Archos

Archos 43

First of all, thank you to advancedmp3players.co.uk for making this review possible.

Specs:
Dimensions: 135x65x9mm
Weight: 130gram
Screen: 4.3inch resistive touch screen, 854x480 (true 16:9)
Battery life: 36h music, 10h video, 12h web browsing
Operating system: Android 2.2
Capacity: 16GB
Colour: black
Price: £157

Included accessories:
USB Cable (micro USB)
Earphones
Quick start guide

Disclaimer:
The Archos 43 and the Archos 70 are identical, except for a very few differences, so this review will be a repeat of that of the Archos 70 a few weeks ago.



Build quality and hardware:
The Archos 43 is built on a metal frame with high gloss metal and plastic covering, which makes it feel very sturdy and exclusive.
One of the differences between the two models is that the Archos 43 has a 4.3-inch resistive touch screen. Resistive screen, I hear you think, but even if it is a resistive screen, and as such cannot compete with a capacitive screen when it comes to responsiveness, it is one of the best, if not the best resistive screen I have used.
On both sides of the screen, or more rightly above and below the screen as the 43 is meant to be used in portrait mode mainly, you have the built in stereo speakers, which sound very good for their size.
On the right hand side of the Archos 43 you will find the power button and volume controls, on the left hand side of the player you have the micro SDHC slot and a mini HDMI port, at the bottom you will find the micro USB port and 3.5mm earphone jack, and finally on the back of the player there is a kickstand and a HD 720p video camera. Of course there are WiFi (b/g/n) and Bluetooth 2.1 EDR modules built in as well as a g-sensor, it can also be used as a USB host. The Archos 43 also boasts UPnP support, which means that you can stream media from your home network or media server over WiFi.



Menus and overall usage:
The Archos 43 and the Archos 70 share the same Android operating system, all menus etc are identical.

The options are endless when it comes to personalising the layout of the menus and general use of the device. There are five different home screens which can be accessed by swiping right/left on the screen, each of these home screens can then be set to your own preference by changing/adding gadgets and widgets, icons, wallpapers and live wallpapers, etc. Lets just say, everything can be set to your own liking.
Android marketplace is not loaded on the Archos 43 straight out of the box, it can be easily side loaded though, and as such give access to hundreds of thousands of applications.
When connected to a pc the Archos 43 will utilize the MSC mode, meaning that Windows see it as a mass storage device, with drag and drop support for file transfer.
The power button is also a hold button for the screen and with a long press it brings up a device mode menu where you can set different modes for wireless connections and sound as well as deep sleep mode, the volume controls do as the name suggests.

Another thing worth noting is that Archos are very good at bringing out new and improved firmware versions for their products. The firmware can be freely download from their homepage, or when connected to a WiFi network the newest firmware will be downloaded and installed automatically by the player.



Audio:
The Archos 43 has the exact same audio capabilities as the Archos 70.

There are a number of music player applications one can use on the Archos 43, Winamp, Cube, Poweramp and Rockbox to mention a few, but I will concentrate on the native music player application.

The Archos 43 can play mp3, wma/wma-pro 5.1, aac/aac+ 5.1, ogg, flac and wav files, and with an additional plug-in it also plays ac3 sound.
There is no gapless playback on the native music player application, but installing Rockbox enables gapless playback.
As usual, I plugged in some high quality earphones to really get the best out of the Archos 43.
The sound is very nice indeed, and when using the Rockbox application it becomes excellent.
The sound characteristic is very neutral, with no apparent emphasis or roll-off over the audible spectrum. While the sound may not quite reach the Cowon X7 standard, it is not far off, and using different applications available the sound can be tweaked to near perfection.

There is a built in equalizer with five different settings as well as a user definable one. The music library can be searched either by folders or ID3 tags, and you can create playlists on the go. There is also the option to add favourites, songs or full albums and they are then very easy to locate in the menu for quick access.
The now playing screen is informative and nice looking with the big album art and all the playback controls easily accessible.





Best tip for music playback, use Rockbox, while it is still in beta for the Android platform it works and it sounds very, very good.

Video:
Again the Archos 43 and 70 are identical.

As with the music player application, there are many video player applications available for the 70, and going through them all is next to impossible. Some of them are, QQPlayer, Realplayer, Vplayer, there will be a version of the Vlc player for Android as well, sometime soon.

If you decide to use the native video player, I would suggest buying the cinema plug-in to enable ac3 and mpeg-2 decoding. With this plug-in you can play the following formats on the Archos 70, avi, mp4, mkv, mov, wmv, mpg, ps, ts, vob, flv, rm, rmvb, asf, 3gp.
External subtitles supported are, .srt, .ssa, .smi, .sub.
The only limitation of the video player is that it can only play up to 720p, full HD content will not play. You can connect the Archos 43 to an external screen or HDTV with a mini HDMI cable.



The native video player is excellent, and with the cinema plug-in it can play just about every possible format in an excellent manner.

Photo:
The photo application is the same as on the bigger brother, with the exception that there is a direct access icon to the camera. You can zoom, rotate and slideshow the pictures. Nothing extraordinary, but all works as it should. Of course you can install a more powerful image viewer or editor if you like.

Extras:
Again, the Archos 43 can do exactly the same as the Archos 70.

The Archos 43 is capable of the same tasks as any netbook. Thanks to the USB host function you can connect external hard drives to it, external keyboards, either USB or Bluetooth ones, connect it to an external screen or HDTV. There are a multitude of applications freely available to make the Archos 43 a fully fledged mobile office, Word and Excel apps, Skype, a plethora of web browsers and email clients to choose from, navigation apps (requires a GPS receiver).
The built in 720p camera is a nice touch, but cannot really compete with a standalone camera. There is no radio in the Archos 43, but then again you can listen to internet radio. There are endless amounts of games to download, I have tried a few of them and the Archos 43 is a really nice game machine as well.



