Fire up the e-book reader and the screen flicks to portrait but there's no auto or manual rotate option, so even web pages have to be viewed in landscape. Another omission from the 7 is a web cam, but the circular blanking plate on the right side of the device suggests one may be coming in a future version or Archos changed its mind to save a few quid.
Does the business as a media player
Skype video calling is one of main uses I put my netbook to, so this rules out me ever replacing it with an Archos 7 – until a Skype Android app appears that supports video. With the Archos 7 Home Tablet featuring a built-in microphone and two decent little speakers, it seems this model is certainly equipped, whenever Skype decides to launch a cam-friendly version for Android.
The 7's file support runs far beyond the Android norm extending to DRM-free MP3, WMA, WAV, APE, OGG, FLAC and AAC audio, H.264, Real and MPEG-4 video. To put it another way, it plays most files with an avi, mp4, mkv, mov or flv suffix up to 720p in resolution – along with JPEG, BMP, GIF image files. With no DRM support, iPlayer downloads are out of the question.
Size isn't an issue, neither is the weight
I've always been impressed by the quality of AV playback on Archos devices and the 7HT is no different. Attach a pair of speakers or headphones and you have a cracking portable desktop cinema, though its ability does throw the lack of an HDMI port into sharp relief. Alas, there is no support for subtitles. Content can be synchronised using an MTP media player – as well as drag and drop from either Linux, Mac or Windows machines – however, the only way to set up playlists is from within the device.
COMMENTS
Seriously?
Android 1.5 and no Market Place or Google account sign in?
For those reasons I'm OUT.
not bad for the money...
It reads to be as being not bad for the money, which if thats what you want, great. I can see a lot of reasons to knock it though, and no doubt people will.
Resistive screen - yuk
Old Android V. - why?
No access to Android Market place - mistake
Poor/No media streaming at home - why?
But, for the money....
Almost...
This is almost exactly the kind of thing I want. A cheap tablet just for use around the house. Shame the outdated and unofficially supported version of Android gimps it.
Hit or miss?
I vote miss, quite significantly. Shame, I've been looking forward to this one since it was announced, but the limitations are just too serious. Especially given that it is quite likely that the market will shortly have a number of similar devices without those limitations, all under £200 and quite possibly under £150. Android 2.1 as a minimum, and preferably 2.2 or even the forthcoming 3.0, with access to the main Android apps store, are going to have to be considered basic requirements in this market, I think - they certainly are for me.
GJC
Forget Archos
I used to like Archos. Had a first generation Archos Player and was listening to mp3's on the bus way before SJ had the first thought of an iPod.
Had an AV560 with a 60GB drive for watching movies a few years later. Then a 5 series (before they switched to Android powered) with a 250GB drive which I still use for listening to stuff at work. But that was my last. Got fed up of the custom connectors, docks, download codecs and lack of bug fixes, not to mention Archos' gimping the volume output to play nice with French and EU law.
