Customer Reviews

Archos 9 PC Windows 7 Starter Tablet (Black)

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(24)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(20)

 

 

What it is:
The Archos 9 is a highly portable Netbook, without a Keyboard making it smaller and lighter weight. It has the touch screen functions of a Tablet/Slate Computer. :)

What it isn't:
It isn't a Notebook or Desktop PC. (Though if all you use your Desktop for is to play Free Cell, surf the web and check your E-Mail, then this will do the job in place of a full computer, but it isn't one, nor is it designed to be one. It also isn't a phone with delusions of grandeur. (Android Tablets and iPads.)

The Good:
It is light weight, small and portable, what you would expect from a Netbook or a Slate computer.
More power than an iPad or Android tablet at a cheaper cost than the iPad.
1. It does run Windows 7, with all that implies, to include:
a. Multi-tasking,
b. Full web browser
c. Full Flash support
d. Quicktime/iTunes
e. Real Productivity software like Open Office or MS Office, so not only can you show your Powerpoint presentation but you can edit it if you need to.
2. It has a USB Port and can add a couple more.
a. This means you can run USB drives, USB DVD drives, keyboards and mice as well as other USB uses.
3. It has a 60GB Harddrive, which is large for this class of product.
4. It uses an Atom 1.2 ghz (Multi-threaded) processor, which is typical for Netbooks of its age. Windows Experience Index is 1.7 when running Windows 7 Home Premium which is on par with other Netbooks.
5. It is available now at a great price.
a. Unlike other Windows Slate computers, which aren't available and keep getting pushed back and Android Tablets, which the OS isn't quite up to running a computer, yet, you can have this now.
b. It is significantly cheaper than the iPad, which isn't even in this class.
c. The only tablet in this class and price range that is currently available are the ASUS and Lenovo touch screen Netbooks and they are a bit larger with similar performance. (We also have a 9" ASUS.)
6. The Trackpad/Mouse buttons. While these strictly aren't needed, I find them very useful to have available. One thing I don't like about the ASUS is the need to open it to get to the touchpad/mouse buttons.
7. Built in camera for VOIP video chat.
8. A touch Screen that accepts stylus entry, and, with Windows 7 Home Premium+, very nice hand writing recognition software.
9. The Beta version of the Touch Screen tools at Archos: The calibration tools are really well done. Significantly better than those that came with the ASUS.

The Bad:
1. No SD Card slot. One would think having one of these would be a no brainer. (Oops.)
2. When they upgraded the processor they didn't upgrade the cooling. It gets a little warm on the left side which could have been avoided by simply venting the case.
3. It doesn't appear to accept Multi-touch even with Windows 7 Home Premium installed. This seems to be a lack of forethought on the part of Archos since Windows 7 handles Multi-touch very nicely.
4. The built in on screen keyboard. I hate it, YMMV but the Windows 7 Home Premium pop-up keyboard is smaller and on a 9" screen that is important.
5. No button to easily rotate the screen. With the buttons attached, one would think that would be one of them. they include a button for their keyboard and one for turning off the Wifi/bluetooth, at least they could have included one for rotating the screen, or allowed those buttons to be programmed to do it.
6. Windows Starter: While that is considered to be the standard OS for a Netbook, at least to get you started and to lower the cost, Windows 7 Home Premium is the cheapest version where the Touch Screen goodness is included. (Factor that upgrade into your cost.)

The Ugly:
Archos Customer Support pushed me off onto Microsoft when my Windows 7 Anytime upgrade wouldn't run. ("We don't support that upgrade.") Microsoft pushed it back on Archos. If either had read their own forums the answers are there. (Found them afterwards.)

So you don't run into the same issue here are the steps.
1. Plug your Archos in, it will take longer than the battery will last.
2. Adjust your power settings to not go to sleep, and not shut down.
3. Uninstall your virus checking software. (Simply turning it off may not do the job.)
4. Install the Drivers and Bios Updates from Archos' site.
5. Install all of the Windows updates for Windows 7 Starter.
6. Run Windows Anytime upgrade.
6a. Let it sit. Don't believe it has hung up just because it seems to be hanging. (Look at the HD light.)
6b. Don't try to do anything else while it is running.
7. Once you are rebooted into Windows 7 Home Premium reinstall your Virus Checker software.
8. Back up your hard drive. (Use that USB port and back it up to an external drive, in fact I recommend that anyway because 60GB is too small for what you may want to carry with you, and your most likely cause of needing a backup is because you dropped it and damaged the HD. :))
9. Ditch the software you don't need, empty the trash and defrag.
10. Calibrate your screen.

