Customer Reviews

Archos Gmini 400 20 GB Digital Audio/Video Jukebox

5 star:		(36)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

First a little background info on me. I am 18 and a sophomore in college. I have wanted an mp3 player for a while, but could not justify the cost for just music. I spent weeks reading about all sorts of players, but all of them were mostly the same. Then I saw the gmini, and after reading lots of opinions, I decided to purchase it. I also have a LOT of friends who own iPods, so I have seen and used them.

When people see me holding the Archos Gmini 400 (gmini) they often say "Is that an iPod?" iPods are all the rage lately and people can't seem to get enough of them, but why? For those of you who don't know much about an iPod, here it is in a gist:

MP3/AAC player
Games
Portable Hard Drive
Black and White Screen
Unique Touch Interface

The games are limited to basic black and white games, still fun, but they get old. It plays MP3 and AAC, and is the only player to support songs purchased in itunes. However the portable hard drive feature can get a bit confusing. You CANNOT upload your songs from an iPod. You can only upload DATA off of it. You can upload songs if you store them as data... but then you can't play them from the iPod. So don't expect to use it to transfer songs between computers or even to just save space on your hard drive by deleting your music once it's on the iPod. You can play it off the iPod to your computer, but you won't be able to retrieve the actual song files, so when the iPod dies, you're out of luck.

Now, onto the gmini. It is the same size as an iPod, and it plays MP3's, that is about all they have in common. The gmini has the following features:

MP3/WMA/WAV music playback
MP4 Video Playback (Divx and Xvid)
Games
Photo Viewer
CF Card Reader
AV out for viewing on a TV
Audio in for recording
Mic for recording
Color screen
Portable Hard Drive

The gmini has a much larger feature set, for only a small amount more, but what are the trade offs? The battery lives are similar. The 4G iPod is about 12 hours, while the gmini is 10 for music. The iPod, right now, is very stylish. It's white, it's sleek, and it has no buttons. The gmini, is, well, not. It looks almost like a shrunken gameboy with more chrome. I have to admit however that it is not as ugly as the pictures make it look online, and does feel nice in your hands. The fit and finish of the gmini is just not as good as an iPod. I've handled many iPods and they are all smooth and perfect. The gmini has some spots where it just doesn't look as good. The buttons have space around them, which are likely to attract dust, and it just doesn't seem as modern as an iPod with it's click wheel. What you give up for looks is gained back, and more so, by the features.

Screen/Video Play Back

The screen is amazing. Though it is not the best resolution wise, it has great color, contrast, and brightness. Horizontal viewing is limited (it turns blue if you move too far to the side) but this device is really only meant for one person to use, so this doesn't matter. The movies, if encoded to the right format and a resolution about the size of the screen, play back extremely smooth. If you use a higher resolution for playback on a television then the FPS drop and it becomes choppy at times, but it is still watchable. The video feature is the big draw over the iPod, but there is more. Here is a general summary of everything there is to know about the gmini.

OS

The OS is much like windows 3.1. If you have ever used windows, you will know how to use this OS. You can navigate through folders, or it can organize your songs into categories based on the ID3 tags. If you want to know how to use more advanced features, like copying from a CF card to the hard drive, a quick glance at the manual will solve all your problems.

Photo Viewing

What can I say, other than it is there. It isn't astounding, but it works. The pictures load slowly (at least mine did, at 1600*1200 resolution in jpeg format) and when you zoom in, it seems as though the gmini lowers the quality of the image. However, it works and is useful for showing off shots of last nights get together, etc. Also, having the CF slot is a really useful feature. Did your camera fill up? No problem, dump the pics in the gmini and keep on shooting, I wish I had this at the NYC auto show.

Music Playback

You can create play lists on the fly, open existing play lists, browse by ID3 tags or the file system, and it all works just fine. You can even play all your music files at random, which is what I do most of the time. The only part that is annoying is finding the song you want in a long list of titles. I have terrible memory when it comes to names of bands, so I usually just know the title of the song. When searching through thousands, it gets annoying without an iPod like wheel. You need to sit there holding the dpad down, which takes some time. It does speed up as it goes along, but then you end up passing where you wanted to go, etc. It isn't that big of a deal, but if I could change one thing, I would change it to touch interface instead of buttons. How is the sound itself? Good.

