Archos Gmini XS200

[boputnam]

Anybody know it?

I snagged one on advice of my IT neighbor guy. I'm going to the Russian Far East for a few weeks and the incredible distances involved and lengthy time in various old-world airframes made me think an audio mental distraction would be a smart idea...

About half-size physically of an iPod, 20 Gbyte, reads mp3's and other "common" compression formats (read: it does not have to be iTunes format, but can read those, too...).

So, I've spent the last few days stuffing it full of whatever. Amazing simple and smart to stuff. Wow. This is one hungry dude! And, oh-so-simple - that's why my neighbor suggested it for me...

I'll report-in, on my return...

[boputnam]

Beauty.

Just returned from a LONG trip to the Russian Far East, and this performed flawlessly:

• Mundanely easy to load - USB connection to PC. It is basically an external HDD - 20 GB !!! - with no Apple restrictive formats. MP3's baby...
• Once loaded, you can set it up to your personal style. I tend to "browse" the HDD and select Band Groups from the "Music" folder, but it will play individual artists' work - even if it represents only a few dis-connected tracks somewhere on the HDD. Amazing archiving info.
• Battery life is approx. 11-hrs. Recharges in about two, from either 110 or 240v.
• Sound quality is excellent - I use the Bose QuietComfort2 noise cancelling headfones and the performance was astonishing.

This badboy lasted the entire 9-hr flight across 6 Time Zones from Blagoveshenk to Moscow, and then onward the 3.5-hrs from Moscow to Heathrow. It was also of life support quality for the 6-hr drive to the mine site from Blagoveshenk.

All the issues of "unplanned stopping" have been ameliorated in the lastest firmware (v1.2.0) - if your device is older, this free download can be found on http://www.archos.com/

I cannot recommend this highly enough.