Looking For A Good Divx/xvid Pmp


Fyvve

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Im looking for a PMP that can play my divx and xvid files without first converting them. I mostly like to watch ~800mb full length movies and scene released TV shows. I have seen portable DVD players that would do this but have yet to see a hard drive based player. Does anyone know of one? Every player i see requires converting the files to either a format or resolution that it supports (iPod, Zune, etc.)
 
Fyvve said:
Im looking for a PMP that can play my divx and xvid files without first converting them. I mostly like to watch ~800mb full length movies and scene released TV shows. I have seen portable DVD players that would do this but have yet to see a hard drive based player. Does anyone know of one? Every player i see requires converting the files to either a format or resolution that it supports (iPod, Zune, etc.)
You should look at the Cowon A3, the brand tend to be popular with audiophiles since they have high quality audio output and support FLAC, along with AAC, OGG, H264, WMV and others. So it is a win for me since H264 and AAC are very good quality, I want to fully stop converting my medias to xvid and mp3 at this point. 30gb and 60gb version, 800x480 4" screen, reasonable price for what they offer imo.

The Archos gmini400 in the old day has already been possible to play videos at dvd resolution, they were the first company to introduce the pmp I believe, I really liked them at one point. I had the Archos 604 Wifi, it was a nice widescreen pmp, with limited touchscreen, removable li-ion battery, and underdeveloped webbrowsing. Their newest player is the 605 that support flash such as youtube, view movies over computer network, and 800x480 4.3" touchscreen. The price is not bad either, but it doesn't have the removable battery feature of the old 604wifi. Personally I still prefer the Cowon A3 over the Archos 605, even if the A3 does not have touchscreen and wifi, and read below for why.

I don't like the direction that Archos are going and their anti-customer business way, beside after I found out about the GP2X (waiting for it to be shipped) and Pandora I wouldn't need the big brand names, I like supporting the underdogs. But for example, to be able to listen to AAC and watch H264 or watch dvd's VOB, you have to buy an additional software plugin. The plugin were "not a finished product" as well since there were no "library-ing" for AAC music. And among all other accessories for the device you have to buy which are expensive. They stopped releasing firmwares to fix bugs for the 4th generation and just moved on the 5th. Another reason is because they started using Hitachi hdd (remember the Rio Karma where the customer service recommended banging the player to get the harddrive to unstuck). I got hit with that woe using my Archos 404, and the RMA did nothing to fix my device. I could not buy a second harddrive to replace because they lock the firmware of the player to the serial number of the harddrive, so customers are not allow to change harddrives. So I would really only buy the Archos if I could find a used one on ebay at low cost, such as the 404 for about $110, or the 604 wifi at less than $150.
 
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I bought an Archos 605 because it was one of the only PMPs out there with a 160GB HD and universal mass storage support. Just about everything else out there is either too small or requires special software to load it with files. I don't know that I can recommend it, though. As someone else pointed out, it requires additional plug-ins to really make it useful (cost me about $60CAD for the plug-ins I bought) and the firmware is pretty flaky. When I'm listening to music on it, it will often stop responding to button presses completely, even when the buttons aren't locked. This prevents me from skipping songs sometimes, changing the volume, pausing a track, etc.

On the other hand, the screen is pretty big and very nice, and with the PVR dock it's great for watching movies on my TV. I like it more than I liked my old iPod (which I thought was a piece of garbage). I'd recommend it if storage space is a major concern, otherwise the Cowon A3 is the better choice due to its broader codec support. If Cowon had made a 160GB model, I would have bought it in a heartbeat.

Maybe Craig & Co. will make my dream PMP after they finish my dream gaming handheld. I know that if the Pandora had a 160GB HD, I would toss my Archos in the garbage.
 
eksasol, awesome post. Did you join just to reply to my thread? Thanks! The A3 is pretty awesome but more than i want to spend as i will only be using it for vacations. I just found the archos 604 for $139.00 US with free shipping with a quick google search. That seems pretty cheap and i may go for it though i may have to look into how much the codecs are going to cost me. Thats sort of a dumb way to go about things imo.
 
eksasol said:
So I would really only buy the Archos if I could find a used one on ebay at low cost, such as the 404 for about $110, or the 604 wifi at less than $150.

I just found a brand new 404 on my local Craigslist. He's asking $145US. Will i have to buy the codecs for this one too?

Actually that 604 for $139 is looking pretty good now. i like the widescreen action.
 
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Ravnos said:
I bought an Archos 605 because it was one of the only PMPs out there with a 160GB HD and universal mass storage support. Just about everything else out there is either too small or requires special software to load it with files. I don't know that I can recommend it, though. As someone else pointed out, it requires additional plug-ins to really make it useful (cost me about $60CAD for the plug-ins I bought) and the firmware is pretty flaky. When I'm listening to music on it, it will often stop responding to button presses completely, even when the buttons aren't locked. This prevents me from skipping songs sometimes, changing the volume, pausing a track, etc.

On the other hand, the screen is pretty big and very nice, and with the PVR dock it's great for watching movies on my TV. I like it more than I liked my old iPod (which I thought was a piece of garbage). I'd recommend it if storage space is a major concern, otherwise the Cowon A3 is the better choice due to its broader codec support. If Cowon had made a 160GB model, I would have bought it in a heartbeat.

Maybe Craig & Co. will make my dream PMP after they finish my dream gaming handheld. I know that if the Pandora had a 160GB HD, I would toss my Archos in the garbage.
I just found a 605 for $200US. I think it will play my files right out of the box. Have you ever used it to watch downloaded movies and tv shows? I wont be using it for anything but video so i wonder if you ran into the same firmware problems when watching videos or is it just with mp3s?
 
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I haven't had any problems with it not responding to button presses during movies, but I usually watch them through the DVR dock on my TV. I've watched quite a few downloaded movies on it without too many problems, but the additional codecs are pretty much required as some of the AVIs I've come across use audio codecs that aren't supported by default (AC3, for example.) Softsubs are also supported if they're in the .srt format. .idx/.sub files will not work. $200 sounds like not a bad deal though, depending on how big the hard drive is.
 
I was just browsing Dynamism and i saw the gp2x specs there. It says it can support 720 x 480 and 2500Kbps bit rate. Thats pretty high i think. Maybe high enough for what i want. Am i missing somehting? I read the encode guide here and it says to resze to 320x240 so I think i might be.
 
Fyvve said:
I was just browsing Dynamism and i saw the gp2x specs there. It says it can support 720 x 480 and 2500Kbps bit rate. Thats pretty high i think. Maybe high enough for what i want. Am i missing somehting? I read the encode guide here and it says to resze to 320x240 so I think i might be.
Higher bitrate videos seem to run slower for me. I had some that the audio would come slightly unsynced. It also takes up less space on the SD card.

If you just want video, I would go for a Cowon or Archos.
 
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