The K-Zone: Archos AV420 multimedia player -- a review

So far as Archos' reputation is concerned, gadget fans are divided into three distinct groups: people who love their products, people who absolutely abominate them, and people who have never heard of them. The last group is by far the largest. With some reservations, I put myself in the first. I have owned a number of Archos products, and they have all worked flawlessly, and offered facilities so much more sophisticated than the competition's, that I have to wonder how their competitors sell anything at all. Compared to, for example, the Archos JBM20, a similarly-priced iPod offering looks like a wind-up phonograph. Archos has never marketed as agressively as, say, Apple or Creative, and this may account for that company's lack of visibility. It is much harder, I think, to explain the profoundly adverse reactions of some reviewers. To be sure, it is clear that the aesthetics of Archos products is the work of engineers, and not artists -- their early multimedia products are among the ugliest pieces of consumer electronics ever to hit the shelves. Their user interfaces are odd, and the company's technical support -- well, the less said the better. But Archos' tech support is far and away from being the worst in the industry (ever tried dealing with Belkin? Sheesh...), and their user interfaces are extremely functional when you get over the initial confusion.
      So, to put the record straight, here is a review of the latest Archos model -- the AV400 series (the AV420 in particular), from someone who actually uses one every day, rather than someone who's had the word `iPod' hypnotically implanted in his brain.

The AV400s

There are currently three models in the AV400 range, with different hard disk capacities: 20Gb, 40Gb, and 80Gb. The 20Gb model is slightly smaller than the others, because it uses a 1.8'' rather than 2.5'' drive. I have only used the AV420 (20Gb) model, but I believe the others are identical except in physical size and disk capacity, and in that the AV420 has a removeable battery and the others don't.
      In short, the AV400 is a portable audio/video/photo viewer and recorder. For audio playback it supports MP3 (naturally), and also Microsoft audio formats, including those with DRM encoding. Why anyone would want to use these formats, I have no idea. Video is played and recorded in MPEG4 Simple Profile. Images must be in JPEG format (or Windows BMP if you're daft enough to use it).
      There is a built-in microphone and (very small) speaker, and the unit comes with a cradle to tidy up the huge bundle of cables that are required to integrate the unit fully with a full-blown AV system. The AV400 can record from a composite video or s-video source, as well as accepting movies encoded on a computer. More on this aspect later. There is also hand-held remote control.
      Amazingly, the AV400 can generate as well as receive infra-red remote control signals. It does this to make scheduled program recordings -- it can switch on and select channels on a TV, for example.
      For interfacing to computer equipment, there is a USB2 port (which is extremely fast), and a built-in compact flash (CF) reader. The CF reader is intended to receive data from digital cameras, not to act as an expansion slot. So far as I know, it does not support CF microdrives (which is a bit of a shame).
      The distinction between hard disk sizes in the various models in the AV400 range is an important one. The hard disk on the AV420 is not upgradeable, even at the cost of voiding your manufacturer's warranty. It appears that the next size up in the Hitachi 1.8'' disk range (40 Gb) is about 1.5 mm thicker than the 20 Gb model. The contents of the unit are so tightly packed that this larger disk simply won't fit.

