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 enlarge | Brand: Archos
Category: CE
List Price: $349.99
Buy New: $219.95
You Save: $130.04 (37%)
New (35) Used (1) from $379.11
Rating:  9 reviews
Sales Rank: 6391
Color: grey
Media: Electronics
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Batteries Included: Yes
Hard Drive Size: 250
Shipping Weight (lbs): 7.7
Dimensions (in): 10 x 1 x 6
MPN: 500973
Model: 500973
UPC: 690590509733
EAN: 0690590509733
ASIN: B000S6R93W
Release Date: October 1, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
| Showing reviews 6-9 of 9 | | « PREV | | |
Not yet completely matured March 25, 2008
6 out of 7 found this review helpful
After 3 weeks of using this device, I have mixed feelings towards it:
- This is an useful product, and I'm sure there is a market for it;
- The wifi and network capabilities are great and the hardisk is of decent size;
- The setting up was easy, as was the connection to my wifi network;
- It is easy to program a recording but it could be simplified. Actually the whole interface is workable, but it could be more user friendly;
- The price is a little too high, considering that it comes without a web browser and some video codecs, all of which have to be purchased apart if you want to access the full potential of this machine;
- I didn't like the quality of the videos I've recorded. I got some fuzziness and sombre images, even after tweaking the recording settings;
- I had the machine in my bedroom. For some reason, every night around 3 or 4 AM, the hardisk began to whirr for some minutes. It wasn't too loud, but it was enough to wake me up.
All in all, I took the decision to return this item, hoping that it'll be perfected in the future.
Has potential, but purposely hobbled by Archos to get more money March 16, 2008
37 out of 39 found this review helpful
OK, first here's what the Archos TV+ will NOT do (as there is a lot of confusion out there)
1. It will not surf the Internet. This requires an additional $30 plug-in.
2. It will not play surround sound encoded movies. It's not that you just don't get the surround sound, it won't play the movie period. This requires another $20 plug-in.
3. It will not play H.264 (.mov or .mv4) movies. This will run you yet another $20 for the plug-in.
4. It will not record TV shows. It does not have a built in tuner, so you need to attempt a Rube Goldberg type setup where the Archos TV+ controls a real recording device (VCR, DVD Recorder) to turn it on, change the channel, etc... (Didn't work with my 2 year old DVD recorder.)
So, it will cost you another $70 to realize the potential of the Archos TV+. (Plus the as yet defined cost of the 'TV Program Guide' that is only free for one year.)
Without the additional money, any attempt to play a movie other than a MPEG-4 .AVI with (only) Stero sound will bring up message that you cannot play the file and need to purchase one of the various plug-ins, with a convenient button that lets you 'buy it now'. There is little doubt about their strategy to make more money here.
The Archos TV+ also has this weird Bright White top to it (check out my photo in the product images). All of the Archos photos for the TV+ show a distinctly silver top, and in multiple calls to Archos they were even confused about the color. I got stories that a few had white tops, that there were many different colors of tops out there, then finally as I went up the chain (I really wanted the silver), that ALL of them had a white top despite what the Archos photos show. The white top really sticks out like a sore thumb amid the rest of the A/V equipment.
Now that the random, things you wouldn't expect are out of the way, the reason I got the Archos TV+ was to get beyond the piles of DVD's that my kids watch. The DVD's get misplaced, or left out and scratched, etc... and the TV+ does a great job in storing them! It is also easy for my kids (Hi Kat and Maddy; ages 5 and 8) to browse the videos and select what they want to watch. Let me be clear, it is worth the price just for that. It is also fanless, so no extra noise.
Connecting through a home WiFi network was fairly painless (just set up a home network workgroup and share out a folder on your PC), although even with a strong signal from my router (about 20 ft away), it will still drop the connection about 20% of the time, and I will need to re-start the transfer.
So, I really like the TV+ to keep the kids shows on, and once I got my conversion workflow set up to avoid all of the annoying 'can't play this file buy the plug-in' messages, using it has really smoothed out.
You don't get HD quality, the Archos customer service is totally lacking (policy appears to be to tell you anything just to get you off the phone vs. get you a real answer), but if you can control your video file conversion to align to it's strict spec's, it's a nice little addition to your home entertainment system. (Except that white top!)
 Archos TV February 15, 2008
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
Good product and compact! I was looking at purchasing the Apple Tv for quite sometime, but I was waiting to see if Apple Tv would incorporate web surfing. I mean isn't it a computer after all? Shouldn't I have the ability to browse the internet? The Archos Tv was all that I was looking for. Web browser, Tvio, hard drive all wrapped up in one. The Content Portal is okay, but I can watch Youtube videos and Google Videos with a click of the keypad.
Pros: does what it says it does, download videos from the internet, watch streaming media, access my computer files
Cons: Keypad could have been better, Purchasing additional plugins becomes expensive
 Awesome Digital Media Player January 29, 2008
11 out of 12 found this review helpful
This is a digital media player for your home entertainment center. It has the same operating system as the Archos portable video players (like the 605 wifi). It has all of the formats of AV inputs that you would need but you can only use one at a time which can be a pain if you want to switch. It can play a wide variety of file formats as well (just like the 605). You will need to buy two plugins in order to play MPEG2 with AC3 audio and H264 files. Yes it does play XVID/DIVX.
For me, the main selling point for this unit is the network connectablity. I plugged in an Ethernet cable (it has wifi as well, but that's slower) and it lets me browse the other computers on my network just like the explorer in windows. I can then play any media file I find videos, music, or pictures. You can also use the media sharing feature of Windows Media Player 11 and share network files that way as well. This lets me us this unit as my own on demand system. I can dump all the videos we want to watch over the next few months and have them in neatly organized folders. The kids can have their movies all in one place and watch all the SpongeBob they want. I plan to have all our Christmas movies dumped and on the unit so we don't have to hunt for them next year.
Archos TV can record form an external sources as well, but I already have a PVR for that, so I won't be using it. It uses an IR blaster type setup to control the cable/satellite box for recording. You get one year of free program guides when you register.
Notes:
- You will need to update to the latest firmware before you do anything else. I couldn't get the auto update to work the first time so you may have to download the firmware via a computer and move it over to the unit.
- I had trouble getting a thumb drive to work in the USB port. I think it pulled too much power. My Archos 504 hooked up no problem. I'm sure any powered USB drive will work fine.
- When you browse your network for the first time, it will take a long time for it to find other computers on the network. Just let it search. Mine took about 30 minutes. After that, it finds them instantly.
- Just like the 605 you have to bookmark videos manually in order to come back and resume were you left off. It will do just one video automatically. This will be lost when you play another video though. I requested an auto-bookmark feature but who knows if they will look into it.
- You can copy files to the unit through the network connection, or by using a USB cable. The unit shows up on your computer as a Drive.
- It can play VOB files from DVDs you own. If you hook up the SPDIF cable, you will get Dolby Digital AC3 sound.
- This is a new unit and they are working on fixing bugs as they are found. It's not going to be perfect for a little while. It is very cool though.
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