Games

The games are based off of the mophun game engine, which is mostly used for cell phones. You can get a lot of 80's like games which are a fun distraction, but do get boring if overly played. I hear there is a 3D rally game coming out this Fall though (2004). The only downside is you cannot play music and play a game at the same time. Overall a nice extra feature to have.

Portable Hard Drive

Connecting the gmini to a PC could not be any easier. Here it is, step by step:

Plug in the USB cable

BAM, you're done. You get a new drive letter under "My Computer" (in windows, and it's similar for mac) and then you just drag and drop your files onto the gmini. The gmini archives all the new files when you disconnect the usb cable, so there is no need to use proprietary software. No drivers, no hassle. You can even upload all your data, music, video, whatever, off of it at any time to any computer. When you decide to put some video onto it, the video converters actually come on the hard drive, and you can install them right from the gmini. Having the gmini is like having a 20gb jump drive. You'll never use a floppy again. For that matter, you won't even use a CD.

General Downsides:

The included headphones are not too great, but when have included headphones been any good?
Style is not the greatest thing ever, though it is made of Aluminum which is pretty neat.
The screen is extremely prone to scratches, and there is no included case, or one you can buy, at the time of this review (10.7.04)
No replaceable battery (neither does the iPod)
Buttons instead of a scroll wheel, or similar touch interface.

Overall, I think it depends on what you want. Do you want a device simply to listen to music, and show off to friends? An iPod will work for that. Or, do you want something that is actually useful? Music, movies, games, CF reader, Real Portable Hard drive, for slightly more than an iPod. Everyone has an iPod, why not try something new? In my opinion, this is the best "player" on the market right now. It crosses the lines between MP3 player, and Portable Media Center.

.Recommended.

First off don't listen to reviewers who just looked at the package in the store and never bought it, that makes me mad they have no basis to review a product. I've had the Gmini for a while now and this thing rocks! It's not just an Mp3 player, but it stores and allows you to view photos and videos, has decent games, and at 20GB it's big enough to handle a ton if data. You might read about people who knock it for its size, but I purchased an ipod case made by Case Logic and it fits perfectly..It's virtually the same size as an ipod.

Another cool feature is the movies, if you can "acquire" movies on your computer then you can convert them to a format that the Gmini uses and then watch movies on this little awesome machine. Tell me how cool this is, recently on a cross country flight I watched the movie The Italian Job which I downloaded, converted, and copied to the Gmini. I had plenty of battery to watch the movie and listen to music the rest of the way. The guy next to me was watching and then at the end of the flight he was asking all about the Gmini and how he could get one.

The Mp3 player is also very cool. You can create playlists on the fly, as well as break you music collection down by artist, album, genre, year it was released, song name. Playlists are very cool because they take up very little space on the hard drive, but they allow you to do so much. For example I have 3 different playlists for when I workout...One for running which is upbeat and has songs that I really get into which take my mind off of running ;)... another is for lifting which contains much more aggressive music that gets me all fired up!...and the third one is my cool down music that I play as I'm walking or stretching. Very cool.

I purchased 2 great accessories for the Gmini. The first was a 3 in 1 case made by Case Logic, model # MPC7. This thing can be used as a belt pack, as an arm band, or detach all the straps and the case has a hand strap. It's very nice and convenient. The other cool accessory is made by Irock and it is a device that plugs into the cigarette lighter of your car and into the headphone jack of the Gmini and basically broadcasts your Mp3's over a radio station that you tune your car's stereo to. It's very cool cause now your Gmini is locked and loaded for long road trips! Just watch out if you accidentally play that aggressive workout playlist while you drive you might develop a case of ROAD RAGE!!!

The photo function is very handy for me as well because I have a 4 month old daughter and love to show off pictures of her all of the time. One of her pictures is also set as the wallpaper of the Gmini! The CF reader is a nice function to have as well. I have a Canon A75 which uses a CF card and I've just messed around a little bit with this but you can take all of the pictures from the CF card and transfer them to the Gmini and then continue taking pictures. Very handy if you shoot tons of pictures, or are like me a little paranoid to take a ton because you are worried that your card will be full when the perfect picture moment comes along.