Additional recommendations:
1. Add: Open Office: Free, runs well and reads/writes most MS Office files.
2. Use Google Chrome for your browser. At this time less bloat than Explorer and Firefox which means it runs faster and cleaner on here. (No issues streaming Hulu or Netflix here.)
3. Get an External USB HD and either the port expander or a good USB2 hub.
4. Get an inexpensive keyboard or one of the roll up ones, if you want to take it with you, if you plan on doing a bit of typing.
5. Don't set your Power Plan to higher than you need it. (SO your batteries last longer between charges. (I do get between 4 and 5 hours out of these batteries.)
6. For long trips, or other periods of extended Battery use get an additional battery. (One of the only Netbooks or slates with the option of replacing the Battery.)

Note: This is a total revamp of this review, after having had it a few days.

The Archos 9 in a neat little device. While it's not going to be an "iPad killer", it does seem to straddle the middle ground between a pc and a mobile device a little better.

The Archos 9 is effectively an EXTREMELY compact pc. And by extreme, I mean this thing is SMALL! And by PC, I mean it runs Windows 7, so in theory if the app works on a home pc, it'll work on this. There are obvious performance issues which we'll get to, but in general, it's code compatible with all Windows 7 software.

First off let me say I really like this device, but it is not flawless. The main flaws seem to be in the preinstalled software, which frankly suck, and the touch sensitive screen, which is only `alright', although I want to talk about what I like about the Archos 9 first, since, after all, I do like it.

What's good about this thing is the aforementioned PC-compatibility, the similarly aforementioned compactness, & the ton of built in hardware. This thing has built in WiFi & Bluetooth, which pretty much lets you connect it to anything you need to connect it to, even without the (sold separately) port replicator. The built in face-forward webcam is nice, I suppose, but not something I would really use. Same goes with the built in microphone, although I could see this getting more use. The built in speakers sound good considering their size. It has an HDMI output on the bottom of the device, which is strangely NOT advertised! Considering the potential of this device as a media player, I don't understand that at all. Also, the display is true 16x9. Despite all this, it seems to get some serious life out of the batteries - while I haven't totally drained mine, the 5 hour advertised lifespan seems reasonable given my experiences. What's missing here is a DVD drive, which of course makes sense for a device like this - and you can plug an external USB drive into the single USB port if necessary.

Now here's the bad news. The 32-bit, single-core Intel Atom Z510 processor is pretty lame, and gets a Windows rating of only 1.3. Now the Atom line of processors are designed for power savings, and compactness, but for those looking for a laptop replacement, beware: this puts it on par with 6 year old machines. The single gigabyte of (non-upgradable) ram isn't overly generous either, and leads to page-flipping, which further bogs the machine down. The 60 gb drive feels a little claustrophobic by today's standards, and is made more so by the ridiculous partitioning of the factory install, leaving only 25 gigs of useable space, and lastly the screen is only "OK" by today's standards, although those standards have been set by the iPhone and the forthcoming iPad, which legitimately have fantastic touchpads. Speaking of which, the touchpad on this device is resistive, which means single-touch (unlike the i-stuff), and feels a little "mushy", for lack of a better word. Again, think of a 6 year old PDA in this respect. The Archos 9 comes with a built in stylus, which given technology on display here, makes sense. One other hardware-related issue I've had is occasionally plugging a drive into the USB port seems to short the whole machine out randomly, forcing a cold reboot. Sometimes this happens, sometimes it doesn't, and I can't seem to determine what causes it. It's happened both when plugged in and on batteries, with a USB hard drive, and a USB DVD drive, but at other times (most of the time in fact), worked fine with both devices.

