Archos 504 hits 160GB mark

Even amongst the early adopter crowd that is Engadget, something tells us few of you have (or need) 160GB of media storage on the go. But for those that do, today's your lucky day. Put that laptop away, because the Archos 504 now has a new drive size: 160GB (for $600), in addition to its previous 80GB (for $400) and 40GB (for $350) sizes. Should be available now at a retailer near you -- or the Archos web store, if you want to buy straight from the source.

[Matt @ Oct 24th 2006 9:16PM]

You'd be surprized, some 40 year old men have 160 gigs of porn that they would love to carry around.

[Evan @ Oct 24th 2006 9:26PM]

thats sick to think about lol

[kittysniffer @ Oct 24th 2006 9:31PM]

I have fifty gigs of music plus about 500 gigs of videos and stuff, and it's all or nothing for me.

[Matt @ Oct 24th 2006 9:39PM]

buy a 750 gig hard drive, a lcd, a car battery and some duct tape and your all set!

[Killian @ Oct 24th 2006 9:31PM]

you mean 160 giggabites? as everyone not from the US apperantly says...

[Keaton @ Oct 24th 2006 10:20PM]

YES!!! then lug it around in your radio flyer like you are sooooo cool... That would be a sight to see!

[Bhagiratha @ Oct 24th 2006 9:42PM]

Does anyone know how to convert a DVD movie to a format that would play on this unit, using a mac computer?

thanks

[Shane @ Oct 25th 2006 8:47AM]

Two options...Try VLC or Handbrake...
http://www.videolan.org
http://handbrake.m0k.org/

[ross @ Mar 4th 2007 10:34AM]

download handbrake for mac. it's a free program that will rip any DVD to the hard drive and put in MPEG4 format in one fell swoop. it's very convenient!

- RE

[Matt @ Oct 24th 2006 10:01PM]

The fact that it can play H.264 and AAC is interesting.. Maybe more companies are starting to understand.

[Matt @ Oct 24th 2006 10:28PM]

Hellz yeah

[bazooka @ Oct 24th 2006 11:59PM]

pee wee herman cool . . . oh yeah.

[peter M @ Oct 24th 2006 10:21PM]

it plays .vob files so just use a dvd ripper like dvd decrypter

[joe @ Oct 24th 2006 10:52PM]

You guys need to take a cold shower. The screen resolution is only 480x272. So you'll be watching those movies at twice the screen size of the iPod with not even half the resolution. Why is it people only complain about the iPods screen and give everybbody else a pass? Battery life (and song capacity) is based on 64k sampled songs and 500k movies. Woohoo this thing rocks.

They managed to leave out imortant information like how fast the battery charges (they do encourage you to buy the dock though) or how fast the USB 2 will actually transfer your media. BTW, Amazon wants $500 for the DVR docking station. The replaceable battery is cool though.

I think I'll wait for the new iPods.

[Aaron @ Oct 25th 2006 12:10AM]

Joe: The 5G iPod resolution is 320x240. So, uh... 480x272 is higher...

[o rly @ Oct 25th 2006 1:43AM]

Well joe, you would wait for a new iPod, simply because you're an idiot.

Not even half the iPod screen resolution? Last I checked, the iPod's screen isn't 960*544; as a matter of fact, the videos you get from iTunes aren't even HALF of that. I'd rather watch a movie at 480*272 on a 4+" screen than at 320*240 on a 2" screen.

Song or movie capacity doesn't matter, as I'm sure those on Engadget and anyone looking into these type of players are going by the fact that it's a 160GB hard drive not the simpleton jargon used to sell players (eg: 1000 songs on your (4gb) nano which equates to 40000 songs on this by your iPod standards.)

The DVR Station is $100, remember that GIYF, even if no one else is. http://www.shoparchos.com/product.aspx?sku=3083078§ion_id=26&culture=en-US or http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=dhs&cs=19&sku=A0741159 are examples (not including coupons.) The so-called $500 price is for the Archos 504 80gb and the docking station combined as a bundle, if you had read the description, you would have figured it out.

Keep waiting on the new iPods, as the Archos (and simple comprehension in general) is way too advanced for a fanboy like you.

[George Jackson @ Oct 25th 2006 6:36AM]

"You guys need to take a cold shower. The screen resolution is only 480x272. So you'll be watching those movies at twice the screen size of the iPod with not even half the resolution. Why is it people only complain about the iPods screen and give everybbody else a pass? Battery life (and song capacity) is based on 64k sampled songs and 500k movies. Woohoo this thing rocks.