Anyway, I am rambling. Forget the ipod photo, or other ipods the Gmini is well worth your money and has features that leave the ipod in the dust (mainly the movies). If you don't have any desire to watch movies or play entertaining games then the ipod and Gmini are very similar and it probably comes down to personal preference. Archos has created a real winner here; I don't believe you will be disappointed.

Archis Gmini 400 is a great device with many capabilities. Gmini 400 is one of the best choices if you compare its features to competitors. Certainly, it is not as beautiful and intuitive as an Ipod, but it does so much more. Its music features are not as extensive as Iriver mp3 players, but it is so much smaller and has video capabilities. Its video mode is not as advanced as many other devices designed as entertainment centers (such as those that can record live TV), but Gmini 400 is much cheaper and it still has a beautiful color screen. The fact that Gmini 400 is the second best choice in many categories makes it a very strong overall choice. It is a Jack-of-all-trades, and being a master of none is not necessarily a weakness if you are looking for a broad set of features.

I bought Gemini 400 a week ago from Amazon, and put it to a good test since then, because I was not sure if I wanted to keep it or send it back. Gmini is a small device that looks like a game boy. The box comes with connection cables, headphones, charger and a multi-jack adaptor. No carrying case is included, and the last time I checked, Archos did not have one for sale. It looks well-built overall, although, to my dismay, the browsing button was a fit flimsy. The charger is unbelievable light and it works for input voltages from 100 V to 240 V, perfect for international travelers. Archos also included handsomely made plugs to be used in Europe and Britain. A full charge takes about 3 hours. One of the great things is that you don't have to wait until the batteries are completely drained before you can charge your device. I did not test how long the batteries last (the company claims 10 hours with music only and 5 hours with video, and the latest firmware update claims significant improvement over battery life), but if you fiddle too much with the screen (and, believe me, you should if you want to learn how to use it), they will obviously drain quickly. I think it is easily possible to get 8 or 9 hours if you only listen to music on your Gmini 400, but this may not be enough for some users who demand more battery life, especially considering that there are alternative products with longer battery life.

Gmini has an ingenious system of file manipulation: Similar to the previous versions of Windows explorer, two windows appear when you want to copy or move files, when you add songs to a playlist, or when you copy photos to the device. Therefore, you can use it as a back-up hard drive, but 20 GB hard drive space (about 18 when formatted) may not be sufficient for people with a lot fo music files and movies to store on the device. I think Archos should have offered a 40 GB version as well.

Gmini 400 becomes ready to use a few seconds after you turn it on, even when the hard drive is full of music and other files. I heard horror stories with other mp3 players that took 20 minutes to switch on, and this is a big deal for me. Operating system in the device looks stable (Gmini 400 crashed only once since I bought it). When I received it, I immediately updated the firmware to the latest version (1.2), which is extremely easy to do. I suggest you do the same before putting any files on Gmini. This is not the easiest mp3 player to use, but learning to use it is not rocket science either. Reading the included manual carefully (there is a more detailed manual on the hard drive of Gmini) is not a bad investment considering how much it increases your enjoyment.

I am not an "audiophile", but Gmini 400 sounds very good. The included headphones, as you can guess, are completely useless. Transferring music is very quick with a USB 2.0 connection. My files (11 GB) took less than half hour to transfer. You can adjust bass, treble, and deep bass on your device but no equalizers are included. One of the best features of Gmini is that Windows XP recognizes it as an external hard drive (you will need to install drivers for other operating systems). Then, you can copy your music files (and other files of course) onto Gmini 400 without using any software (but, if you wish, it is also possible to use Windows Media Player 9 to syncronize files). At this point, you have two choices: either browse through your music using your own folder structure (if you organized your music well) or let Gmini 400 detect your ID tags and organize the music based on Artist, Album, Title, Genre, and Year. Recognizing ID tags (you need to do this every time you add new music) takes about 15 seconds for my 11 GB of music. I had one minor problem. Gmini did not recognize Blues as a genre, and replaced "Blues" in ID tags with "0". Everything else worked fine. When you skip to another song without waiting to the end, Gmini searches its hard drive for a short while, but if you are listening to an album or a playlist, it does not include any extra silence between tracks. This should work great for classical music listeners. Finally, you can easily create playlists in the fly.