The biggest failure however isn't the hardware, it's the pre-installed software, which is terrible. Windows 7 Starter sucks. While the Archos is capable of running the Aero theme, windows 7 starter doesn't come with it, you need to upgrade. There are a handful of other missing features, but that's definitely the most visible. The installed media software is called vTuner, which in my opinion isn't terribly interesting. Going back to the lack of hard drive space, there's a 20 gb partition for backups, but from the factory there's NOTHING IN IT! In the fine print of the manual (really, it's all fine print, another gripe), you will find that it says to do a backup upon first starting the machine, but that's just lazy on Archos's part. If you're going to provide a backup partition, it should come with a "factory presets" image, ESPECIALLY if your device doesn't come with a DVD drive! I found this out the hard way when I tried to update the operating system to windows 7 ultimate and had a failure - I ended it having the wipe the machine and install from scratch, which also meant all my preinstalled software was gone, with no way of recovering it.

In the end I DID succeed in installing Windows 7 Ultimate, along with a standard suite of productivity apps (office 2007, adobe reader, itunes, chrome), and after experimenting with some of the settings (particularly the touchscreen & display settings, along with turning Aero back off), I'm getting acceptable performance from this (again, extremely compact) device. It won't run World of Warcraft (in any playable sense, anyway), but with the right software suite, it serves its purpose quite well. Realistically, I probably didn't NEED to put Windows 7 ultimate on it (if I hadn't messed up the previous install), but leaving out all those other free apps (neglecting Office) seems like another oversight to me, especially Adobe Reader, this thing is BEGGING to be used as an e-book reader!

Speaking of performance, while does technically do 3D, it does it poorly. I loaded a 6 year old 3D 4X space conquest game, "Hegemonia" on this machine and while it ran, it was very choppy on even the lowest settings. Maybe this isn't the best test program, but it does tell you something. Baldur's Gate(1) seems to run well enough. One non-performance software-related issue I've had is that after about a week the onscreen keyboard software seemed to stop working. I reinstalled it and all was well, but if this is going to become a regular occurrence, it'll definately be irritating.

So what is the purpose of this device, might one ask? Well, for me, again, because it runs Windows 7, it's an extremely portable PC. It works well as a media device as well, because of the inherent compatibility of a Windows PC, and here it might even have the iPad beat. Non techies will probably not like this however, as you definitely need to do some tweaking to get the most out of it, and in this respect, Apple will definitely win the battle of the tablets, but really, is anyone surprised by this?


At $549, you can definitely get more pc bang for your buck if you're not looking for ultra-portability, but then again, if you're in the market for a tablet, you probably are. In that respect, the Archos 9 wins hands down. Cheaper than all but the cheapest iPads, able to hold its own with netbooks & laptops, and useful as a media device, the Archos 9 PCTablet is a cool tech device, but only for those not afraid of mucking with the installed software. 3 Stars.

Bought this for minor word processing and spreadsheet work. Watching movies and Wifi was just a side bonus.

Screen: You can watch movies on it, very clear in door screen/monitor. however Glare is bit of a problem when you are outside. Even when screen is at brightest, you will have some difficulty with the screen when you are outside. Touch screen isnt as sensitive as the ipod. You are going to need your stylus or push bit harder w your fingers.
Also get a screen cloth if you dont want smudges on your screen.

Opitcal mouse: really pointless. but better than nothing.

Camera. good for on the go video conferencing. emergency photo taking; i suppose.

Speakers: Not really worth mentioning. although its better than what i expected. Buy seperate speakers if you plan on watching movies/mp3s or buy a good set of ear phones.

Processor: bit disappointed at the lack of CPU power. cheaper tablet modles have more powerful CPU. but is more bulkier. its a give and take.

Noise: no fan = no noise. minus some hard drive noise the unit is noiseless.

Heat: left side of the tablet gets warm. just bit annoying. guess thats where the processor or video card is located.

WiFi: Solid at home. Avg outside, was 2-3 bars at starbucks and slow data DL/UL. maybe Starbucks wifi sucked.

Battery: With normal use (running 2-3 programs, word) lasts about 2.5 hours; also takes 2 hours to fully charge. Havent really tried Stand-by. Only can be charged via wall outlet.

Kick Stand: looks very flimsy. probably end up breaking in the near future.