They managed to leave out important information like how fast the battery charges (they do encourage you to buy the dock though) or how fast the USB 2 will actually transfer your media. BTW, Amazon wants $500 for the DVR docking station. The replaceable battery is cool though.

I think I'll wait for the new iPods."

Oh come on, check out the *real* specifications, enough already with your disinformation bullshit. :

http://www.archos.com/products/video/archos_504/tech_specs.html?country=gb&lang=en

Those are some pretty neat specs right there. And in terms of quality, the screen trounces (kicks it up and down the street in fact) any of the 3 previous iPods I have owned. Which is 3G, 4G Photo and 5G Video. In any case you couldn't seriously watch a movie on an iPod. Why would anyone want to do that? The screen is tiny. This isn't an iPod, it's a PMP - which is an entirely different beast - and it can do things that I have no doubt most iPods won't be able to do for at least another 10 years. But an iPod is a music player and the Archos is a PMP. They are not aimed at the same market an way. So you can relax. You can be an Ipod clone if you want to. No one really cares.

And $500 for the docking station? What are you on? More like $60. The battery charges in under 2 hours and you get up to 17 hours music playback and 5.5 hours video. And no matter how you want to divide it up 160GB is still a lot of space for a personal media player. And no it isn't all used for porn. This little thing comes with a USB host docking station, so you can store video footage from your digital camera on it - and it can rip and record DVDs and it can record from any TV source, like a satellite receiver, or VCR, or Xbox or you name it... And with the 604 you even get WIFI, steaming media and web browsing chucked in too.

I don't know why this is suddenly news anyway. I've had my 504 160GB Archos for two weeks. I thought they announced all this ages ago?

[Dignan17 @ Oct 24th 2006 10:59PM]

I'll submit that not everyone wants/needs 160GB on the go. I do, but I know I'm in the minority.

Personally, I listen to complete albums, not singles. I never know what I'm going to want to listen to. (It's all ripped at fairly high bitrates, too)

Add in video to the mix, and the space disappears really quick.

Then there's the question of how you plan to use the device. Long trips mean storing more video and keeping more space free for storing photos you take.

I'm really considering the 160GB 504. My only problem is that the pricing is illogical given the prices for the other models. You have to pay a $200 premium on 80GB? That's ludicrous.

[resource @ Oct 24th 2006 11:04PM]

This should be hot.

But the new iPod is the elephant in the room that I need to see first.

[Tidy Boy @ Oct 25th 2006 8:09AM]

The Archos AV 420 is better than a current 5G Video iPod and that's years old now.

The AV 500 is an even better, totally amazing piece of kit.

and this just takes the cake, it's phenominal.

Anyone waiting for Apple to produce something of this standard with this amount of features and versatility will be waiting a very long time.

Apple aim their products at simpletons, hence no Apple product will EVER have this much thrown into it, they might release a decent video player eventually but it'll never compare to this feature wise.

As for the storage issues, if this is anything like the AV500 it can play media on external storage devices so you can extend it using a portable 2.5" drive.

[... @ Oct 24th 2006 11:09PM]

@ joe
Keep in mind that those 40 y/o men can't see well enough to need more than the a few hundred thousand pixels...

And do you really think that the battery life will be any noticable amount shorter (comapred to the normal amount that you are going to loose over time just from the batteries getting old) by playing a diferently encoded video when you have that huge backlight screen?

And they are selling it by the amount of disk space, not the number of songs/vids it can hold...

And who gives a crap how long it takes to charge, if you need more than one battery a day (in which case you really need help...) then get another battery and charge them both overnight. What a concept!


Admitadly, the transfer speed is a decent question, but that is going to be limited by the hard drive, and will vary by size, so it is hard to publish...

BTW, nice pic ;)

[roman.kim @ Oct 24th 2006 11:09PM]

Looks cool, add divx avi support, and I would run to the store and get one.

[Tidy Boy @ Oct 25th 2006 8:09AM]

You best get running to the store now then!!

[Eddie @ Oct 24th 2006 11:13PM]

You're not very well informed, now are you roman.kim?

[unlisted @ Oct 24th 2006 11:13PM]

where's the link?

[Tomas @ Oct 24th 2006 11:42PM]

that�s a lot it has more space than my HD, i want one, can you buy me it!!

