Comments on: Review: Baby 2.0

By: Review: Baby 2.0 « Ben.geek.nz Forums

Review: Baby 2.0 « Ben.geek.nz Forums — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 09:56:10 +0000

[...] Review: Baby 2.0Follow me on Twitter Posted 6 months ago # [...]

By: Dylan Horrocks

Dylan Horrocks — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 10:30:18 +0000

One of the many things I love about our Babies (or, I should say, Teen 1.0 and Tween 2.0) is the automatic upgrades. There’s no fiddly downloading or installing, no rebooting or rewiring; they just quietly get on with expanding their capacity and software over time.

Plus it’s all open source: I haven’t had to mess about with a single EULA since we got them (though we did have to register them on first purchase, apparently due to legal requirements).

Of course, we still encounter bugs in the programming now and then (system meltdown anyone?), but really I can’t recommend them highly enough.

By: David Gleeson

David Gleeson — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 06:04:20 +0000

So perfectly Geeky. I am just 3 months in with version 1.0 myself and all is great thus far. The hand — mouth calibration activity is currently running most hours of the day, but the drool/teething boolean is false for the moment.

By: Ben C

Ben C — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 04:23:19 +0000

So will you be putting either of these review models up for grabs via a competition?

By: Ms Constantine

Ms Constantine — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 02:14:29 +0000

Great review. I recommend you keep this for when babies 1.0 and 2.0 are upgraded to adult software.

By: Si Sutcliffe

Si Sutcliffe — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 01:33:28 +0000

Are you finding any incompatibility between Child 1.0 and Baby 2.0?

My own versions of Child 1.0 and Baby 2.0 seemed to interact satisfactorily but there do seem to be intermittent compatibility issues with Child 1.0 and Toddler 2.0 since upgrading from Baby 2.0 to Toddler 2.0

By: Dylan Reeve

Dylan Reeve — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 21:10:03 +0000

The problem I’ve found with third-party documentation for Baby models is the total lack of uniformity of technique. Almost all of the literature I’ve read suggests different techniques for the same fundamental tasks, often completely contradictory. In fact in many cases I find the advice completely incompatible with our own Baby units (actually to be fair Baby 1.0 has been ungraded to Child 1.0, but the same documentation issues exist with that model).

Another interesting thing I’ve observed since obtaining Baby 1.0 was the incredible number of people willing to offer unsolicited operating advice, many of whom have never operated a Baby unit themselves, and may have only seen some basic demonstratration videos on television or the internet.

While throughly satisfied with Baby 1.0 (now a Child 1.0 model) and Baby 2.0… I am not sure we’ll be acquiring any future Baby units. Although I perhaps shouldn’t discount the chance of an impulse purchase at some stage.

By: Ben

Ben — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 21:05:32 +0000

Moss, that’s a brilliant idea. There was some third party documentation that we used for Baby 1.0 that was really, really good. I can’t recall the title but I’ll look it up.

You are right about the lack of included documentation. We were told that the user experience was “natural” and “straightforward” but it was far from the truth.

By: Moss

Moss — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 20:59:52 +0000

May I suggest as a supplemental to your review of Baby 2.0, you may want to delve into the vast array of third party literature available to those who are struggling with their own Baby acquisitions. I find the lack of first party documentation to be a tremendous oversight by the production process of Baby models, and have found that the third party documentation available is incredibly variable in not only content but in authoritativeness.

As a future potential owner of Baby models and a former Baby 1.0 myself who was in Child 1.0 when Baby 2.0 and 3.0 hit the scene, I wonder what one requires to make the upgrade from Adult 1.0 to Parent 1.0 … I have been recommended the book “If Your Kid Eats This Book, Everything Will Still Be Okay” by another reviewer I trust, via http://www.boingboing.net/2009/09/01/if-your-kid-eats-thi.html but I was wondering on your views, as a local reviewer of some repute on such matters.

By: Dylan Reeve

Dylan Reeve — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 20:56:55 +0000

I’ve had a Baby 2.0 for about ten months now. I think mine might be a slightly different revision from yours, but I am still unable to sucessfully configure the alarm system.

What I have noticed especially about Baby 2.0 is how much it’s almost exactly the same as Baby 1.0 in appearance, yet seems to have very different user experience.

Thanks for your helpful review. Perhaps you can demonstrate Baby 2.0 on your Breakfast slot?