The video capabilities of Gmini 400 are limited. You cannot record from TV or any other external source. You have to transfer video files to Gmini using your computer. It is certainly possible to watch an entire movie, but the screen is a bit too small for my tastes. However, you can connect Gmini to your TV and watch your movie on TV screen. Gmini is able to play only specific types of movie files. Requirements (30 or less fps, less than a certain resolution, etc) seem extensive at first. However, Archos included a utility in the hard drive of Gmini. After you install this utility, converting your movies to the format Gmini likes is very easy. You do not have to know anything about this procedure, since almost everything is automated in the process.

The photo mode works nicely. You can transfer your photos directly from your digital camera into Gmini. You do not even need a cable for that (as opposed to other mp3 players). You simply plug your compact flash card into Gmini and it recognizes it automatically. This is also much better than Ipod photo because you do not have to use your computer to place these files on the device. If you go on a trip with the intent to take a lot of pictures, but you do not want to carry your notebook computer, Gmini offers a perfect solution.

Gmini also lets you play games, although I am not interested in this very much. I feel like extensive gaming on this device can ruin the buttons in the long run. Five games were included on my Gmini, and three of them were demos. You can buy games directly from Archos if you pay an additional $6 for each.

You can record voice using Gmini but it does not encode your files into mp3. Also, the sound of the hard drive is clearly audible during the beginning of the recording. You can also record from analog sources using the line in connection. You can even edit these songs on Gmini, but this is nothing fancy. You can simply cut out sections from the beginning and the end of the file. If you would like to listen to and record from the radio, you will have to buy an optional accessory: the remote control. The Amazon website sells Gmini and the remote as a bundle. I think the remote is worth the extra money you pay for it not only because adds radio capabilities, but also it reduced battery consumption of the main unit. You do not have to turn on the screen on the main unit every time you want to search or skip a song. Also, the remote has a microphone to record voice. If you do not want to hear the hard drive on your voice recording, you will need the remote. When you record a song from the radio using the remote control, you have the option of "retro-recording", which lets you capture 30 seconds of the broadcast before you actually pressed the record button-a very useful feature, I believe. You can also edit recordings from the radio right on your Gmini. One problem with the remote is that the record button is placed too conveniently. It is easy to accidentally press the button.

I did not have an encounter with the Archos support yet, but it seems they are at least updating the firmware for Gmini 400 quite frequently (in relative terms, of course). In any case, make sure you buy one from a reputable place with a good return policy (like Amazon, which also has the best price as I am writing this). After thinking about it a lot, I decided to keep my Gmini 400. If you only want an mp3 player with plenty of extra musical features (equalizers, etc.), Gmini 400 may not be the best choice. If you want a very simple device that does nothing but plays mp3s, Gmini is not a great choice, either. However, if you like a little bit of everything, Gmini looks like a great choice. When you add the color screen, the photo and movie features, and the small size of this device, Gmini 400 becomes a strong contender. Good luck finding the right player for you.

I bought the Archos Gmini 400 to replace by 10 GB 3rd generation Apple Ipod that I've had for over a year. I wasn't sure what to expect with this thing, but it turns out to be great. Unlike my Ipod which I only ended up using in the car because of its limited features of only being able to play music, I carry the Gmini everywhere I go since I can not only listen to music, but also record stuff or play videos.

The Gmini's user interface may not be as fancy or simple as the Ipod's scroll wheel, but the Gmini is not that difficult to use, and it's rather easy to use once you get used to it and learn the controls. The Gmini is sort of like a little Windows computer itself, so if you are good with a Windows PC, you'll have no problems navigating around with the Gmini. If you are a Mac user and need things to be as simple as possible, then you may have some problems learning the controls. I like the fact that I don't have to use any junk software on my computer to transfer the files over to the Gmini. I just connect the Gmini to the USB cable and copy them straight over as if it were another hard drive.

The screen on the Gmini is quite stellar, and it almost looks like a small laptop screen it is so bright. I also like the look of the Gmini over the Ipod also, it is nice to not have to worry about getting scratches each time you touch the thing, unlike the Ipod which scratches up rather easily with its polished back casing that ends up looking pretty bad after a while. Just to be safe I put a PDA screen protector over the screen of my Gmini to protect it, and I also use the case for the Ipod with my Gmini since it is the same size and fits perfectly.

