Do you lose things? Ever wish you could clap your hands and find them? Well, this is almost as good!

After loosing the TV remote control too many times, my husband and I spotted this little unit at the Sharper Image store. After testing it out in the store by hiding the sensors from each other (with a very worried sales person monitoring our very childish but fun hide-and-seek game), we thought while it worked well in the store it probably wouldn’t do as well in our tri-story house. Additionally at 49.95 it was an awfully expensive way to find something that was lost.

We left the store (don’t worry, we put all the sensors back) and didn’t think about it again until the day I received a $25 gift certificate in the mail from the Sharper Image.

Armed with my certificate I headed to their website (for a review on the process please see http://www.epinions.com/content_87560064644) to buy this beauty.

The toy, I mean finder unit, arrived today. I immediately pulled it out to take a look. It comes with 4 sensors called Locators which are color coded, one portable unit called the Base, and a mounting bracket. The only assembly was to add 2 AA batteries to the base unit and then decide what you’re going to attach the Locators to.

There are two ways to attach them—either by Velcro (included) or by the key ring on each unit. As all of ours would be attached to remote controls, we used the Velcro. After choosing the color to coordinate with the remote, we placed the Velcro on the item to be found and wrote the name of that unit in the corresponding location on the Base. Easy to do but my son immediately pointed out that I’d written them upside down. Dang! Thank goodness they included 6 blank forms which fit on the base so I was able to fix it right away. They also included stickers—some blank but many with icons to let you know what you’d be finding. Their suggestions? Dolls, art supplies, PDA, calculator, scissors, sunglasses (imaging how cool you’ll look with that sensor hanging from them!), CD and car keys. We stuck with the remote controls.

Now, the fun part. We hid the remotes all over the house—I stayed in the basement with the Base. No matter how hard the family tried, I could always find the missing unit—even in our tri-level sitting in the basement. I was pretty amazed!

Of course my first thought was, what if we lose the portable? Would I need to attach a sensor to find it? Would that work? Nope! Thank goodness they thought of that. If you leave the Base out of the mounting bracket the Base will “beep” after two minutes. It will beep every 6 minutes after that until it is returned to the bracket (or you run the battery down). You can disable the alert with a button on the back of the unit but I find this an important feature for us. When you place the Base into the bracket it turns itself off, conversely in order to search for your locator, you must remove the Base from the bracket.

The Locators come equipped with CR2032 button cell batteries—each had a battery protector which needed to be pulled to activate the unit. It also came with a small envelope with a screw driver in it—a large note on the front tells you to keep it as you’ll need it to change the batteries. While the batteries life depends on the usage, they do recommend changing them yearly even if they’re still strong.

The mounting bracket can be attached in a manner of ways: double-sided adhesive, magnetic strip, or by placing a screw in the wall and sliding the keyhole on the back over the screw.

The rest is easy. Loose it? Beep it. Find-it!

You can buy replacement Locators. A set of four is $19.99. We’re considering buying a second set and doubling up on the colors—so when we press yellow two things will go off, but one of them will be the thing we’re looking for.

It has a full one-year warranty that covers any defects in materials or workmanship and does not cover damage caused by misuse or use other than as intended…

UPDATE 1/22/03: They are a bit bulky. Adding them to the remote controls has added some weight--make sure you position them so that they're comfortable when you grip the remote. Also, the metal key ring clanks around--we've removed it from all of ours since we won't be using them on key rings.

UPDATE 2/2/03: Downgrading two stars--through use the sensors are performing a little less than expected. They still work fine, but the Velcro is pulling away and the sensors keep falling off.

The flaw is in the design--they're too thick and are brushed off easily. Short of using a rubber band to hold them in place, they'll continue to be a problem. If they were flexible, less thick, or made of something other than smooth plastic, they would perform better.

Still better than loosing the remote, but be prepared to have to continuously find ways to keep the sensor attached to the object. Not a problem for anything like a key, but anything else is a pain.

Recommended: Yes