Customer Reviews

Archos 3 Vision 8 GB Video MP3 Player (Red)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

PROS:
Red looks cool.
Sound quality is not the best, above average.
Equalizer.
Light enough to not weigh down shirt pocket.
CONS:
Seems hastily assembled
Sticky touchscreen. Poorly responsive even after many calibration.
Virtual wheel is a good concept but poorly executed.
Who still uses paper decals on mp3's, or any gadgets for that matter, at this day and age?
Crappy buds.
Power/lock slider switch fragile as a loose deciduous tooth.

First of, this is not made to sit among the giants like ZuneHD, iPod Touch 2ndG, Cowon S9, Samsung P2, or Sony Walkman X Series, so i didn't have high expectations when i preordered it last month. After all, the old addage has always been true - that you get what you pay for. However, receiving it 3 days ago and using it since was a major let down in spite of my consciously lowered expectations. The buds went to my drawer of useless cables. Then i find myself at times jabbing the screen with my finger if only to get it to respond. The virtual wheel takes some getting used to, you'll find your screen display seemingly bunjee jumping up and down instead of scrolling smoothly. If you can look past these, then you can have a toy that plays decent above average music.
The price has been dropping on this thing in just a matter of days since it's release. I won't be surprised to see it discounted to $50. Archos should have paid more attention to the quality of the 3 Vision especially now that they are getting more aggressive in the market with their new lines of MID 5's and the 9 that's coing out on the 22nd of this month. In fairness to ARCHOS, they have a commendable tech support staff(i bought a plug-in from them for my 5).
Take it from this old man who likes to buy these toys. There are better players out there.

OK so for the good bits.
It looks REALLY nice, it is small and light, the screen is pretty good (although the viewing angle could be better) and the sound quality appears to be really good.
The navigation is pretty intuitive there is a button which is basically a `back' key which you use throughout all menus and all other navigation is via the touchscreen! It does take a little getting used to but it isn't as bad as some reviewers have stated and once you calibrate ti for yourself I have found it to be pretty accurate and responsive.
It has all the usual stuff music and video playback, FM radio, sound recorder, Photo album and Files repository but it also has a really gucci FM transmitter which allows you to send your tunes from the Archos wirelessly to a receiver, such as an in-car radio. (I haven't tried this yet but I intend to!)

Now for the bad bits. . .
Personally I think that the file storage system is crap.
I like to have pictures grouped by subject, it won't you have to create folders for the pics. Even then I don't know how the system sorts the pics as it certainly is not numerically or alphabetically within the folders. . . it could be last uploaded pic is the 'newest' so gets put to the top of the list, but that isn't always true so it is anyones guess!

I hate the fact you can only have 1 playlist. If I had known this before hand I probably wouldn't have bought the unit despite its other redeming features. Again you need to put your tracks into folders and use those as playlists but that is a right royal pain in the . . .

Finally although the packaging and advertising says it palys MP4, I have had to convert all the MP4 files I have to AVI to get them to play. another royal pain in the . . .

Over all I think this unit is pretty good if you are happy to just have a bunch of files to play (pics, music, video, whatever) and aren't bothered about how they are stored / sorted. However if you are slightly OCD like me then this probably won't be the MMP for you.

I have had this mp3 player for 29 days and today it won't work. I have had nothing but problems with it since I bought it. Tech support is not helpful and I can only hope that I am able to return it and receive a credit for it.

I thought that it was a pretty good buy. It was a replacement for my old MP3 player which I'd had for almost 3 years and it was starting to show it's age. I bought in June before a trip to California and for the most part it worked great!

Pros: It works VERY well. The video playback is AMAZING and it holds your place in the video so if you turn it off you can go back to where you left off. The music quality is good, too. I didn't really use the radio or microphone but I'm sure they were great. It's pretty sturdy as well. I dropped it a few times and it held on. It's very slim and fits easily into pockets. But beware it's also slippery and there is no place to buy cases for it.

Cons: You can't turn the volume all the way down to the lowest it can go, otherwise you won't hear anything. Also the touch screen gets really dirty because you have to use your thumb to scroll and if you're at the top you can't keep turning one way to get to the bottom and if you're at the bottom you can't keep scrolling to get to the top. It also doesn't alphabetize. It synchs them like they're saved in your files. It's difficult to find stuff. Oh, and the time LOVES to reset itself. It's on a 24 hour clock not a 12 hour. Fail battery life for videos.

My biggest complaint about this, despite all it's wonderfulness, is that after two and a half months the volume got screwy. I would put headphones in and only one side would work. One headphone was completely void of any sound at all. And I tried with multiple pair of headphones. Now I just use it to listen to music before I go to sleep.

Overall this is actually a pretty great product. I gave it a low rating because of all the cons but if you're curious, buy it. It's worth the price you pay (for the most part.)

I was at first a little scared due to the reviews about this player, but after getting it I knew they were wrong. The touch screen at first was a little of but I found the calibration folder and got it working. The FM transmiter is a little scratchy but everythig else works. I even tried to scratch the bottom part of the screen, no dammage was done. Busy trying to find a software to copy all my movies.

This was the second Archos 3 I had ordered--the first one had extensive Newton Rings (the glass was warped and made the screen look like an oil slick), right out of the box. So the first one was sent back, and this second product arrived with only minor Newton Rings on the screen, so I just stuck on a screen protector and kept using it--as I understand it, this is a common problem with touch screens and it was minor enough not to interfere with video watching. After about two weeks the screen started giving completely random responses...the back button would adjust the volume, the volume wheel would skip tracks or power down, etc. Returned under warranty for full refund, looking at the Sony Walkman mp3/mp4 players.

I bought this for my daughter as a present around 3 months ago. It has already started to flake out. Granted, she is pretty damned hard on her mp3 players, but that is just ridiculous. The Creative Zen players I have bought her in the past have lasted much longer and I have had good luck with them myself.

If that isn't bad enough (and it should be), the interface, while sleek and "modern" looking, is very hard to work with while doing the kind of things that people tend to do while using mp3 players; things like jogging or working out at the gym. More ease-of-use, less style please.

I bought this product to replace and iPod that I had lost. The price is right for this unit but I've had a lot of trouble downloading material to it and you have to be careful when storing so the batteries don't discharge.

Received my Archos rather quickly and was pleased with my purchase. The Archos has wonderful sound and crisp picture. I have had the player for a month now and it still is going as strong as the day as I opened it. Transfering files is extremely easy and to use it doesn't really require someone to use a manual; everything can be easily learned just by playing with it. Only a couple small gripes. The calandar function doesn't allow you to set any reminders or enter any events. Also: although it plays mp4, avi, wmv, etc video formats, it doesn't seem to play all the movies I transfered. Has played all formats, just not all movies in my home library plays on the Archos when transfered (which I've had the same problem on a Sony player I also own). Therefore, my complaints are rather minor in comparison to everything the Archos does do and it performs them rather well. I would recomend this device to anyone who wants a touchscreen media player but doesn't want to spend the higher dollar amount for the name brand products.

I bought the vision 3 because I generally like Archos products. The things I don't I can live with (like the lack of USB port on the Archos 5 and 7)

At any rate I had my Archos Vision for just under a week and the screen cracked apparently from nothing other than normal use. This renders it inoperable. Be advised this is one delicate piece of equipment. If your going to buy one invest in a protective case.

Probably not good if you have children who love your electronic stuff