It is very easy to play music with this thing, and it's also easy to create play lists or delete files on the go. One very cool feature is the album art that shows when you play your music. I recommend downloading Musicmatch Jukebox Plus and using their super tagging feature which fixes your MP3 tags, and it also adds the album art into the tags for you which are perfect for the Gmini.

The Gmini works very well as a recorder, even though you can sometimes infrequently hear the hard drive spinning. This thing is perfect to take around with you and record your friends making fools of themselves at parties, or to record a concert you go to.

If you want to put videos on the Gmini, it does take some time encoding them in the proper format, but it's not too hard to do if you are computer savvy. It is cool to be able to watch videos on the Gmini or to use the included cable to watch them on your TV. It is sort of like carrying around a DVD player or VCR in your pocket if you go over to a friend's house. I've also used my Gmini to put photos on from my compact flash card, and this is also a breeze.

Unlike Apple who appears to not care about customers who purchased previous models and they try to make you buy a new model when in reality they could release a firmware update with the same features included. It appears that Archos routinely has been releasing updates for the Gmini, and they have just recently released their third firmware update (1.3) the other day. This update can easily be downloaded from their website onto your Gmini as a portable hard drive and it's rather simple to update.

If you are somebody who wants what everybody else has or if you are trying to fit in with your friends who aren't very tech savvy, and if you buy into all the hype and advertising generated by a corporate giant, then go buy yourself an Ipod. If you want to stand out and be cooler than those friends with those feature lacking Ipods, and if you know how to use a Windows computer and don't need things to be as simple as possible, go buy yourself an Archos Gmini 400. You'll be much happier with the extra features you get, and you won't be feeding more money to the giant that is Apple, who purposely leaves features off of their Ipods, only so they can release new models later on with features they should have had a while ago. I am going to be selling my old Ipod on eBay, and I won't miss it or Apple one bit.

I bought the Gmini400 after doing a lot of research on many different MP3 players.
After doing this research, I found that the Gmini was, by far, the best value if you want a function loaded device. I travel a lot so some of the key selling points for me were the video and the plug and play capability. The video playback is great and better looking than I expected from the small screen. I've been converting my DVD's to Divx format with some free software I got off the net and they look great.
The PnP capability is great too. Unlike the IPOD, this thing can be plugged into any computer without adding software and it just shows up as an external hard drive. I've used it on 6 different computers with no problems at all. Just drag and drop files from/to yours and your friends' PC's.
Bottom line is this thing is way better priced over IPOD's competitor, the IPOD photo, and it has a lot more features - voice recorder, video, plug and play, plus everything the IPOD does.
I'd highly recommend this to anyone.

OK, do you have a cell phone? A Nokia perhaps? Well, this Archos Gmini 400 is smaller, yes smaller. Here's how I found the Archos...

I initially wanted a very large capacity MP3 player. So, after 5-6 months of researching and waiting, I settled on the DMC Xclef 500. Why? Well, it has 80GB of space. And the newer models have 100GB. But so what? I got the Xclef and it stunk. Super heavy. Super big, yes it was like having 3 ritter candy bars (or 3 CD jewel cases). Don't even think about returning the Xclef. If you've had it for 10 days, including Sat/Sun, forget it. And if you can fed-ex it back to them in that short of time, they assess a 15% restocking fee. Yes, $54 just to return it, no shipping returned. DMC is terrible. Thinking of getting the Xclef 800? Beware! It's battery life might be half of what they claim, if you are lucky. And they say that if you do not "condition" it the way they want you to over the course of like 10 hours, it's not warranted.

Thus, I began my search again. I stumbled into a CompUSA, and there sat a beautiful $599 Archos Video player/recorder. Yes, smaller than the Xclef, and it plays and records videos. Not the same capacity, but so what.

