Hellobee Boards

Probably not the response you want, but we really like the Motorola for this. We had the one in the baby's room setup close to the crib and the one in the toddler's room setup in a corner so it can see most of the room. And then the monitor will auto scan between the two rooms every 10 seconds (or you can view one room at a time, which is what we do now, three years later).

We do have to have the monitor plugged in at all times, but we basically just keep it by our bed anyway.

I don’t know if it’s in your budget, but we love our nest cams. I was really against them to begin with. We had a foscam security monitor we used with apps with our first and it was great (if a bit clunky) when it worked. But it was unstable
We got a nest for our second and just added another nest for my older kiddo. It runs across every device we have, we can run the app on our tv, we can run it on our computer
I know some people like a physical parent unit which I understand.
I also really like the plug and play aspect. We are currently living in Europe and we have been jumping from air B and B to air B and B and it’s SO easy to set the nests up

Similar to @northstar we are planning on using two separate units.

DS is almost 2.5 and the Motorola we have for him is not the greatest but I don't leave it on all night or day anyhow. It is more to peek in on him and we likely will just go to an audio monitor if it does die.

For the baby I picked up an Infant Optics that is leaps and bounds better than the Motorola so far (I used it for DS for a while but just recently moved it since the baby is due any day).

Definitely not what you were looking for but the switching on one monitor was going to annoy me and the quality of the Motorola was deteriorating so I thought it best to just do two separate monitors.

@trixi: It's so easy and honestly, audio monitors are SO much cheaper than trying to find another system that works. I don't regret how we made it work at all. I just couldn't sleep with the noise switching on the video parent unit. It was driving me crazy. Plus, this way, we won't miss our daughter saying she needs us. That was my fear is that she would call out, the monitor wouldn't be on her and we wouldn't know that she needs us.

Did you know you can replace the battery in the Motorola and perhaps get some more life out of the one you have? My Motorola was pretty much like what you described after 3-4 years of use so I pulled out the battery in the parent unit, entered in the type in an Amazon search, and then ordered a replacement battery. The unit was practically as good as new after that. Just a thought if it is cheaper to buy a second camera and continue using the model you already have....

We went through THREE Motorola monitors for my first son. Terrible product, in my opinion.

We got the InfantOptics DRX9 or whatever it’s called when we had our 2nd (now 3 months). We love love love it. We got one camera before baby was born for my older to try it out because our third Motorola bit the dust. That was about 3 months before the new baby was born. So 6 months in and zero complaints. We have 2 cameras and 1 parent unit. It scans between the rooms and honestly I think it’s perfecrlu fine. I was worried about not hearing both of them at th same time but it’s a nonissue.

@trixie same problem with motorola but just returned to Amazon (a year down the line)

We tried 5 different monitors before returning to motorola and going with two separate (nannyshare) - it's much easier than the scrolling

For what it’s worth we have issues with our summer infant plug as well. They won’t do anything because it’s out of warranty. But as long as i wrap the cord under the stand it will charge appropriately so it’s a non issue now that i know how to deal with it. We’ve had this monitor for 3.5 years without issue. And i believe we replaced the battery once.

@trixi: just to offer a dissenting opinion: we got a dual camera video monitor 3 years ago when we moved and were expecting baby #2. We have used it pretty much every night for the past 3 years and I am happy with it. We have it on the switching between two cameras all night as my older child sleeps on a different floor from us. I had the same worry about the noise difference but I have been able to solve it by putting both cameras very near both fans so the sounds are basically the same. I sleep through the switching all night without a problem. I don’t remember the model but we basically just keep it plugged in next to the bed so we haven’t had issues.

@trixi: Please do report back if you are able to contact Motorola - we're having a similar issue with our parent unit, the plug needs to be at just the right angle to connect.

Our solution probably won't work for your situation, as our two share a room, but we use the Motorola with two cameras, and manually flip between our son (5.5) and daughter (15 months), usually keeping it on our daughter. The nice thing about sharing a room, though, is that we can still hear our son when the monitor is on our daughter's camera.