Archos 5 firmware adds GPS car holder support, new file browser
By Darren Murph 
posted Apr 11th 2009 12:28PM
posted Apr 11th 2009 12:28PM
[Thanks, Christopher]
Read - Firmware v1.6.53 changelog
Read - Firmware download page
posted Apr 11th 2009 12:28PM
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"We tell ya, the Archos 5 is becoming more inviting by the week."
That's true! however paying to activate the features on the thing is a complete deal breaker for me!
+1 Good point.
its not that bad though! you just gotta find the bundles on ebay! i got three plugins for the price of one :D
(and if you're cheaper than that just find the torrent :P)
its not that bad compare to how much people spend on stupid iPhone and iPod and they still not own that what they paid for (about music) and apps that they use only for few time and think its waist of money-)
Although Archos DOES update their firmware (which is good) the stability and reliability of the Archos firmware itself is quite questionable.... I bought an Archos 5 from B&H updated to the current firmware and the thing crashed like 5 times within an hour... It was subsequently returned...
Awesome
Way to go.. but having NEVER posted on engadget (and i hope this doesn't get me reported :D LOL..)
I'd say, all's good with their stuff as it comes out new... i bought the 604wifi and things were pretty rough in d beginning, not to mention that it was DEFIITELY one-of-a-kind at the time, but hey, its's ovr two years old now (yeah, saving up for the new MID) and works just fine!
Points:
1.still NOT purchased a SINGLE plugin - its a scam, it tell you.. how exactly are the same plugins for windows free??
2. Hacked once, but nothing like the PMA.. And what's with their... upd=garde to v 1.63 and u CANNOT owngrade??
3. Thought it would double up as an open source jazzy piece of hardware- archos DOES use linux and is bound down to release the source.. and frankly, i DID EXPECT an SDK - none of which happened in time, and by the time the src code was released.. i guess ppl had moved on.. STILL NO SDK.
4. opera 8.5 sucks with the inbuilt ram - 64 mb does NOT cut it on heavy pages.. no flash, dow loading is sketchy... HOGS d battery..
5. Y cldn't they add a microSD module into SUCH a BIG chassis?? i mean, i'm OK with it being ~350 gms.. solid- have dropped it numerous times and is still purring. BUT WHY!!! do we have to pay soooo much for addd-ons?? without the dock, its pretty much ordinary - and that itself costs 99 dollars!!
6. I live in india - NO TECHNICAL SUPPORT whatsoever here.. sucks as i had to ship it every time in case of aan issue- cots one hell of a lot overseas shipping.. D:
7. They're nuts- not really an argument, but a point to be duly noted.. They're a smaller corp than apple and still kicks apple's ass.. and guess what!!??? their marketing is horrible... why not get aggressive?? their stocks a crashing and thou i'm gonna be loyal DESPITE all these issues.. there isn't a single store here!! and i dn't know if i want to keep shipping stuff ..??
p.s.:: thier propertairy cable crapped on me twice... yeah, i had two.. and so i had tto but a docking adapter and stuff.... seemed cheap at 400 $ then, turned out to over 500$ now... gosh, and a better archos 5 160 gb for just 280 off amazon, this sucks!!
While your experience is a suffering one, I however, have had a great experience with the Archos 5 60GB.
Pros:
- Battery Life: I charged this once at the beginning of the week. I consider myself a moderate user listening to music, watching a couple TV shows I have downloaded each night. It's only at half battery.
- Touchscreen responsiveness: I used an iPhone in the past and this touchscreen is on par or even better than the iPhone touchscreen. It's super responsive and easy to calibrate.
- Plugins: Only purchase the codecs/plugins you use. Not everyone needs all the plugin support and this keeps the device cost relatively low. I bought all the plugins anyways.
- Accessories: DVR Dock is on the way, HDMI out, RCA out among other featues. I can plug the Archos 5 into my car and feed the video to my Pioneer dash nav unit (F700BT). Videos play on the screen, music will play and so on. A lot more accessories are available and are great for people that want an All-In-One device but only need certain features such as GPS, or TV Out.
- Form Factor: Perfect size. It can fit in my coat pocket, glove box and storage compartments in the car so it's out of the way when docked in the car.
- Screen/Case: No dead pixels on mine at all, no stuck pixels. Solid build quality, has some weight to it, does not feel fragile.
Cons:
- A couple DiVx/AC3 movies have audio issues depending on how they were encoded. I got stuttering sound on a movie I downloaded. Other movies played fine. I re-encoded the movie using MP3 audio and it works perfectly fine. Other AC3 audio videos work fine, so it might be a compatibility or a setting I missed possibly.
- I use MediaLink on my MacBook Pro to stream to the PS3. The Archos 5 has UPNP and detects my share with MediaLink. When it connects it reboots. To be fair, my PC cannot connect to my share either, although the PS3 sees it fine and plays my music and videos over WiFi perfectly fine.