So, I thought, surly the Gmini 400 is as small. Was I wrong! It's smaller. But about the size of an original Ninetendo game controller. And cooler. You don't need proprietary software or drivers to install it (if you have W2K pro or XP home/pro). Just plug it into your USB 1.1 or 2.0 port and wa-la! Once you copy all 20GB of songs into the device (drag and drop), just turn on, navigate to the folder and begin playing. Yes, this supports Windows media player 10 sync, just sync with Windows Media Player just like iTunes from iPod. Or, sync with iTunes like it was an iPod!!! This gmini has all the features. And look at the price! I already downloaded 3 games on the archos.com website, too easy to install. Just drag into the root of the gmini and it self installs. Anyhow, if you want a good 20GB MP3 player that also plays MPEG-4 (ripped DVDs) movies, get it. Get it just to have a 20GB USB drive that plays games and songs and movies. Don't wait for the 40GB, as that hard disk may be twin platter. If so, they'll have to rebuild the case and probably won't offer it. Archos is definitely the best in the business.

Lastly, I ended up buying the Archos from Amazon.com because they had a competitive price, and usually get it shipped out immediately. I chose the USP ground method and it got to me 5 days after I placed the order (including Sat/Sun). Now, that's some quick delivery time.

I bought the Gmini at the end of May-- it was a great product and surpassed the iPods that many of my friends sported. >D Although the buttons seemed a bit flimsy, that was just a minor concern.

Unfortunately, earlier this month, the charger stopped working. My family and I called up Archos and talked to them about this problem-- guess what they told us? They wanted me to go to RadioShack, PAY them to look at it, and send the defective machine back. I told them no, it's their responsiblility to provide us with working products. We had to put up a fight with the representatives, and finally they said they'd call us later that day.

Ninety-six hours passed, and we got nothing.

We called them again and demanded they send us a charger. Yet again, after an argument with the operator, they said they would sent us a nother one and it should be at our doorstep by the end of the week. It arrived three days late.

And now, thanks to their stubborness, my Gmini has shut down and refuses to turn its power on. The thought of having to call them a third time and bicker with the reps makes me wince.

So, in conclusion, it's a great product, but you better hope it's in perfect condition-- otherwise you have to put up with one hell of a customer service.

My partner and I are traveling for at least a year. I did many, many hours of research trying to find the best device that would both play MP3's and store photos. We've been traveling for 2 months now and the Gmini400 has been great. We bought some very portable travel speakers so now we can play listen to our music in all the various hotels we stay in. We have at least 70 albums on the Gmini and have been adding stuff as we travel. It sounds great.

We also take a ton of digital photos and it's super simple to download them to the Gmini because it has a CompactFlash card reader built in. You don't need to be near a computer. The color screen is not as quite good as the one on my camera and the pics come up a little slow but you can see the pics fine. Also you can plug it into a TV or computer to see them better.

We mainly wanted the MP3 player and photo storage but there are other cool features. There is a recorder so we can record our trip thoughts or whatever. You can play videos - although I can't seem to play the ones I've shot with my camera (Canon Powershot G5). There are some games (not so great but I play them occassionally to kill time when waiting for busses).

The battery may not be as long as some but we did a 11 hr bus ride and listened to it off and on a lot and it didn't die.

It seems sturdy too - I've dropped it on cement a couple times.

I've owned the gmini for 3 weeks and I couldn't be happier about the purchase. When I was considering buying it some of my main concerns were about its size (the machine itself and its screen), and the battery life.
When I finally saw the gmini I was surprised since I expected something bulkier and bigger, so its size is - to my belief - ideal. The screen looks bigger than I imagined and you can see everything in a movie with great detail, It really amazed me how you can get such a great resolution out of something so small. I though everything in the movies would look really small but that's not the case. So if the screen is one of your concerns it really shouldn't be.
As for battery life, I really haven't had any issues with it, last time I tried it, it gave me 9.5 hours of music give or take, where as to video I really haven't tried it for more than 3.5 hours, but it will at least give you that on a consistent basis. It still had battery when I replugged it, so I'm sure it can give you more time.
As for its user interface and handling it, the basic things (playing movies/music, forwarding, volume) are really easy and intuitive to use, but some stuff (queing songs, playlists, repeat modes) you do have to check the manual for. On the other hand, putting files on it is a piece of cake, just plug the usb and open the drive from my computer, inside of it is a bunch of folders titled music, videos, photos, data.. so all you have to do is drag the material you want in your gmini to its corresponding folder; piece of cake.
While getting a dvd to divx or xvid format is time consuming and sometimes complicated ( NO software for doing this is included), if you do manage to get your hands on a divx or xvid movie the software included in the gmini will "edit" it so it can be played in your gmini with the click of a button (by edit I mean make it have the right size and frames per second - maximum of 640-480 size and a 30 fps, if you don't know what this is don't worry just open your divx file in the software and click start and it will do everything for you, if the movie you have already clears the requirements its obvious you don't need to use this software).
Overall considering your getting a portable device, the video feature is exellent for the gmini's size, you can really watch a movie no problem at all, and your also getting an exellent mp3 player, plus the extra features, it really is a great buy, I do hope this was helpful to you.

