Archos PMA400

[BuzzLightyear]

Well took a strole down a shopping centre in the UK - and guess what I found on display in the Dixons store - I'll let you all know how I get on later - at the moment I'm copying loads of stuff onto it.

Buzz :D

[Jason Dunn]

Cool, let us know what you think of it!

[BuzzLightyear]

OK - late night last night playing with this PMA400, up early this morning, playing again. Initial thoughts are as follows, just a few bullets I'm affraid ..

1) First boot from new takes about 90 seconds (I guess it will be like this for every "hard reset" - subsequent switch on's take about 4/5 secs - bearable - just a tad too long for me - shutdown takes about the same time to.

2) There is no case but the screen cover is a strange "clips on the edge then bends to cover the screen" device - I actually like its simplicity.

3) The stylus is held in the cover and is a very bendy and weak looking, just aswell replacements are 10 euros for 4 on the Archos site.

4) Havn't used the Qtopia OS before - its nice, everything seems to run ok - the first load of the app seems to then cache it in memory as it loads quicker next time.

5) Its a multitasking OS - you can change settings, do email, surf the net while playing music. Some things you cannot do like view pics while running video.

6) The WiFi works well and is easy to set up - no idea of the range tho yet.

7) Headphones are the same I got with the GMINI 400 - hmm use some others.

Ok thats it for now - I'll check back later after I have spent more time with it - any questions tho please ask away

[Jason Dunn]

What types of video does it support? Resolution, bit rate, etc...

[BuzzLightyear]

Like other Archos devices its a Xvid/Divx only player, at the moment, windows media has always been promised for the other devices but never turned up.
The screen is 320x240 but the player supports 704x480 @ 30 f/s (NTSC), 720x576 @ 25 f/s (PAL). I tend to use the included "convertor" software to shrink thinks to the native rez of the screen, just to save disk space. Not sure what the max bit rate is for video, but I have used some quite high figures (far higher than what is required really) and it seems to cope.

I guess the real killer thing about this device is what will be made of the fact it runs the Linux Qtopia OS - there's even a few sites around already with people who have "re-packaged" Zaraus software to run on the PMA400 - indeed I have just installed some.

Is this the break through device that does it all ? Who knows. Its the same height and width of my HP4700 PPC its just twice as thick ! - so not sure about selling the 4700 yet.