Hi A mate of mine bought one of these about 2-3 months ago & swears by it ... http://www.archos.com/products/gen_5/archos_tv/index.html?country=global&lang=en Anyone here using one & if so, how are you finding it ? Thanks
He bought it in London the old fashioned way, a shop (remember them ). I asked him for the pros and cons, here's the reply; Cons: Have to pay for the Web Browser plug-in but definately worth it. Battery Life is fine listening to music but not great watching movies. You don't get a charger, have to charge off USB which can take ages. Chargers can be bought seperately. It's chunky and won't really fit in your pocket unless you have baggy "gansta" pants. Pros: Great resolution for video quality Great sound quality Full web browser is class Touch screen and interface are really easy to use Can play flash videos so you can watch YouTube on it etc Really easy to make playlists If you get the docking station (also sold seperately) you can plug it into your tv and record straight from it to the Archos! It's got a kickstand so you don't have to hold it when watching movies It's very good and I use it all the time but it's not perfect. Main con is the battery life when watching movies - about 3.5 hours tops. Fairly poor. Main pro - the web browser basically turns it into like a mini-laptop (media and web, that's all I use my laptop for!). Hope that helps.
I read this thread and thought "wow - must get one!". I had been thinking of buying a mac mini as a media centre. This looked cheaper and better. Then I read things like: http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-video-recorders-dvrs/archos-tv-80gb/4505-6474_7-32750781.html http://www.itreviews.co.uk/hardware/h1589.htm It doesn't seem to be all it's cracked up to be?
Have you looked at Apple TV. http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-media-receivers/apple-tv-160gb/4505-6739_7-32463364.html I have to say it looks worse again simply because (typical flippin Apple) they only allow you to stream their formats. So if you download your movies from, errrm, questionable sources, you cannot play them through Apple TV (they can be converted but apparently with a loss of quality).
Sorry for hogging this thread! (but hope I'm helping - lol?!) There is another very affordable option that a friend (a big techie) made me aware of this weekend. It's (rather cheesily) called Popcorn Hour. It's $179 and $45 delivery, so that's just over €140 (maybe a bit more if it gets stopped in customs). I bought it last night! It plays tons of movie file types and audio codecs. Plus it's great for high def stuff apparently (inc 1080p video). The only down points I could find are it's poor for music (which I don't care about as I want it for movies specifically) and the UI is apparently a bit poor, plus complicated to set up initially. However if you can live with that, it's supposed to be a great value box. When this was initially released early this year there was a huge waiting list. If people are interested in it, but want to wait and see what I think then I can post up a review when I get it set up and working. Or feel free to pm me in a week or two when hopefully it's up and running
Hi mate Absolutely no worries with your "hogging the thred", anyone providing useful tips is very welcome here ... I'd be extremely slow to buy the Apple machine, for the reasons you state (I've not even looked at the machine, or the link you posted for it lol ) That other machine, Popcorn Hour sounds interesting although hope it's not too tricky to set up, I've been known to lose my patience with that kind of stuff. Might sit quiet for a week or two, see how you get on with it first The fact that Archos are a known make & that one of my best mates has one for a few months now & continues to swear by it, were the two reasons I had been focused on the Archos, but going to sit tight for a week or two me thinks.
No probs Garrett If I forget to update the thread, as I said, feel free to pm me and I'll try to give my thoughts. Note however, I won't be able to compare it to either Archos TV+ or indeed Apple TV. Cheers.
Ah, sure then your useless mate ...Why didn't you buy all 3 machines ? just kidding I was chatting with my mate, who now tells me I got the machine wrong, it's actually the 80gb of this machine: http://reviews.cnet.com/portable-vi...80gb/4505-6499_7-32740055.html?tag=prod.txt.1 & he tells me there's a 160gb http://reviews.cnet.com/portable-vi...60gb/4505-6499_7-32740056.html?tag=prod.txt.3
Hi mate Just wondering, how are you getting on with that Popcorn machine of yours ? - I've still not done anything myself, despite all the talk
Hi Garrett, I dunno if we're talking about the same types of machines - i.e. your last post referred to a portable media player, and popcorn hour isn't portable (for connecting up to tv). But ... Only received it about a week ago. Unfortunately it got caught in customs, so final cost was €175 approx (€140 inc delivery, €35 customs). Is it any good? In a word, yes it is. For the money it seems well worth it. I had read that setting it up is a bit fiddly, but I had no such problems. I unpacked it, plugged it in, connected a HDMI cable to my LCD tv (it comes with the cable) and turned it on. Everything started up ok. It doesn't come with an internal HD (you can install one), but has 2 USB ports, so I plugged my external HD into it. Picked movies from the GUI and then browsed to the relevant directory on my HD. Picked a 720p episode of Planet Earth - loaded in 1-3 seconds, and plays perfectly. Have tried many standard movie codecs so far and almost all work. The only 2 that didn't were .mov types (quicktime) and mkv compressed HD format (video perfect - no audio). But I haven't updated my firmware yet, or indeed searched the popcorn hour forum for further info. All standard AVI, MPEG etc formats work brilliantly. I have yet to connect it to my network, or to use it for music / photos, and configure a few other things, but so far, for the money, is well worth it. It does what it says on the tin!
Hi mate Thanks for that. Your right, I'm after a portable player with a HD, so sorry if I've confussed the issues here. Nonetheless, interesting to read about the popcorn box, what's GUI btw ? Thanks.
No problem Garrett - shame it's not the same as your looking for. GUI means Graphical User Interface. By that I mean the software interface. Apologies for being a bit techie, I work as a software developer
Hey, Don't apologise mate, I'll be needing your help to plug the thing in, if I ever buy one thanks again