Price
AU$579.00
Review Date
Monday, 15th of October, 2007
What's Hot
Attractive, good value for money, well-designed, intuitive layout, high-quality screen
What's Not
There is no dedicated power cable, you have to charge via USB
The Final Word
The Archos is attractive, good value for money and well-designed, with an intuitive layout and high-quality screen. Charging is a hassle, however.
Archos 605 WiFi - Perspective
Archos 605 WiFi - Right
Archos 605 WiFi - Front
Archos 605 WiFi - Top
Archos 605 WiFi - Bottom
Archos 605 WiFi - Perspective
Archos 605 WiFi - Perspective
Archos 605 WiFi portable media player
David Price (PC Advisor) 15/10/2007 09:34:01

Sleek, light and beautifully designed, this successor to the Archos 604 WiFi ups the ante in several ways. The screen resolution and battery life have both been boosted and there's more storage on offer -- the 605 range goes all the way up to a mighty 160GB, although we tested the 30GB version. In other respects, however, Archos largely sticks to a winning formula.

The 4.3in display reproduces video with clarity and precision. The decent size and quality of the touch screen make film playback on the move a pleasure rather than the trial it often is on portable devices.

You can use the bundled headphones -- the audio quality with these is nothing to write home about -- but the Archos also has a speaker built into the front panel. This produced fairly good sound.

At 150g the device is a breeze to lug around, far undercutting competing models with comparable screen sizes. It also feels comfortable in the hand, while the buttons are laid out intuitively. You can connect wirelessly to the Internet, but a Web browser is one of several software plug-ins that will add to the cost.

The only real down side is the charging procedure -- no dedicated power cable is supplied, so you have to charge via USB. This is extremely slow and occasionally flaky, with the device sometimes refusing to power up at all. This was worrying.

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