[peter M @ Oct 24th 2006 11:51PM]

wow, then amazon is making a killing for every fool that buys the DVR docking station from them. mostly because it's $99 on the archos web site

linky:

http://www.shoparchos.com/product.aspx?sku=3083078§ion_id=26&culture=en-US

[ScooterJP @ Oct 25th 2006 12:27AM]

manufacturers are usually a step behind the needs and greeds of early adopters, so predicting that few need so much storage is foolhardy in extremis (I expect you did that just to get us chattering, Ryan).
I have 150GB of music standing by, 30GB of specially-formatted (iPod) video, and a TB or more of standard video (e.g. DivX). Hence my hesitation to plunk for a single-format machine like an iPod.
Now, I could look forward to carrying all that round with me one day, or somebody will create a solution that lets me stream that content (or somebody else's). Either way, users' need for capacity and bandwidth is getting bigger, quickly.

[aka Wombat @ Oct 25th 2006 12:35AM]

I will not be a victim to this impulse buy!

[dukrous @ Oct 25th 2006 1:11AM]

if only I had 600 bones to drop on this. The Archos 504 is mega sexy and I'm seriously considering one. The only thing that makes me pause is the bulk of the device. I need to hit a local retailer and hold one in my hand before I go for it.

[joe @ Oct 25th 2006 1:55AM]

@ ... said "And do you really think that the battery life will be any noticable amount shorter (comapred to the normal amount that you are going to loose over time just from the batteries getting old) by playing a diferently encoded video when you have that huge backlight screen?"

I meant that the battery will need to be charged a lot more frequently that every 5 hours for video or 14 hours whatever for audio. The hard drive will have to be accessed a lot more frequently. They are really fudging the battery life specs by using such crappy encoding rates for their battery life standard.

@ Aaron
My 5.5g iPod has 640x480. So uh... that is about 60% more pixels. And, I don't think the frame they use in the promo shot shows an actual screen shot.

Maybe somebody can buy one of these and do an actual review and let us all know how it works in the real world. Afterall we know engadget's is good at foreplay, but never follow's through.

[Brian Fleisher @ Oct 25th 2006 2:31AM]

Um dude, the 5.5 G has the ability to play 640x480 videos, but the screen itself is still 320x240. Oh and to both you and the guy who contradicted your point, 320x240 is one-fourth the resolution of 640x480, so 480x272, as a ratio to 640x480, has about 1/3 of the pixels.

[Julian Bond @ Oct 25th 2006 4:06AM]

So a 160Gb 2.5" drive is $200 more than an 80Gb drive? Doesn't it make more sense to buy the smallest drive size Archos and then retrofit a 2.5" drive yourself?

I really hate these marketing premiums based on disk size when the underlying hardware really isn't that much more expensive.

[dukrous @ Oct 25th 2006 6:20AM]

Not sure how feasible that is...the 40GB is $350. Cheapest I see for 160GB drive is $160 on Pricewatch, so for a $90 savings you risk trashing the device. And that's if you can even get a drive in there. Once you pop off the battery, the drive is exposed to you, but who knows if you can pry it out and what special software might be installed to the drive.

[justdave @ Oct 25th 2006 7:05AM]

I thought this had been about for quite a while too. Roll on the 604 wifi tho, seriously tempted by it. Need to have one in my hands first tho...30gb + wifi or 160gb? argggghhh. I want both.

[kaybee @ Oct 25th 2006 9:58AM]

The main reason I have not purchased an iPod over these years is that they did not have enough space for all my music. 160gb is more like what I need. I will get this if the price drops.

[general Public @ Oct 25th 2006 10:41AM]

"Check my video review of the Archos 504 (160GB) at http://archosfans.com/2006/10/22/504-video-review/

I submitted this link to engadget but they did not include it in their story."

No doubt they didn't include it in their story because you're a bumbling fool, and your "review" is a joke. The unboxing video you produced is about as informative as a mute squirrel. Thanks for wasting my time. /end rant

[Zeek @ Oct 25th 2006 11:14AM]

Just got the 500AV 30gig [last-gen] from woot for under $280.
I resign my apple fanboydom today. This is a player that gets it. Remote, USB cables, TV docking station, IR cable for turning on the cable box, case, more- all included. DVR capability the intuitively works, right out the box. I haven't been this excited on a device that's overdelivered on it's promise since- well the opposite feeling of let-down that Apple's left me with for years. No flame-bait here, just very happy with well-made, thoughtful device.

[SteveJ @ Oct 25th 2006 11:59AM]

A 4.3" screen is fine, and clearly superior to an iPod's 2.5" screen, of course, but what I want is a 30" PMP! Just think of it - the display would be massive and kick your teeny tiny 504's screen six ways to Sunday!