All in all I am happy and can probably find a fix for the Media Link issue, although it's not a big deal to just copy the media to the device anyways.
Not sure if you are talking about your 605 experience or the Archos 5... but this baby does have FLASH... the browser works pretty well (not perfect) but all in all is a good surfing experience. On the more recent FWs you have the option to run flash embedded or full screen even.
On the sour note for this new release.. "GPS support" is total bullshit.. well almost. It's buggy as a can be and while they seem to have made the installer work with the A5.. that's about all they did with this release to have "official GPS support". I had the GPS working 4 revs back.. and while I had to jump through some hoops to get it to install and run.. (since it wasn't offically supported) it showed a number of bugs then that all still exist in the latest "GPS" version of fw. A call to Tech support revealed that a lot of GPS owners are complaning about the same bugs.. I'm just surprised they didn't test this fw and discover these bugs too.. and fix them before the release. Tech support said to expect another fw release in a few weeks to fix these bugs.
go on eBay they have good deals for whole package!
@ Scott cons:
Not all codecs were created equal. You can download movies all you like, but you won't find too many common codecs between them. One person will switch to the flavor of the month and you'll have something that suddenly won't play.
yeah, definitely agree with some points and particularly annoying that the dock must be purchased separately....
bro, i'mtally in with u on this one... but all i'm trying to say is that despite introducing gr8 products into the market, archos hasn't got their priorities rite.. say what?! their suprt for older gen products with stil capable harware is dismal.. D:
they archos 5 roxx.. wish i had1, but then i'd rather buy then new MID they promise to come out with, perhaps with an oled screen ??
here are some further issues.... f u HAVE to o 3 i'm a bit disgruntled
quter pixel anmc notupported in divx/xvid files.... it shows a SUPID progress bar when it knows d codec just to ask me to purchase the plugin...
thumbnails of higher (not even 520p) music vids play.. but the video won't work!
will not playback quicktime from ma camera.. lumix tz5.. shame.
STILL kick aple's ass :P -i admit.. (did i mention THAT before :D )
but sadly the wifi experience is damn clunky.. no upnp... file server is rather random over ma netgear wrg14v7 or sumthin.. and u ned tw tabs to browse d net without randomly halting... funny.. download a big file and u can't do shit in d meanwhile.
gets hot hot hot despite heavy metal use in d constuction which shld keep things cool!? :C
i use my htc for a better web experience... why is the opers 8.65 SO MUCH BETTER on my 320x240 screen (yeah) than 8.5 on a 480x272 widescren?
ohh.. my fone does flash and radio(net) and downloads and syncs push mail AND is small , plays back About 50 codecs :), does RSS.. weather... better UI
its frggin HTC
A LOT CHEAPER.. 240 d's loll (vs 500 total)
Here's my problem... the 5 and the 7 are the exact same thing except for the screen size. Why am I not getting these features on my 7? This is BS. I'd love to have a 7 inch gps screen for my car... same with the helmet camera. Why can't I use that with my player?
and all you naysayers doubted archos! gaze upon the spoils over which we early adopters feast!!! you cant have them! ahahahaha!.... ugh.... i need a chili dog =_=
The 160gb 5 is currently $279 on Amazon
http://➡.ws/amazonarchos
I've been wanting the GPS cradle for my 605 for a good 6 months now. It's been so long that I gave up checking for availability, seems they are actually in stock at some stores now here in the UK. Took them long enough.
Yeah I dropped 500 for the 605wifi 160GB.. POS >_>
Trevor... yeah right. Wow... they released another device that doesnt work for a crap. They keep cramming stuff out the door before it is even 25% stable. And that includes the 5 itself. I own one... and it is GARBAGE. Go with an Ipod or Zune. It may not "CLAIM" 10,000,000 features, but at least their features work. of the 10,000,000 Archos claim you are lucky if 10 work as claimed.
I just don't see it. Consider this one of those 'works for me' sort of responses.
My end users (iow, the family) are happy as clams with the Archos5. Their
response to it was "wow, it's much better than an iphone". The fact that the
unit gives the impression that it holds more than the iTunes store is probably
what accounts for most of that.
Big screen plus a ton of stuff and remarkably less picky about video formats.
Mine has my entire music collection, all the family photos (in full res), a ton
of movies and 11 complete TV series.
waitin for that Archos Androd phone later this year with all the storage as a regular PMP!!!!
Ahhh, all sounds great except that the GPS I bought said USA/CANADA maps and what I go was USA maps from 2007 and not updates and a promise that the next firmware might recognize the canadian maps. Yah, thanks.
Otherwise my only other complaint is that the sound sinc is sometimes off when I record with the DVR.
Photos and DIVX films are great