When my baby recieved this toy it was loud in the box. Then good old mom tried to get it out of the box so he could play with it. In the process, I dropped the toy approximately 5 times accidentally. So I think it turned out to be pretty durable.

When I pulled the demo tab out of the back, the toy's volume lowered exactly 60 decibles. This is supposed to happen. It is an FCC ruling the it not be loud so that the toy doesn't blast your child's ears out when they immitate you talking on the phone. This may be annoying to some parents, but it's to protect your child's hearing. When the tab is in the back of the toy, and it's still in the box, it is in "DEMO MODE". This is loud because toy departments in stores can be extremely loud and they want you to be able to hear the toy over parents who are screaming at their own screaming children. My house is not as loud as a toy store because my child doesn't run it, and the toy works fine.

The ABC tunes and Numbers are just what I want my child to see. They are very clear on the screen, and the large variety of sounds and light patterns are pretty neat. I think that it offers a great capability of clearly teaching children some basic building blocks of literacy, and would recommend this toy to anyone.