Comment: When you use the touchscreen keyboard. you lose 1/2 the screen. keyboard size can be adjusted, its still bit annoying. Wish it was bit lighter so i can hold it in 1 hand comfortably.
The system Hard Drive is partitioned. 15g for backup. and 40 or so for main. you hae 25gigs free on your main patition. After your Win-7 update. ull have 24gigs free. You might wanna get a larger HD/USB drive.

Also, you will need to buy a USB DVD Rom. you cant install any programs w/o it. i recommend [...]usually 55 bucks. on sale for 40 bucks. glossy black is nice.

Boot up takes longer than i thought it would cause of system security program. Also went into setting and put it on Best Performance rather than look. Only comes w 1 USB port. if you might want to get a USB spliter. It comes with a coupon for 35 free MP3s off of archos's site.

Over all. I wouldnt recommend this to a business looking for tablet PC. BUT i would recommend this to the general public who wants portable/stylish media player/ w some computer capabilities. THIS IS NOTHING like ipad. iPad is designed for solely entertainment/multimedia. if anything. Archos is better; simply because it does everything ipod does + it can do word/spreadsheet processing. that and it costs less. If you want to wait, you can get the MS-Courier, which looks awesome.

Before I start, I should mention that the current Amazon stock of Archos 9 has the Z515 processor as opposed to the original Z510. Not only do you get a 100MHz increase in clock speed over the original, but you also get Hyper-threading which is bound to help with performance in certain situations. I've also uploaded some CPU-Z and GPU-Z screenshots (found under the main product picture at the top of the page). Now on to my observations:

What was Archos thinking when they decided to put Windows 7 Starter in a tablet PC? It is the only edition of Windows 7 that doesn't include the tablet PC features, such as the much improved on-screen keyboard or touch gestures. So the first thing I did after getting this device was reformat the hard drive, and install Windows 7 Professional.

I used a 4 GB USB flash drive to install 7 Pro, and the installation took about 30 minutes. I got the latest drivers from Archos, Intel, and Realtek websites. The first thing you must install is the video driver. The screen is almost unreadable until you do that. Additionally, make sure you install the latest touchscreen Beta driver found on Archos website (don't even bother downloading the "stable" one), in order to unlock full touch functionality (MAKE SURE you check that "Install PS2 Driver" option during install).

After installing drivers, set your components to run in full speed mode regardless of power source (in the Power Options control panel item). Also, if you open Intel Graphics and then click on the "Options" button, you will see an option called "Performance Mode". Not sure what it does, but it was unchecked by default. So I enabled it. :) With 7 Pro I was able to turn on the Aero interface, and while it is a little sluggish, it works just fine. I also removed some default Windows programs like Media Center and DVD Maker, while adding others like Games (which were disabled by default in 7 pro). After that I ran Windows Update to get everything there was to get for my edition of Windows.

Also make sure you run all calibration options found in the touch screen driver utility (HIDeGalaxTouch).

I then proceeded to install the essential software:

- Adobe Reader --- a good ebook reader if you tweak it a little. Modify the fullscreen options for a better touch experience. Particularly, check the "Show navigation bar" option and set the Mouse cursor to "Always Visible". Also, add a few buttons to the main toolbar to make the interface more touch friendly.

- Firefox --- with "Grab and Drag" add-on for iPhone-like page scrolling.

- Adobe Flash Player 10.1 Beta 3 --- for hardware accelerated videos. Download and install both Plugin and ActiveX versions. The latest Flash beta actually adds support for the GMA500 video card found in Archos 9. Make sure you use the latest Intel drivers though.

After drivers and software was properly installed and configured, I disabled unnecessary startup programs and services, ran a full check-disk scan, and defragmented the hard drive.

And finally I ran Windows Experience Index. This is what I got:

Processor: 1.7
RAM: 1.8
Graphics (Aero): 2.9
Gaming Graphics: 2.4
Hard Disk: 4.1

About the performance: As expected eBook reading and web browsing is flawless. Even Flash heavy websites such as Grooveshark load fast and work just fine (take that iPad). Youtube videos are smooth as long as you keep the quality at 480p or less. Going fullscreen is not recommended as the video becomes choppy. You can however expand the video horizontally to fill the browser window without any noticeable performance hit.

Hulu is slightly less forgiving even in non-fullscreen mode. The video starts a little choppy at first, but then stabilizes itself after a few seconds. So as long as you don't go in fullscreen mode and keep your video streams in low-res mode, you should be able to enjoy Hulu as well.