Data formats supported for playback

The AV400 supports a relatively small range of data formats: MP3, Microsoft audio, JPEG, BMP, and some flavours of MPEG4. It does not support Ogg formats, which is a source of irritation among the geek community; but most people have never heard of Ogg, so are unlikely to be bothered.
      I've only ever used MP3 audio, so I can't comment on how well the unit supports Microsoft formats. So far as MP3 is concerned, the unit has played every variety of MP3 I've thrown at it, with huge variations in bitrate and sampling. The AV400 is also very flexible in its handling of JPEG images -- it can handle any reasonable size, and will zoom and pan to display images bigger than the screen.
      It is the AV400's handling of video which has come in for most criticism. It is claimed to support only MPEG4 Simple Profile; and in practice it supports only the DIVX flavour of MPEG4. Reports on getting it to play, for example, XVID (an open-source MPEG4 encoder) files have been mixed. Clearly there is a political issue here -- DIVX is a business, and charges money for its technology, while there are perfectly good free, open-source alternatives. Presumably at least a small part of the cost of the AV400 goes to pay for the use of DIVX code. It's not difficult to see why this irritates some people. I refuse to get involved in this kind of dispute, because it's better to be happy than right, and wasting my time arguing the merits of open source to people who are incapable of understanding does not make me happy. A more compelling criticism is that the AV400 does not support MPEG2, which is by far the most widely used encoding format for video these days.
      Archos might well counter this criticism (if the company condescended to communicate with its customers at all) by saying that it's better to support one format well, than many formats poorly. The MPEG4 format is well-suited to store reasonable-quality video with very low bitrates, so if you have made a decision to support only one format, MPEG4 is a good choice for a handheld device.
      For myself, I have accepted that the video I want to play on my AV420 will have to be re-encoded -- I mostly watch stuff taken from DVD, and I'm not going to want to store DVD-quality video on a handheld device. So if I'm going to have to re-encode anyway, I might as well re-encode in DIVX format as anything else. Despite what some reviewers say, I have found that converting video for the AV420 under Windows is a no-brainer. I use the (supplied) VirtualDub front-end, and also Dr.Divx (which, alas, is commercial, but inexpensive). The only gotcha with Dr.Divx is that it defaults to encoding audio with variable bitrate, which the Archos unit doesn't much like -- it tends to lose A/V sync. Changing it to constant bit-rate is only one mouse click, and that is all I've ever had to do with Dr.Divx to get it to work with the AV420. The supplied converter works fine as well, but does not (so far as I can tell) handle MPEG2 streams. This means that its not much good at ripping DVDs.
      Under Linux, I have had success using mencoder and transcode to convert for the AV400. However, so far I've had better results (that is, a better compromise between file size and image quality) using the Windows tools. This irritates me a little, as I hate using Windows, but I don't have time to experiment with tweaking all the settings available on the Linux tools to see which ones produce the best results.
      I've found that if I encode video specifically for the built-in screen, then I can get about one hour of video into 200 Mb of disk space. Encoding for an external screen (which needs about four times the bitrate) requires about 600 Mb per hour. At 200 Mb per hour the quality is not marvellous (as it would be judged if displayed on a proper monitor), but it is perfectly watchable on the built-in screen, and I can get more than 30 hours of video onto the unit. Sadly, I don't get a 30-hour battery life -- see below.

Data formats supported for recording

The AV400 records video in DIVX format, with selectable bitrate. However, audio is recorded in (at best) ADPCM format. The AV400 cannot record MP3 directly. So if, for example, you want to record a long radio program or record a lecture with the built-in microphone, you'd do better to record in plain WAV format (if you've got enough disk space), then encode as MP3 using a PC. I'm not sure why the AV400 can't encode MP3 directly -- it's certainly not lack of CPU power. Conceivably there is some legal problem, or perhaps there isn't enough space for an MP3 encoder in the firmware.

Battery life

Battery life depends most obviously on whether the screen is in use, and how bright it is. I always use the screen on minimum brightness, which is perfectly bright enough for indoor use. I find that, with this setting, I get about 4 hours' use to a charge when watching video. For playing audio with the screen off, I find that I get more than 12 hours use. It might be longer than this, but since I use the unit 1-2 hours a day, 12 hours' use corresponds to a week, and I always charge at least once a week. I've also bought a car charger for then unit (about ten quid from eBay), so I can, er..., charge it in the car.
      A potential advantage of the AV420 over the other models in the range is that this model has a removeable battery. Spare batteries are available on eBay for about £35. The batteries themselves are quite small -- about 40x40x6 mm, so you could easily carry a couple in your pocket. So, if you need a media player for long airplane flights, the AV420 is probably a better bet than the bigger models, as these don't have removeable batteries.

Ease of use

The AV400 user interface is generally not well liked. I'm not sure why -- it works perfectly well, and is ideally suited to a unit with a small number of buttons. In fact, you can operate the AV400 using a single thumb when you get the hang of it.
      On the main screen is a set of icons. Some of these operate the built in audio recorder and video recorder, while others are for playback and viewing. The icons labelled `Video', `Music', and `Photo' are, in fact, slightly misleading. What these icons do is to invoke the file browser, but with a filter for particular file extensions, and starting in a particular directory. For example, if you select `Photo', only BMP and JPEG files will be displayed, and the browser starts off in a directory called /music However, if you navigate the directories, you'll see exactly the same directory structure whichever of these icons you select. If you haven't put your audio files under a top-level directory called `Music', then you can still find them by navigating to the proper place. This means, in effect, that these icons are redundant -- you can simply select the `Browser' icon and find the file you want. Presumably they are there to help out the iPod users, who don't understand what a directory is. It is mildly irritating that you can't remove these icons, or replace them with more useful ones.
      The Archos also allows MP3 tracks to be selected by tag. That is, you can get a list of artists, or albums, and navigate to particular tracks that way. I'm too lazy to put tags into my MP3 files, so I don't use this facility very much.
      The four-way button pad to the right of the screen allows navigation through the various menus and directories, and is reasonably intuitive. However, when a particular item is being viewed the function of this pad changes, and the other, three-way, pad comes into play as well. At this point things become less straightforward. When playing music or video, the four-way pad becomes a seek control (left and right buttons) and a volume control (up and down). The middle button operates play and pause. When viewing photos, these buttons zoom and pan. The three-way pad corresponds to a menu which appears at the bottom of the screen. Each of the three buttons will have a different action, depending on what is being played, and you need to refer to the screen all the time. This button system is exactly the same as on the earlier JBM20 but -- and this is important -- on the JBM20 the three-button pad was directly under the screen, so you pressed the button under the on-screen menu item you wanted. On the AV400, the three-button pad is to the right of the screen, so your eyes tend to flick from side to side when using it. OK, so this is a bit fiddly at first, but the unit packs a lot of functions into a small number of buttons, so this is only to be expected. It's possible that I did not find the three-button pad awkward because I have got used to it on the JBM20, where it is more intuitive. A person unfamiliar with Archos products can expect to find the buttons a bit strange at first, I think.