Conclusion:
What’s not to like about the Archos 43, it has great features in a great form factor at a really great price. Highly recommended.

Archos 70

First of all, thank you to advancedmp3players.co.uk for making this review possible.

Specs:
Dimensions: 201x114x10mm 8GB, 201mmx114mmx14mm 250GB
Weight: 300gram 8GB, 400gram 250GB
Screen: 7inch capacitive touch screen, 800x480
Battery life: 36h music, 7h video, 10h web browsing
Operating system: Android 2.2
Capacity: 8GB SDD or 250GB HDD
Colour: black
Price: 8GB £212, 250GB £269.99

Included accessories:
USB Cable (micro USB)
220 volt charger
Earphones
Quick start guide



Build quality and hardware:
The Archos 70 is built on a metal frame with plastic covering and as such it feels very sturdy and well put together. The 7-inch capacitive touch screen is very responsive and bright with excellent viewing angles. On both sides of the screen you have the built in stereo speakers that sound surprisingly good for their size. To the left of the screen there is a built in VGA web camera for video calls/chat. On the right hand side of the Archos 70 you will find the power button and volume controls, on the left hand side of the player you have the micro USB connector, a micro SDHC slot (only on the 8GB model), 3.5mm earphone jack, a mini HDMI port and the AC input, and on the back of the player there is a kickstand. Of course it has WiFi (b/g/n) and Bluetooth 2.1 EDR modules built in as well as a g-sensor, it can also be used as a USB host. The Archos 70 also boasts UPnP support, which means that you can stream media from your home network or media server over WiFi.



Menus and overall usage:
As the 70 use Android operating system, the options are endless when it comes to personalising the layout of the menus and general use of the device. There are five different home screens which can be accessed by swiping right/left on the screen, each of these home screens can then be set to your own preference by changing/adding gadgets and widgets, icons, wallpapers and live wallpapers, etc. Lets just say, everything can be set to your own liking.
Android marketplace is not loaded on the Archos 70 straight out of the box, it can be easily side loaded though, and as such give access to hundreds of thousands of applications.
When connected to a pc the Archos 70 will utilize the MSC mode, meaning that Windows see it as a mass storage device, with drag and drop support for file transfer.
The power button is also a hold button for the screen and with a long press it brings up a device mode menu where you can set different modes for wireless connections and sound as well as deep sleep mode, the volume controls do as the name suggests.


The background is a live wallpaper, this is why it looks blurry.



Another thing worth noting is that Archos are very good at bringing out new and improved firmware versions for their products. These firmwares are free to download from their homepage, or when connected to a WiFi network the newest firmware will be downloaded and installed automatically by the player.

Audio:
There are a number of music player applications one can use on the Archos 70, Winamp, Cube, Poweramp and Rockbox to mention a few, but I will concentrate on the native music player application.



The 70 can play mp3, wma/wma-pro 5.1, aac/aac+ 5.1, ogg, flac and wav files, and with an additional plug-in it also plays ac3 sound.
There is no gapless playback on the native music player application, but use Rockbox and voilà we have gapless playback!
As usual, I plugged in some high quality earphones to really get the best out of the Archos 70.
The sound is very nice indeed, and when using the Rockbox application it becomes excellent.
The sound characteristic is very neutral, with no apparent emphasis or roll-off over the audible spectrum. While the sound may not quite reach the Cowon X7 standard, it is not far off, and using different applications available the sound can be tweaked to near perfection.

There is a built in equalizer with five different settings as well as a user definable one. The music library can be searched either by folders or ID3 tags, and you can create playlists on the go. There is also the option to add favourites, songs or full albums and they are then very easy to locate in the menu for quick access.
The now playing screen is informative and nice looking with the big album art and all the playback controls easily accessible.



Best tip for music playback, use Rockbox, while it is still in beta for the Android platform it works and it sounds very, very good.

Video:
As with the music player application, there are many video player applications available for the 70, and going through them all is next to impossible. Some of them are, QQPlayer, Realplayer, Vplayer, there will be a version of the Vlc player for Android as well, sometime soon.

If you decide to use the native video player, I would suggest buying the cinema plug-in to enable ac3 and mpeg-2 decoding. With this plug-in you can play the following formats on the Archos 70, avi, mp4, mkv, mov, wmv, mpg, ps, ts, vob, flv, rm, rmvb, asf, 3gp.
External subtitles supported are, .srt, .ssa, .smi, .sub.
The only limitation of the video player is that it can only play up to 720p, full HD content will not play. You can connect the Archos 70 to an external screen or HDTV with a mini HDMI cable.



The native video player is excellent, and with the cinema plug-in it can play just about every possible format in an excellent manner.

Photo:
The screen really shines when it comes to showing photos. You can zoom, rotate and slideshow the pictures. Nothing extraordinary, but all works as it should. Of course you can install a more powerful image viewer or editor if you like.

Extras:
Where do I start? The Archos 70 is capable of the same tasks as any netbook. Thanks to the USB host function you can connect external hard drives to it, external keyboards, either USB or Bluetooth ones, connect it to a external screen or HDTV. There are a multitude of applications freely available to make the Archos 70 a fully fledged mobile office, Word and Excel apps, Skype, a plethora of web browsers and email clients to choose from, navigation apps (requires a GPS receiver). The only thing missing is a radio, but then again you can listen to internet radio. There are endless amounts of games to download, I have tried a few of them and the Archos 70 is a really nice game machine as well.



Conclusion:
For the price and size and overall usability, the Archos 70 is very, very hard to beat, if not unbeatable. Highly recommended.