Back seat video player

[richking58]

I can’t believe that I’m about to ask for advice on this particular product, but c’est la vie, here we are....

My 18-month-old hates car rides. It’s miserable. She has hated car rides since we first brought her home. All she does is scream and cry. The car seat doesn’t matter - we’ve tried different ones. It does help if someone sits back there with her, but that’s not always feasible, nor does it always work. Personally, I think she doesn’t like being restrained, and well, that leads to the unpleasantness of the car rides until we figure out teleportation.

I have learned she will watch videos, and so long as someone is holding a phone she can see - the rest of the car can ride alone in peace. Now I need a video set up for my back seat.

I drive a 2008 Toyota Corolla.

Does anyone have any recommendations?? She does have one of those rear facing mirrors, and we plan to “extended rear face” as long as possible. I’m not sure if an option like this exists, but ideally I’d love some sort of tablet like situation that I could control from my phone or rent from the front seat. Also it would be ideal if I could play movies from it without it needing to be hooked up to a DVD or in car system.

For those of you that have installed some type of system like this in a car, how did you handle your rear facing passengers? Is it best if I install the player on the front of the center seat headrest? How did you get power to it - just charge it well? Honestly any advice regarding this would just be great thank you.

 

[journeyer11]

@richking58 If you’re going to be using screen time (absolutely no judgment here, care rides with screaming kids are awful) I’d recommend getting an iPad. My three preschoolers have iPads, we got for a couple 12 hour road trips. I started giving them to them with baby bum songs on repeat with the screen locked under the guided access feature. They’ve had them for two years now and use them for ABC Mouse, some games and videos. I suggest a tablet over a strictly video player so there’s flexibility and I think it’s a better long term investment. We went with iPads after trying the kindle fire kids. For younger kids, before reading age, they needed so much help to navigate the kindle that it wasn’t helpful when they were in the backseat. There also wasn’t a way to lock the screen. The guided access feature of the iPad is great because you can lock all, or certain parts of the screen.

 

[richking58]

@journeyer11 I’m right there with you. I am well aware of the current guidelines for “one hour a day of screen time”. But like you said, two minutes in the car with a screaming baby, and I’m ready to throw all guidelines and recommendations out the window.

She’s not quite at the age yet where she can hold a screen, I’ve handed her my phone locked on Nettseveral times, only for her to drop it onto the floor 30 seconds later. It would have to be affixed to some thing for her to be able to watch it.

 

[mason1]

@journeyer11 I agree with all of this. We also tried the kindle tablets and found them extremely slow and not intuitive at all. The iPad is easy for most to use and locking it down is easy. You can get a tablet holder for hanging off the headrest to put it in.

 

[theycallmejt]

@richking58 We’ve used a couple of different options. Amazon sells headrest-mounted holders for tablets. We got an inexpensive Lenovo tablet that we use JUST for the car and use Kodi to put movies from our collection on it.

 

[richking58]

@theycallmejt Does it download the movies or do you stream?

 

[theycallmejt]

@richking58 Definitely not streamed. My hubs ripped the movies from dvd, compressed them, and moved them to the tablet (maybe via SD card?)

 

[richking58]

@theycallmejt Gotcha.

 

[divineinspirationsoflove]

@richking58 I have the exact same issue with my 19 month old. I bought a used Kindle fire for 15 dollars and factory reset it. Downloaded a few free downloads for the store and play them for him when we ride around. I let him hold it.. but when he messes with it I can't fix it as I drive.. so I've considered just rigging it to the back of the head rest near his mirror lol
My son loves How to Train Your Dragon and Finny the Shark. Both are free downloads. It also keeps a battery charge for 7 hours.

 

[katrina2017]

@richking58 I used an iPad that I preloaded with some movies and shows and put it in a clear sleeve that attaches to the headrest of the seat in front.

In the end it didn’t help us much because she would get car sick anyway if the car ride was longer than 10 mins so we had to just endure the screaming which suuuuuucked.

Goodluck!

 

[tallerants]

@richking58 I’m about to buy a mount that goes on the head rest for our Amazon tablet. Then download some videos for her. We take a 2-3 car ride both ways each weekend and the misery isn’t worth it

 

[lucielou]

@richking58 I just used an iPad + a strap that holds it in place over the headrest. I download movies, music videos, and TV shows - and then hook it up to my car's bluetooth so I can control it while I drive.