[Steve Pontius @ Oct 25th 2006 2:09PM]

I still need another 45 to cover my music :-)

[Ash @ Oct 25th 2006 11:02PM]

Still waiting for a replacement of my broken Dension DMP3 (http://www.densionusa.com/dmp3_info.htm) Why doesn't someone hook up a high quality DAP (Squeezebox or Sonos like) directed purely at audio to a hard drive interface, use DC instead of a battery, display good enough to show tag info, load it like a simple external drive and just allow navigation by the directory structure. I guess iPODs ruined the chances of anyone even bothering to try. Not enough customers??

[mark @ Oct 25th 2006 9:29PM]

I have about 40 gb's of music and 320 gb's of videos. So, theyre getting there. :D

[nanowoodward @ Oct 26th 2006 1:09PM]

can't wait for the 160 drive to make it to the ipods...that'll be the day.

[L'Emmerdeur @ Oct 27th 2006 11:44AM]

If it has the same "feature" as my AV700, which doesn't copy files larger than 1Gb, it will be pretty difficult to fill up 160Gb.

Archos can suck it, I'm tech-savvy, and it's been a nightmare getting stuff to play on it since Day 1. If the .avi file isn't just so, it won't play. If it is larger than 1Gb, it stops playing after the first 1Gb of content. The .tivo files transfer properly, but .mpg files are hit-or-miss (even though the two are essentially the same type of file, with Tivo encryption added to the .tivo files). And the conversion GUI that ships with the Archos to make sure a file will play on the AV700 fails to convert most files.

And I paid $500 for what?

[Kevin @ Nov 13th 2006 5:43PM]

I have 3 Ipods in my home. Itunes is being used to manage all of my music. My question is, Can this Archos play all of these files as well or do I have to have a seperate folder with all of my music in it just for this thing?

[narrativium @ Nov 16th 2006 11:10AM]

Ok, let's look at the screen size argument rationally for a moment.

The iPod has a 2.5" diagonal screen with a 4x3 aspect ratio, giving us a screen with an area of 3 sq in. At 320x240, that gives us a screen with 160 pixels per inch (ppi).

The Archos 504 has a 4.3" diagonal screen with a 16x9 aspect ratio, giving us a screen with an area of ~7.91 sq in. At 420x272, that gives us a screen with 128.5ppi.

By comparison, my 17" 4x3 computer monitor at 1280x1024 has 97ppi, and it's certainly sharp enough. In fact, 72ppi is sharp enough for images presented on a video screen.

The iPod have marginally sharper images than the 504. Will it be noticeable? Probably not. The 504 is the clear winner as far as screen size and resolution is concerned.

[abdelkarim @ May 2nd 2008 7:28PM]

.................................................................................

[Jerold @ Nov 18th 2006 10:35AM]

I would consider a 160GB version. I;ve got the AV500 with 100GB and it is great in that I can record shows as a DVR and when I travel for work, I can watch all the shows on the plane. I also rip movies from DVD's so I can dump them onto the unit and travel with them as well. I can get the movies down to about 700MB to 1GB each (depending on the length of the movies) and one hour tv episodes around 350MB. You can get a lot of video on these units.
I'm still not 100% confident with setting the "best" resolution when converting/ripping, but most all the videos on mine are avi format in divx codec and mp3 audio. The resolution I think is perfect for this size screen, since it is a 4.3" screen and not a 50" plasma. I just dump stuff off and on as I watch episodes/movies. Transfer is thru Windows Media 10 and it is very fast. Battery on my unit last a loong time. I mistakenly unplugged it from the TV adapter unit and took it with me and when I got back about 10 hours later, the unit was still on and the battery level was still at one bar (the battery level shows 3 bars at full charge). These comments are based on the Archos AV500, so I would think that the characteristics would be the same or better on a next generation unit.

[Steve @ Nov 18th 2006 6:38PM]

I think I'll hold out for the 604 Touchscreen.

[michael @ Feb 11th 2007 12:27PM]

Hi I have the Archos av480 it has an ok quality screen and a pretty good 80 GB hard drive. Once the 504 160GB came out I bought one. I Love how much videos it can hold. It plays them back in DVD quality on a TV and a very good high quality internal lcd display. My old av480 did not have the hard drive space I needed because I was recording shows like crazy but the 160 GB drive has made it so I dont have to delete shows when I want to recorde another one. If people are looking at them and are deciding to get one I would wait because there is the 160 GB one with WiFi coming out soon.