pleased with it and is going to be in charge of the music it is going to play in our forthcoming exhibition, so he's very happy about that!
Elaine
