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.