****Performance Tip****

The above observations are made when having the display set at the native resolution (1024x600). Here is a Youtube/Hulu performance increase trick: Lower the resolution to 640x480 (and instruct Intel Display Panel to "maintain aspect ratio"), and you will be able to watch smooth Youtube videos in fullscreen mode. Seriously, you will experience no low FPS or choppy video in fullscreen mode. Hulu is a lot better as well, but still a little choppy when in fullscreen mode (though I haven't experimented with that yet).

********************

Those two are Flash based services though, and the new Flash is still in beta, so we might see performance improvements in the future, as it comes closer to a final release.

On the other hand, videos downloaded on your computer (Divx, Xvid, etc) are smooth even in full screen mode.

I wish the screen on this device was a little more sensitive. Manipulating Windows using your fingers is painful due to items being too small and too close to each other. Using a stylus however is perfect. You can also use the built in optical touchpad controls for convenience.

However, in my opinion this is better device than the iPad, due to having a full Windows OS, and expansion capabilities via USB. You can do EVERYTHING the iPad can do, plus a lot more. Granted, the iPad has a slightly larger screen which also supports multitouch. But what good is multitouch when you can't even multitask? ;)

Overall, the Archos 9 is a good alternative to the iPad, at least until HP Slate is released. You have to consider the price as well, which is pretty low amongst full size slates. The Archos 9 costs about the same as the 16Gb iPad, and (judging by the rumors) it's going to be about 50% cheaper than the HP Slate PC. So, for the price you are getting a very good machine, as long as you are willing to tweak it a little. You must also understand that this is not a productivity device. It's a media-consumption device. It's meant to browse the web, read books, listen to music, and watch movies. Yes, there is no instant gratification here like in certain Apple products. You have to charge it for at least two hours before using it for the first time. And when you do turn it on that first time, you have to go through the initial Windows configuration and activation. However, compared to Apple handhelds, you are also getting a superior machine with a full fledged OS.

I have owned numerous Archos products over the past several years and have been very pleased with them. I still use an Archos 5 and 704 for my travels. I was impressed by the description of the Archos 9 eagerly awaited its arrival. At last an opportunity to consolidate the number of electronics I carry on trips! However, I quickly discovered that the actual unit was not going to live up to the marketing claims or my expectations. There were two major flaws that were evident right away. First, a quick peek at the disk drive under "My Computer" revealed that the actual capacity available to store any personal data was slightly under 25 gb. And this was before installing any of the applications that were provided by Archos. The actual hard drive size shown was approximately 55 Gb (not the 60gb claimed), subtract the 15+ gb for the recovery partition and the space used by operating system files and you are left with the 25 gb. My music and video collection, which is not particularly extensive, is around 45 gb. Second, it appears that the actual battery life when using the unit normally was closer to 3 - 3.5 hours than the claimed 5 hours. I suspect the actual life while watching a movie or doing any other video or processor intensive work will be even less. Other less serious flaws included the sluggishness of the device and the inherent difficulties in using the touch screen on content designed for keyboard and mouse such as web browsing, etc. I couldn't even enter the product serial number during the activation process as there was no way to bring up an on screen keyboard at that point.

Archos envisioned a great product but the technology to build the product just wasn't there. So, I'm going back to my netbook and waiting for the next generation of this product.

The Archos 9 Tablet is a well-built machine, very easy to hold/carry, runs everything you need, convenient, but the PC can be SLOW at times. The slow speed can be attributed to the 1.2 GHz speed of the processor, and the small 1 GB amount of RAM. 1 GB of RAM may seem like a lot to some, but with today's demanding applications, mainly entertainment, a machine needs to have at least 2 to 3GB of RAM.

SPECS of Tablet: Intel Atom Z515 1.2 GHz Processor, 1GB RAM, Windows 7 Starter Edition 32-bit Operating System, and a 60GB Hard Drive (but only about 44GB is available because the other 16GB is used for the recovery drive).
Native Resolution is 1024 x 600, with the possibility of 1024 x 768, but things seem out of proportion. Stick with the 600 resolution.