This player is very impressive, you cannot really tell from the pictures but it is quite a show stopper. Here are a few reasons why I chose this above the iPod:

- same size and weight as the iPod
- plays videos on the LCD as well as TV
- acts a a photo wallet, with built-in support for getting images off of CF (and other cards through a compatibility add-on) cards
- good music quality
- "native" support in the OS, no driver needed to mount player on PCs on modern OSs like OS X and Win XP
- good battery life for a device this size
- supports games through Mophun engine (same engine used for most recent cell phones including NGage)

Here are some further details. Hopefully this helps you pare down the feature list to the things you really need.

Photo Wallet:

I travel frequently to India and other locations--most times I do not want to take a laptop with me but still carry my high mega-pixel camera. So the Gmini is exactly the right thing for me as I'd rather only carry one small pocket size device.

Video:

The device cannot record video so it should not be classified as a PVR (like the iRiver or Archos AV400). The Gmini, however, can be loaded with divx encoded files for playback on the LCD or a TV. This is handy for traveling or for just ferrying a movie from your computer to your bedroom TV or over to a friend's house.

Music:

The device supports the two formats I use most: mp3 and WMA. I do not really use OGG or APE so do not mind that these are not included. The sound quality is very good, though the equalizer is not really feature rich - only has bass and treble controls with an optional bass boost. I would have liked to see at least some presets. That being said, you won't really miss the equalizer unless you are using low quality earbuds. I use a pair of Sennheiser headphones (the HD 212 and HD 590) when at home and Sony Fonotopia ones at work. Your mileage may vary with the supplied headphones...

The Gmini also supports recording to WAV (compressed or not) through the built-in mic or an optional line in attachment. The built-in mic is sufficient for quick recordings but if you plan on doing a lot of bootlegging, get the line in attachment as it will produce better recordings (i.e. will allow you to avoid any device noises as well as move the mic to a higher location at a concert without letting go of your device).

Look and feel:

The device is really small--almost too small at times! The make is fairly good, the only plastic parts are the middle enclosure. The front and back silver as well as the buttons are all aluminum. While its not steel like the iPod, the aluminium actually makes the Gmini lighter and easier to carry around in a coat pocket. The buttons are very firm and responsive--great for sorting through music and navigating the device but not great for playing games (I prefer the gameboy feel personally and would rather have them be a little bit softer in feel).

Accessories:

The Gmini comes with headphones (earbuds), a line out for your TV, a universal adapter with attachments to use in Europe and other parts of the world. There is also an optional SD, MMC card attachment you can buy as well as the FM / Recorder attachment mentioned previously.

Here are some drawbacks to the device:

- would have preferred recording straight to mp3 as an option
- would be nice to have a carrying case included. I like my Gmini a lot and would not want it to get all scratched up :)
- FM and line-in recording attachment is a little pricey right now IMHO
- The mophun games on archos's site are a little expensive (for me anyways) at ~6.00 a game. It would be nice to have a variety pack of old classics like pacman, asteriods for cheap
- limited video codec support out of the box--you will likely have to reencode some of your videos to play properly on the device (archos provides some tools as well)
- no direct video recording to turn this into a full PVR (though if that made the device bigger, I'd support the decision to eliminate the feature)
- internal non-replacable battery (though I personally know which li-ion battery the Gmini uses and could replace it myself)

Overall the device is exceeding my expectations. While I'm wary of Archos as it is a non-local company and support has been a black mark for them, I also have owned enough devices to know that there is no perfect company (e.g. iPod battery issues, Rio quality issues, iRiver support issues). Archos has survived long enough now to make a mark for itself so here's hoping.

Also, there is a budding community for this device at www.gmini400.com, feel free to go there to get more advice or check out (sometimes unofficial) tricks, customizations and FAQs.