We've got a massive trip coming up. It's going to take us only through three states, but one of them is PA. Destination: Hershey. Those 8 hour treks are going to wear us all down without a very good AV system.

Who's got suggestions? My wife claims that there are replacement headrests with screens built-in. I'm skeptical.

100 bottles of beer on the wall. 100 bottles of beer.....you know the rest.

That's my suggestion. But then again, my kid hasnt taken his first breath yet so what do I know?

I will say that when the time comes for our first trek, I will keep it old school and do all the family fun activities that I was raised with before we opt out for technology.

We've done that already, 2 years ago. The thing is that it gets really old. If the kids were old enough to read, we'd have books, but we also wouldn't be taking this trip. So, we're going the tech route.

Here's the big contrast between now and when I was growing up. My parents would have cheated any bit that they could. But they couldn't. We were allowed to lay on the floor, in the "crow's nest" above the seat. Now, kids are confined to have very little motion and are accustomed to entertainment and the quality of entertainment and education saturation is high enough that by the time you've been at it 4 years, it just doesn't feel like you're giving in.

I can't imagine being able to count to 50 or write my name at 5 years old, but now it's expected for getting into kindergarten. Things have progressed.

I would think the 'replacement' head rests would be fairly expensive... expensive enough that I'd probably instead spend the money on a couple of earlier generation Ipads/Ipods and a chitload of downloaded movies and apps before modifying the car... because then your 'entertainment' gadget is not automatically car centric. (You could always make that rule... you can only use these in the car...) But you then have 'portable' options.

TheBoy LOVES "TV in the car." Our is a very OLD strap on (yes, I said it) dvd player, but it functions well enough that we can put in a Phineas&Ferb DVD and make it to Indianapolis with one DVD and some chit chat time. He doesn't know anything better exist... yet.

Pick up a couple Kindle Fires or other cheap Android tablets. Then you can have movies on the back of your headrests (with a little duct tape, or something more elegant) as well as in the pediatrician's waiting room, the shopping cart seat, the bedroom on a sick day, etc.

You can use a program called Handbrake to rip DVDs on your PC/Mac, then copy the files to your tablet. You can expect the files to be about a GB per hour, but since kids are less picky about HD you can easily put about 16 hours of Pixar goodness on an 8GB tablet. And you can sneak in some educational games, too! There are a few that are even road-trip themed, so the kids are entertained without missing out on the Americana outside.

You'll also want (need) some kid-sized headphones. You can play the sound through the car speakers if you're into torturing yourself, but you'll still want the headphones for waiting rooms and such.

Thanks for the suggestions.

We looked at some tablet options and then the boys started getting slammed by these Vtech Innotab2 commercials. Finding out that the new games still work on the first generation means,we can probably get a couple of them for $100 and load movies and a few games for the trip. That will be nice. Even better, they should be easy enough to use to be useful when they decide to ride with grandma and grandpa. A danger with full-featured tablets is that my parents aren't likely to be good for tech support.

I've heard those innotabs are decent.

If they have ds systems, get an r4 card and load it up with their favorite movies and shows. Or you could go the tablet route, or if you have 12v in the vehicle and the room you could use a laptop. This is what we do a lot of times (I drive a Ram which has a large center console and plug the audio into the aux jack).
We rip all our dvds to hard drives. much better.

I put an aftermarket DVD headrest system in our van after we bought it 10 years ago and I think we've turned it on twice. The main problem is glare. If there is much sunlight at all, the screens get so washed out you can barely see anything. This may be less of an issue now.

I think the tablets are a good idea.

And don't underestimate the power of audio. Good old audiobooks from the library can work like a charm. They sometimes will also lend out the player. Cost $0. Audio stuff is dirt cheap and the kids can noodle out the window while they listen.

I would look into the one's that are portable and you can just strap them to the back of the head rests. They are not to expensive and this way you can also move them from vehicle to vehicle if you choose to.

My boy is due in March but I have quite a few nieces and nephews. My previous Chevy Avalanche I had before my pickup now was fully loaded and had the factory DVD player and rear monitor. Even on an hour long drive if they were sleepy or cranky that thing worked like a charm. Flip on their favorite movie and they are quite the whole ride or fall asleep.


I will probably add the ones to the headrest in the new truck or get one that mounts to the ceiling once my boy is old enough.

We bought an Innotab 2 this week. It arrived yesterday. I don't think I'll be able to load anything on it until we're actually on the road. We'll see how that works out. What really saved us is finding my iPod Touch 32Gb. The 4 year old is adept at using it and I know I can load it with everything I want him to have. If Mr Nik will just remind me of some of these apps he's gotten for TheBoy...

I'm just starting on converting some Tivo Recordings to the Innotab and iOS formats. I've got some long nights ahead of me, I'm sure.

This page has been helpful in converting the video files. Mostly in finding a free conversion program. We'll see how useful it actually is later tonight.

I have only loaded these 5... all freebies.

Where's My Water
Where's My Perry (same game, only Perry the Playtpus themed)
Scribble Lite (VERY basic drawing app, I wouldn't bother)
Zoodles Kid Mode (your recommendation)
Bubble Bum (a couple of cute games from the maker of another inflatable seat - blog post coming on that item I swear)

Check out tech.woot.com today they have some dvd headrests for sale. Sale ends Nov 20th. or until it sells out.

tech.woot.com/plus/a-giant-pile-of-pyle-audio