BATTERY: 2 Hours and 10 Min on HIGH PERFORMANCE mode (before getting the 10% battery power remaining message). Other options include BALANCED (2 Hours 45 Min), and POWER SAVER (3 Hours 10 Min). I don't recommend using Balanced or Power Saver mode because the tablet runs slow as it is, so HIGH PERFORMANCE mode is a must, unless you really need to conserve power.

INITIAL SETUP: Took about 30 minutes to do the initial setup, up to the point where the user is logged into their profile and the desktop is ready. It took a long time to process everything. It takes most computers 5 minutes.

BOOT-UP time: Regular boot-up times take about 3 minutes. Sometimes 4 minutes.

BUTTONS on the side: The KEYBOARD button on the left side brings up the on-screen keyboard quickly.
The A button brings up the Ctrl+Alt+Delete screen. The LEFT and RIGHT MOUSE buttons are on the left side. The 1.3 MegaPixel WEBCAM is also on the left side.
The RIGHT side of the tablet has the ON/OFF POWER button, and the finger mousepad.

LEG STAND: There is a small sturdy leg that pulls out from the back so you can prop the tablet on a table at a 45 degree angle like a picture frame.

HEAT info: The back of the device gets warm, but never hot or uncomfortably warm in case you want to hold it for 2 hours.

TOUCHSCREEN: About 95% of your clicks and presses will register the first time. The remaining 5% is probably because the computer is busy processing. The touchscreen is very accurate and responsive, whether you use a stylus pen or your fingers.

STYLUS: The included stylus is conveniently attached on the back of the tablet, but it is flat, flimsy and not very good as a pointer. The plastic stylus sits flush with the back molding. Easy to slide in and out. I use a stylus from an old Palm Pilot, that has a rubber point, and it works great, but it can't be attached to the tablet since it is round. But the rounded rubber stylus point makes it much easier to drag objects around on the screen compared to the flat plastic tip of the included stylus.

KEYBOARDS: There are two different on-screen keyboards you can use, and one additional keyboard that the PC brings up when necessary. The keyboard button on the left side of the device brings up the TouchIt Virtual keyboard that will take the place of whatever is on the screen. It cannot be dragged/moved, and it takes the bottom half of the screen. The second keyboard is an ON-SCREEN KEYBOARD, and that is the main one I use. It can be dragged/moved, and it takes about a third of the screen, and it overlays on top of anything else. Both are quite good and both have their advantages depending on what you need to do. The third keyboard is also good, but it is only available when the computer brings it up, like at the CTRL+ALT+DELETE screen, and other windows system screens. Entering keys on all the keyboards is responsive and easy.

SCREEN ROTATION: You can rotate the screen 90 degrees, 180, 270, or keep it NORMAL using the menu. NORMAL is great for looking at landscape pictures, and surfing the web. 90 degrees is perfect for looking at vertical portrait pictures and documents (WORD, PDF, etc).

TEXT and IMAGES: Text looks crystal clear when viewing documents, PDFs. Photos also looked crystal clear on the LCD screen.

INTERNET BROWSING: If you want to open multiple tabs or windows in your internet browser, it will take an extra step. On any screen that requires double clicks to activate an icon, you can hold the pointer on the screen for 3 seconds to bring up the menu (same as a right-click on a mouse). But when you are dealing with links that only require a single click, you can't just hold the pointer on them because it will open that link. So you have to click near the link, then use the finger mousepad button (glide your finger over that little square on the right side of the device), and get the mouse pointer on the link, then press the right mouse button (on the left side of the device) to bring up the menu to open new tabs.

NETWORK: The network card easily and quickly detected my Wireless network. I have a N+ network and it gets detected every time and never drops the connection.

USB PORT: The USB port can be used to attach flash/thumb drives and transfer any files you need to.

VIDEO CLIPS: Video clips that are downloaded on your machine, played by Quicktime or Windows Media Player, each take about 5 to 10 seconds to open, but the videos play cleanly. Sound is weak, but use headphones for better quality sound. YouTube videos play cleanly as well, and they also sound clear when you use headphones.

SOUND: The built-in speakers are very weak and small. Sound quality is bad on those tiny speakers. But using the headphone jack and headphones, the sound is clear and quite good. Official Music videos in Youtube sounded clear, just as they sound on TV.