Inputs and outputs

The AV400 can play and record audio and video, and has a large number of inputs and outputs to effect this. There are stereo audio inputs and outputs, composite video inputs and outputs, and s-video input. That's potentially seven cables in all. To keep these cables tidy, the AV400 is supplied with a cradle. The cradle connects to the AV400 using a small, multi-way connector, and has a thick bundle of wires coming out of the back for semi-permanent connection to your AV system. The unit comes with a video explaining how to wire this all up. If you're a home cinema enthusiast, and are used to wiring up AV equipment, connecting the AV400 is trivially simple. I have connected mine to the VCR inputs and outputs on my Yamaha AV processor, and all seven cables from the cradle plug in side-by-side. It's a very neat set-up (see photo), which allows me to record from any audio or video source at the flick of a switch. If you are connecting to a television or VCR, you can expect to have to use a variety of different cables and adapters, and some trial-and-error.
      Rather annoyingly, the AV400 does not come with a means of connecting A/V devices except the cradle, and the cradle is too big for portable use. Archos supply a non-cradle cabling system as an optional extra, and it's not too expensive.

Computer interface

What joy! -- the AV400 supports USB2 out-of-the-box. Earlier models required an add-on to support USB2. If you've only ever used a USB1.1 media player, you'll find the difference is staggering. Because the data transfer is so fast, it's almost unecessary to have a larger than 20Gb disk -- after all, you can upload a full-length movie in less than a minute.
      The AV400 supports the USB mass storage protocol; that is, it looks like a removeable USB hard disk (which, in a way, it is). No proprietary drivers are required for most operating systems -- it certainly works without special drivers on RedHat 9 and Windows XP. You can, in fact, use the AV400 just like a removeable hard disk: there are no limitations on the data you can store on it. Of course, the fact that you can put data on it does not mean that the AV400 will be able to process it using its built-in player -- only the formats described above can be processed.
      You can also get data in and out through the built-in compact flash slot. This is a type-I slot, so you won't be able to use microdrives. This slot is primarily intended for reading data from digital cameras.

Gripes

Nothing is perfect, and the AV420 has a number of niggles.

MacroVision. MacroVision is a copy-protection system devised by Satan. Most consumer DVD players output the MacroVision key signal when playing encrypted DVDs; this signal is not visible, but can be detected by other equipment. If the AV420 detects MacroVision on a video signal recorded through its AV inputs, it encrypts the recorded data. This is, arguably, just about forgiveable; what is unforgiveable is that it then refuses to play the recording through the AV outputs -- you can only use the built-in screen. This means that you can't record from your DVD player with a view to watching the DVD on, say, someone else's screen. The solution is simple -- rip the DVD using a PC and transfer it to the AV400 in DIVX format. You may also be able to configure your DVD player not to output the MacroVision signal. I'm not going to tell you how to do this -- Google is your friend here.

No screen protector as standard. A device this expensive ought to be supplied with a plastic screen protector, rather than leaving the purchaser to hunt for one on eBay. The screen would, no doubt, be very expensive to replace if scratched.

The supplied carrying case is useless. The case is very rigid, and would serve to protect the unit from being bashed, but you can't use the AV400 without completely removing it from the case. You can get a `travel' case from Archos, which has cut-outs for the screen and buttons, but a more useful case ought to be supplied as standard.

Conclusion

It's hard to find anything not to like about the AV420. It does everything it says it does, and it does it simply and reliably. It's not perfect, and it has some typical Archos idiosynchracies; but the competition is not perfect either, and the Archos is streets ahead of the competition in functionality.
©1994-2006 Kevin Boone, all rights reserved