12th Doctor Sonic Screwdrive Remote Review

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The 12th Doctor Sonic Screwdriver by The Wand Company is the second generation of this Sonic, originally released as the 11th Doctor Sonic without the ability to do the trademark flick extension action.

This regenerated version does have the flick extension ability, making this a lot better for those who want to use this as a prop.

Generally The Wand Company are known for their attention to detail not just with the product but the entire packaging, unfortunately that attention seems to have slipped a bit with this product. It comes in a fairly dull cardboard box (the 10th Sonic and the Star Trek Phaser had a cool cases) and also has a rather uninspiring transparent plastic stand, as opposed to the excellent metal stands on more recent products.

Unfortunately they’ve also not upgraded this to be USB charged like their other products, instead opting to stick with a couple of AAA batteries which are a bit of a pain to change.

However, like other Wand Company products this can be programmed to fire out different IR commands using different gestures. If you’ve used previous remote from the Wand Company you’ll know this to be a simple, if time consuming process, but once done your Sonic is ready to fire out commands at the flick/push/turn of the wrist.

12 Doc Sonic Side

There are 3 memory banks and 13 different gestures meaning you can store 39 remote control commands, so for example you might control your Virgin Tivo, your TV and your amp all via the Sonic rather than via 3 different remote controls. Fortunately there is a practice mode allowing you to get the hang of the various motions.

In use the remote works well and fortunately you can use a quiet mode so it’s not making lots of noise while you’re trying to watch TV.

There is also an FX mode that allows you to use this more as a prop, with different Sonic sound effects being played depending on the gesture you use. These sounds are only played if you are holding the button, ensure it doesn’t fire off sounds randomly when you’re just walking around.

If you leave the Sonic in FX mode the Sonic doesn’t automatically power down, instead the tip flashes and after a couple of minutes without any movement it flashes some morse code, and for every 1963 (the year of the very first Doctor, nice touch!) flashes it spits out another code. FX mode also allows you to use the ‘Any-TV-off scan’, allowing you to turn off TVs without programming the Sonic with the off command.

Overall this model isn’t up to the bar set by recent Wand Company products such as the 10th Doctor Sonic or the Star Trek Phaser, the packaging and stand are a let down and the use of batteries is disappointing. However, the Sonic itself is a great product, especially with the flick to extend action, the new button placement makes it much easier to use and it have a really nice weight and quality feel to it.

The 12th Doctor Sonic is availble from Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/1LKxTMV and Amazon USA: https://amzn.to/1M9gYoB


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