INSTALLATIONS: Files are installed either by downloading them or by using the USB port.
Adobe Flash, Adobe Shockwave, Adobe PDF Reader: The Flash and Shockwave installations are supposed to complete in 30 seconds, but they dragged on and completed in 2 minutes. PDF Reader loads quickly, and scrolling through PDFs is also quick.

MOVIE TRAILERS and QUICKTIME: I played a few movie trailers in 480p in Quicktime, and they did not run smoothly. The sound seemed to crackle, and the video was skipping a few frames here and there.

Overall, the Archos 9 Tablet is a good tablet, but probably slow to process half the things you want to do. The Archos box has the slogan "Entertainment your way", but it may only serve 75% to 50% of your needs flawlessly. A worthwhile purchase, but it could definitely be improved with a faster processor and double the RAM.

Straight out of the box, I would have given this device a 2.5 or 3 out of 5. It was not a bad device at all but definitely was far from perfect. The screen is resistive, so for those who have never used a resistive screen, it can be annoying. It is a bit on the heavy side for its size but still pretty light.

Construction:
It is actually a pretty well built device. The brushed aluminium on the back is a nice touch and it feels nice and solid in the hand. A weak point in the construction is the stand on the back. It was fine for about 2 months then one time, the plastic warped and the glue gave way so the stand just broke off the device. A little bit of glue could probably fix it but it definitely is still a really weak stand to start off with.

Battery Life:
I was not expecting a 10 hour battery life out of this thing but the battery life on this devices did not last very long without needing to get charged again. 3-4.5 hours is what I typically got with wifi on doing word processing. Doesn't stretch too much further with wifi off.

Speed:
The Z515 (1.2ghz) does often struggle. It is no speed demon but it is definitely comparable to pretty much all netbooks. The fact that the RAM is unupgradable is also pretty annoying but look to my recommendations to see what I have done to improve the speed.

Heat:
The device does get hot on the left side, but not as bad as some people make it out to be. Does it get pretty warm? Yes, but it has never been too hot to be uncomfortable to hold.

When buying this here is what I recommend what you should do:
1.Upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium - Windows 7 starter doesn't give you the touch capabilities which Home premium offers. Believe me, the on screen keyboard, easy scrolling and flick gestures make this device 100X better.
2. Take advantage of ReadyBoost software - Since upgrading the RAM is impossible, I use the ReadyBoost to help speed up the computer a bit. It wont drastically improve the speed but it is definitely noticeable. I use elago Mobile Nano II USB 2.0 microSDHC Flash Memory Card Reader (Black) along with a 4 GB class 6 microSDHC card and it doesn't stick out of the device very far so you can just leave it in, however this does take up the one and only USB slot.
3. Use Google Chrome - It is a way faster browser and it is also more space efficient. The minimalistic design of chrome leaves more viewable webpage area than any other browser making it perfect for this size screen. Make sure you get the extension which enables touch scrolling.
4. Backup - I recommend backing up on an external hard drive as the hard drive on the device is already pretty limited. Backup when you first get the device and again once you upgraded. This device doesn't come with a CD drive or Backup CD's so it is up to you to back it up.
5. (Optional) Upgrade the Hard drive - I have seen many people replace the hard drive with a SSD however I did not do this as it is pretty expensive but people who do say that the performance is further improved, however if you do this, ignore no. 2 in my recommendations as no 2. will do nothing once you already have a SSD.

Overall:
It is not a bad device and is pretty cool for carrying around. After a bit of tweaking, I actually really like this device. I have watched movies on it and the screen is pretty decent. Even with it's few flaws it has (Weak stand, Windows 7 Starter, unupgradeable RAM) it is still a solid device.

Once calibrated, this PC tablet works wonderfully. It is responsive to the stowable stylus or a tap of my fingernail, and I can even scroll with my thumb after adjusting the right edge width. The screen is sharp and clear, and it's speedy enough for pleasurable surfing and blog-reading, which is what I mostly want to use it for. I have not watched any HD movies on it yet, although the sample movie clip included with the computer shows what it's capable of...and it's gorgeous.

