If you are searching for an affordable and impressive video baby monitor, it is time to get to know the Infant Optics DXR-5. As you may already know, this gadget has been a best seller on Amazon for years, winning great a reputation based on feedback from thousands of parents just like you.
There are strong reasons for you to love it. With the reliable basic functions, you are aable to stay connected with your infant 24/7 – a huge comfort for any parent, but particularly brand new or first time parents. One of its features in particular might blow you away. Yes, that is the super long battery life we are talking about, which could even beat most of the “high-end” monitors on the market.
Now priced at less than $100, it could fulfill most of your basic needs for monitoring. However, just like its competitors out there, it is not 100% perfect.
Read this review to figure out how amazing it is, comparatively speaking, and decide whether it is the best baby video monitor for you.
Infant Optics DXR-5 Portable Video Baby Monitor
Benefits of Infant Optics DXR-5 Unit
- It is affordable, so you won’t break the bank on it
- It provides you with a crystal clear video and audio feed of your infant
- The portable and compact design lets you carry it around with you easily
- No clicking noise to annoy you when the nursery is quiet
- You don’t even need to plug it in through the night because of the superlong battery life (up to 12 hours)
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>> Read Customer Reviews of Infant Optics DXR-5 on Amazon <<
A Further Look At the Nice Features Of the DXR-5 Unit
1) You Can Barely Feel It in Your Pocket
It’s such a portable and cute gadget that most mothers seem to love to carry it around the house. The shell made of blue and white plastic is really lightweight and the small size can even fit in your pocket. With a vertical mounting stand and wall mounting screws, you can easily mount it on the wall and monitor your baby from any angle you like. Plus, it only takes 3 steps to set it up and you are good to go.
2) You Can See Everything on The 2.4″ Full-color TFT LCD
The video is better than expected at this price. If we haven’t seen those expensive monitors providing high quality video and audio, we would consider it as great rather than good. Anyway, you get what you pay, don’t you?
What you care the most can be nothing more than if your baby is moving around, if he is sleeping, or if he gets stuck inside the rail of the clip. You can watch these kinds of baby thing clearly with the Infant Optics on its 2.4″ Full-color TFT LCD. Besides, the video feed at 30 frames per second is quite streaming.
3) The Sound Monitoring Will Bring Peace to Your Ears
The audio of the Infant Optics does not have an outstanding performance. The sound is a bit low according to some reviews. However, it is enough to hear your baby when he murmurs or makes little cries. It also comes with a white noise eliminator module to mute the white noise automatically when it doesn’t detect any meaningful sound above a predetermined level for 10 seconds, so that you won’t hear any clicking noise that would annoy you when the baby is quiet. This feature helps expand the battery life, as well.
4) Creepy Guys Won’t Get a Chance to View You Infant
It would freak you out if you knew that strangers were able to hack into the system and watch your baby on this parent unit accidentally or intentionally (hackers). That where the FHSS technology comes into play. It will jump between different channels to encrypt the video and audio data transmission. It protects your Infant Optics dxr-5 baby monitor from being hacked by those out there with ill intentions.
5) Basically You Don’t Need to Worry about Interference
The signal is not completely interference free with WiFi. If you try to place it too close to wireless router (like within around 2 feet), there would be a significant drop on the network speed. The reception range is good – you can still receive clear video and pure audio from 200 feet away indoors, if there are not too many floors or walls in your house.
6) You Can Even Check In On Your Infant in Complete Darkness
There is no need to keep a lamp on at in your baby’s room to watch him through video monitor from time to time at night. The camera is able to ‘see’ things in 5 meters clearly by emitting infrared light when it’s dark enough in the room. This night vision will be automatically triggered when it turns dark in the room. But don’t expect too much on the image quality in this mode.
7) The DXR-5 Will “Sleep” With Your Infant
Another key feature is its optional standby mode. The monitor comes with a 900mAh Li-on battery which can last for 12 hours in best condition according to the latest update from Infant Optics. It can also reduce power consumption rapidly by turning the audio and video circuit off when there is no baby’s noise for 3 minutes.
It will get back to work immediately when the camera hears a meaningful sound. According to the feedback of a mother, the soft music played to get the baby to sleep is enough to wake the monitor up from standby mode.
8) Do You Need to Monitor Several Kids At a Time?
You can monitor more than one camera at a time if you are so lucky to have several kids or if you need monitor the playroom and the bedroom frequently. However, the LCD display on parent unit does not scan between cameras automatically – you have to manually do that, which we don’t really like. Each camera is less than $70, while some other monitor cameras might cost you $90 to $100.
Cons
- It is not as versatile as other high-end video baby monitors like the Motorola MBP33. You can’t remotely pan, tilt or zoom the camera or talk to your baby.
- The lightweight and thin plastic of the sell does bring some kind of cheap feeling, however it’s much more durable than it looks.
- Another small issue is the battery size of the monitor. It’s not standard, but not hard to buy, either.
Verdict
The Infant Optics baby monitor is probably the best baby video monitoring device around the price point of $100. It will be a great option for you, if you don’t want to spend too much on a video baby monitor with a camera or are limited by the budget. High quality audio-only monitors won’t be much cheaper than this. But it’s not for those who are looking for versatile baby monitors. They should consider something else like dropcam pro video baby monitor.
Update
- All the modules sold after 15th Jan 2014 come with an enhanced battery that can last up to 12 hours with video turning off.
- The annoying beep the parent unit generates when entering sleep mode has been removed in 2012
- If you want more advanced features, give the DXR-8 unit a shot.
Just bought it. There is no much surprise, but we are pretty happy with the overall quality. Hope it would last long.
Fantastic video monitor for the money and pretty happy with crystal clear picture.
Good baby no monitor overall. A lot of nice features for the money. However, this runs on 2.4Ghz, the same as many Wi-Fi routers. We have major Wi-Fi issues through a lot of the house if the camera is on. The monitor does not have to be on to cause the problem….just the camera alone will. It drops my Wi-Fi speed from 70Mbps to 0.1 or 0.01. Basically we need a new router with 5Ghz or turn the camera off when not needing it. Really wish they would fix this.
Infant Optics is worth the money
Even though there is a better model – the Infant Optics DXR8, this baby monitor still works well, and it is cheaper to buy!