MidlandLXT600VP3 FRS Walkie Talkies - Long Range 36-Channel Two-Way Radios, NOAA Weather Alerts(2-Pack, Black)

Really fun! Real Walkie Talkies! Not a cheap toy that will easily break or sound all static-y. As good as a cell phone for kids w/o the monthly bill. This set reaches really far. Further than I'll let my seven year old go out on her own. My teens tested it and it still provided connection more than 10 miles away. Definitely a good buy. No more calling out the door when its time to come in from the playground. yay!IMPORTANT UPDATE [01/02/14]no vibrating feature but it does have silent mode to disable all roger beeps and ring tones, an external jack for headsets/other accessories, the RX icon appears when receiving but the screen doesn't light up and volume control at it's lowest is still audible within a 30x30 ft. room.also, it seems that awesome range I noted in my earlier review only applies to open, unobstructed rural areas with optimum performance conditions being near water. on our first range test my kids took one straight up the mountain from our place, there's a river that runs from up there past our home to a lake about a mile away so the reception was great then. last evening i tested it again when I went to the local shopping center just a few blocks away. TX/RX was cut off as soon as I entered the parking lot surrounded by several low-rise buildings. however, I don't know if the break was caused by interference due to all the sky traffic over our area on new years eve or if changing frequencies would have helped us pick up the signal. so far we've only tried 2 channels [channel 1 for the first test, before I read the pamphlet stating "you must be licensed by the FCC prior to operating on channels 1-7 and 15-22 or serious penalties may result", and channel 9 for the shopping center test]Another thing in the pamphlet worth mentioning is that although the radio complies w/national and international radiation protection standards, it generates measurable RF energy exposure when transmitting and it's important to limit exposure to the electromagnetic energy by transmitting no more than 50% of the time (how much time? it doesn't say) so if you're buying for kids make sure they're mature enough to understand and use responsibly. my 7 yr. old gets it now but at first she just wanted to press and babble on and on about anything and nothing at all, even just to giggle, so I explained about radiation and the consequences of too much exposure and she's not too keen on overuse anymore. did that lesson ruin the fun for her? maybe a little but all in all our family is still happy with the purchase.hope this info helps you with your buying decisions. have a happy new year and make it count. [smile]

I purchased this set for the kids because I was frustrated with buying “kids” walkie-talkies that often broke or never worked properly. We use them around the house, in the garden, and for short walks. So far, everything has been great. The sound quality is good, and there are more features than we actually use. One useful feature is the ability to lock the channel, which prevents the kids from switching to other channels.

I purchased these walkie talkies to use on a European cruise so that my wife and I could communicate with each other on the ship and when onshore. Since we didn't have cell phones that would work while we were in Europe, we needed to have communication devices that would be dependable. We weren't disappointed with these walkie talkies.Before we left the U.S., I experimented with these units to see how they'd perform in a city environment. We live in Tucson. My wife stayed at home (inside the house) with one unit, and I drove away from the house with the other unit. I stopped and got out of the car at various distances away from the house. The units worked well within 1 mile. Between 1 and 1-1/2 miles, the quality of signal began to deteriorate. At 1.5 miles, it was hit and miss. Over 1.5 miles, there was no reception.Since I knew we would never be more than a few blocks apart while we were on land on our trip, I was confident that we could depend on these walkie talkies to keep us in touch. In fact, they performed well in a number of different city and topographical environments on our trip.At one port, our ship anchored offshore and we had to take tenders to get to shore. My wife went ashore ahead of me, and I was able to talk with her from inside our cabin while she went ashore on the tender, and then I spoke with her once she got to shore. It was great.The only time that they failed us in an important situation, was when the batteries were too weak to transmit a strong signal. (FYI, I was using 3 fresh Energizer Advanced Lithium AAA batteries in each unit.)IMPORTANT: When the units failed, this was the situation: Even though the battery indicator was at 3 bars while the units were in standby mode, as soon as either of us would press the PTT button (the button you press to transmit when you want to talk into the walkie talkie), the battery indicator would show the empty battery shell icon (zero bars)! Of course, we didn't know that it worked that way. (The documentation doesn't describe how this works.) We were lulled into a false sense of security by the 3 bars, while in reality, we needed to change the batteries! If you buy these walkie talkies, be sure to periodically check the battery level by pressing the PTT button so you will know the true battery level. We learned the hard way. Luckily, I knew where my wife was located when this happened, but it could have been a more serious problem if we didn't know where to look for the other person. We were on a 3 week cruise and this occurred during week three.I didn't expect these walkie talkies to work at all on the ship due to its metal construction, but I was very happily surprised to find out they worked reasonably well, even when we were separated by several decks and while I was at the back of the ship and my wife was toward the front of the ship -- even when one of us was in our inside (no porthole) cabin at the back of the ship. They didn't always work, but they worked more often than we could have hoped for. In the cases when I wanted to find my wife and my signal wasn't reaching her, I'd just start walking through the ship and keep pressing the CALL button (it emits a loud alert signal), and eventually the signal would reach her. I never failed to find her using this technique. It was really helpful.I can recommend these walkie talkies for the types of limited situations described above. The price I paid at Amazon was a good value for the performance we got. As far as their ability to transmit 26 miles -- dream on!!