Archos 605 Wi-Fi Portable Media Player (30 GB) by Archos
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Our Price: $374.99 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $134.95 (click here) Category: Network Media Player See more digital camera details and other models |
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Digital camera reviews of Archos 605 Wi-Fi Portable Media Player (30 GB)
Digital camera Review: Abandoned Property
Summary: 2 Stars
Archos makes a very nifty product in the 605. I bought mine from Amazon, on sale, over a year ago and have used it quite a bit since that time. Archos does not inlcude everything needed to use the device; but they can be bought at discount via eBay.
I have found that watching movies on the device is handy when waiting for a plane. DISH Network has a free feature to be downloaded that permits fast downloads from their DVR (except HBO) to the device. You can store thousands of pictures to share with friends on the relatively large screen. The screen is larger than that of an iPod Classic.
One thing that you will find very disappointing is this: Archos does not support this item after they introduce another version. Case in point, they updated the software two years ago to support Flash 9. Flash 10 is here and no update. Anything produced with Flash 10 will not work.
This may be planned obsolescence. If you find this to be a great device; you may spends lots of money to get the latest and greatest version.
In my mind, if I had it to buy today, I would buy one of the 10 inch netbooks available everywhere for pretty low prices and get periodic updates to the software.
Digital camera Review: Almost 5 stars, but the volume is too low!
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a nice improvement from the 604. The higher resolution is much nicer for web browsing. It also makes my pictures and videos look so much nicer! The web browser works great and I love how it can do flash. The only issue I have is the low volume. MP3's are not to bad, but I can turn the volume all the way up with headphones on and it's just at a medium sound level (not loud at all). Any movie ripped with 5.1 is terrible with headphones. With the volume all the way up it is still soft and hard to hear. The build in speaker is a little louder on this compared to the 604, but I just wish the headphone output was louder. I was able to rip a movie with an MP3 soundtrack and increase the volume by about 200%. This made a huge difference and it is now at least listenable. I am guessing you need the docking station and have your 605 connected via SPDIF for the 5.1 sound to work.
Update 09/19/2007:
Well I had originally purchased a 604, but it was defective and I returned it for a 605. I only had the 604 for 2 days before I returned it, but I purchased the cinema plugin for it. I called Archo's sales and they said they could refund the charge if I purchased the plugin for my new Archo's, which I did. They even sent me an email confirming the refund. After about 2 weeks I never saw the credit. I called them today and they told me that it was a mistake and they could not refund me the 19.99. I told them about the email and she said she already saw it, but told me too bad! I was really shocked and will dispute the charge with Visa. Still very poor customer support. I still love the new Archo's, but that was really poor customer service. Chad
Digital camera Review: Alot of features and great picture......quality a concern
Summary: 3 Stars
My first Archos arrived with WiFi non-functional. Thanks to Amazon for replacing the damaged unit as Archos customer supportwas ABSOLUTELY no help in trying to resolve the problem. As indicated in previous reviews, Archos support is terrible.
My second unit arrived with everthing functional. WiFi was quickly enabled and easily found my wireless signal and connected with no problem. The unit immediately searched for a firmware update and downloaded and installed. Since I primarily purchased this unit for travel, I did pay the extra price for the internet browser as well as ability to play MPEG-2 files. While pgms and movies download at a decent speed, I find that some web pages and sites are very slow with the Opera browser. Browsing tends to be easier using the Menu keys on the side of the unit (forward, back, etc.) I actually find the menu keys to be quite useful, It maybe just the way I hold the unit, but they are very responsive and toggle well. Links on web pages are often small and I have not figured out if I have to double or single tap to select. It seems to change up on me. I prefer to use the stylus over touching with my finger, however, am somewhat disappointed that there is no where to store the stylus (like the old Ipaq PDA's).
Connecting to a PC via USB and transering files is a snap. you do need to set your unit to act as a USB hard drive to use windows explorer drag and drop. Setting the unit as a media sync device was also easy, however, windows media player's quirks makes this more difficult than it should be This unit will sync music, video, and pictures and WMP was not intuitive to me to "not sync" my 1000's of misc photo's.
The media player is decent and does play some songs at a low volume. I assumed how I ripped them was more of a factor than the unit itself. The equalizer does a fine job of fine tuning the listening experience.
This player is excellent for watching will ripped video files or pictures. The picture is crystal clear and the screen does not show any smudges or dirt. I am not sure how archos did this, but kudos to them for an excellent screen.
In summary, this unit does a fantastic job with movies, pictures, and videos. WiFi on a working unit connects quickly, but the Opera browser is painfully slow at times. The 605 (30GB) model is a little heavy but has a decent form factor for what I purchased it for. There is no place to store a stylus and the shipped case is as cheap as they get. A leather case can be purchased from their web site like the browser and software to play other (MPEG-2) media files. The available links from the Archos portal is lacking content at this time, but hopes to expand at a later time.
The fact that my first unit was damaged and customer support was non-existent is the reason for the 3 stars.
Digital camera Review: An I-pod killer and well worth the $$$
Summary: 5 Stars
Hey, well i am quite amazed with this product and its abilities and am about to purchase it, i am writing a run down of cons a pros, first of all i luv the high res screen and the extremely high quality of the build, and this is something i must tell everyone as it was amazingly funny, i was at school and this kid was showing off his pussy i-pod touch he like this is an "i-pod aka the internet", and im like hey kid, check this out, this is the Wi-Fi browsing internet 30 gb touch screen, high(er)-res DVR Wi-Fi Multi-store-Choosing photo-viewing cinema quality video player media-player Multi-tasking Bookmarking toutube watching txting MULTIMEDIA
An I-pod killer, i think not!!!!! Exactly, this is the media-player that is well worth the $$$, it deos everything the i-pod deos plus a BIGGER BETTER screen and more!!!!!!!! and more storage!!!!! Come on, you HAVE to agree this is killing the i-pod and it has more features too!!! But i have too go on theres too many fuetures!!!!!
So okay there you go, its bigger better and meaner!!!!!
GET IT ITS WELL WORTH THE DOLLARS!!!! I AM AMAZED!!!!!
COME ON GET IT ALREADY!!!!!!
Digital camera Review: An MP3 Player, a video recorder, a digital picture frame, a web browser (costs extra :) )
Summary: 4 Stars
I own a 605 WiFi. I have been actively using it for abouta month. It is worth the money I have paid and my kids love using it, at home or on the go.
* This is truly a european product. Does not really help you while using it (not so much user friendly) but once you understand how Archos does things (this may take rather a long time) things proceed smoothly. So in a way it expects you to be tech savy.
* Extra cost for the qualifications that fascinates me is a con for this machine. But it perfectly does what I expect it to do but I have to pay for them. Records movies and easily transfers it to the computer. But making a dvd from what you have recorded might be problematic since it records in DiVX formats.
* Sound quality and reliability of Archos is well beyond good.
* Having no place to attach the stylus onto the Archos another tiny but disturbing shortcoming.
* WiFi connection runs smoothly. But I dont own the web browser, which I hope to run smoothly too.
* Battery life is not extra ordinary. Plays video for 3-4 hours. Although I paid utmost attention to initial charding, I was not expecting to reach 5,5 hours of video battery life.
* 30 gigbytes is satisfactory. More hard drive may make it hard to manage the files you have.
* Touchscreen and the buttons are easy to use and works withouth any problem.