But I have a problem with the Archos 9. Because there is no fan, which makes for a very quiet experience, the lithium battery does get hot when held in your hands. Now, maybe there are people who will use this computer by pulling out the little easel-like stick in the back, but not me. I want to curl up on the sofa with it like a book. So I could see immediately that I wanted to rotate my Archos 9 PC Tablet's screen to portrait orientation so the battery would be at the top and not bother me so much. Well, doing so was a BIG mistake. Once you rotate the screen, it's pretty much impossible to recalibrate it; trying to move the cursor is like trying to walk without an inner ear: Directions ceased to make sense and I'd skew off East (or was it West?) when I meant to move North. It was all I could do to manage to restore the computer to its earlier state.

The little end piece of the easel-like appendage pulled off and I had to super-glue it back on, but that wasn't such a big deal. This appendage also stows into the back of the computer, and it can be pulled out short or long depending on whether you are watching a movie or trying to type on the on-screen keyboard. I can see it for watching a movie, but there's no way I'd ever try to type on the on-screen keyboard. Hunt-and-peck with the stylus is quicker. Needless to say, I will reach for my laptop if I have to do much typing.

I installed Skype, but it was too slow to show video unless I stopped everything else from running. This is fine with me, however, because I prefer to use Skype without the visuals. Google Chrome runs very well on it. I found I preferred the software keyboard (which you can drag around the screen) to the one that pops up when you press the keyboard key. I found that by keeping the former loaded and minimized to the tray, I can get around and do things online pretty efficiently. I just wish that battery didn't get so hot OR that I could easily/reliably rotate the screen to portrait. I gave this computer four stars because, on the whole, it's quite nice. But I must say that I am not likely to reach for the Archos 9 very often because of the discomfort from the battery heat when holding it in my hands. If they will come out with a software upgrade that will make screen rotation practical, then I will be a lot happier with this tablet PC.

A word to the wise: Immediately when you take your Archos 9 out of the box and get the software installed, you need to back it up. Don't wait a second longer than you have to. I was able to restore mine to its pristine newly installed state, but had I not backed it up, the whole thing would have been trashed by my little screen rotation exploit. You don't have a restore disk with this product. So be careful.

I purchased this after considering the Ipad since the Archos runs Windows. I wanted the ability to add software and to use the unit as a travel computer for email and basic functions.
The touch screen is very difficult to use without the stylus. The lag time for EVERYTHING is so great that you often think the machine is not responding and you start to reset. The unit consistanly freezes and must be reset to proceed. It took 4 hours to download iTunes and then still would not download a movie properly. It was not an internet conection issue, it was simply that the system would freeze mid download.
I have tried it for different applications from entertainment, web browsing, email and basic work functions and found it to be useless in any of them. The only good thing about it is the size, but even as small as it is, if it does not function for anything, it is not worth carrying around.

This device is Archos' answer to the iPad and other tablets, and it suceeds on most levels. First, the screen is matte, which while is not as OMG looking as glossy screens, makes the screen more readable since it reduces glare. The screen is pretty responsive for a resistive screen, but the styles is the worst I've seen. The tablet has a webcam and USB port, but you'll have to buy Archos' dock to get video out and more USB ports. The device is solidly built. Programs start up pretty quickly (a couple seconds). Google Earth runs fairly well (until you add variables like weather, etc, then it slows down). Flash is iffy, while regular resolution Youtube videos run okay, Hulu and Crunchyroll videos running badly (I guess Adobe will fix that with 10.1). I've tried Bejeweled 2, which runs slowly, but still playable. HD videos are a big problem because the device uses hardware acceleration, so you can't use VLC or Mplayer to play mkv files. Regular DVD resolution video runs fine. This device makes a great ereader since you can install your own reader programs like Kindle, BN, whatever. This device really shines a comic viewer--just install your favorite comic viewer, right click on the screen to get to graphics options and rotate it 90 degrees, viola, awesome comic book/manga reader. PDFs load quickly and nicely too.

Pros:
Screen is matte (maybe this doesn't matter to some, but it does to me)
The touch screen is pretty reliable (calibrate your screen!) although better with a stylus
Ereader! Comic books are awesome.
Install your own programs
Multitasking
Webcam
USB port

Cons:
Slow 1.1 ghz processor (no high games on this thing)
HD video playback sucks
Flash iffy.