Home > Consumer Reviews > Archos Gmini 220 20 GB MP3 Jukebox / Recorder / Photo Wallet-Viewer with Compact Flash Reader

I bought my Gmini a chain retailer for a good price. When I took it to work, one of my co-workers said that he wished I checked with him first. He has an an older ARCHOS and had to return it twice for OS problems. He has the same problems with the third one, but he's just putting up with now.

After two weeks of using my Gmini, non-stop, I thought I was in the clear. Then, it happened.

The screen became garbled and the player did not respond to any key sequences. I had a hard time even getting it to reboot! After rebooting, same problems. Nothing has helped.

It's a terrific player when it works, but the darn screen problem is irritating. It's going back tomorrow and I will buy a unit from another manufacturer.

I selected the Archos on the basis that I could also use the unit as an external Hard Drive. For the price, the Archos GMini 120 gave the largest hard drive capacity when compared to the iPod and the players from Dell and Samsung. I had no problems with the unit being recognized by Win XP, and I upgraded the unit's system software from v1.2 to v1.5 with no difficulty. The controls and menus are functional and logical although the buttons are slightly hard. My player runs 8.5 hours on a full charge, but I get occasional error messages during the last half-hour of use when playing WMA music files (it says there is something wrong with the file). The included ear buds are good, but I prefer my Sony ear buds which give a richer sound. Fit and finish is adequate. The hard drive inside is extremely quiet. I am not interested in the extra cost features so that has not been a problem for me. Overall, this has been a happy experience so far.

I ASK THAT YOU CHECK THE BOTTOM OF THE REVIEW TEXT TO SEE IF IT IS AN "ALTERNATE MODEL." THIS "ALTERNATE" MODEL IS THE GMINI 120. THIS MODEL HAS BUGS AND ABSCENCE OF FEATURES THAT ARE IN NO WAY ASSOCIATED TO THE GMINI 220. PLEASE CHECK THIS BEFORE YOU TURN AWAY FROM A GREAT PLAYER .

I've had my player for a little over two months now. The only time that I've had any troubles with it was when I accidentally put all of the music into the home directory of the player (it's supposed to go in the /music/ directory) which caused it to crash. That was easily fixed; I simply cut and pasted the files from the home directory into the /music/ directory. Upgrading is easy. Simply download the latest update from the archos site (http://www.archos.com) and follow the directions that they give you on how to install it. And as for the battery life, I've had mine last for a little over a total of 10 hours. The buttons work fine and I haven't had a problem with them.

As for features, it doesn't have the most, but it has enough to keep me happy. It has randomize and repeat, an equilizer, very good sound, easy and fast file transfer, ability to choose up to one song ahead of time (while not in playlist mode), bookmarking to start where you last left off, ARCLibrary feature that allows you to browse by artist, album, title, genre, and even playlist, and many more things that I can't think of.

All in all, I think that this product is one of the best alternatives to the overpriced ipods that I've ever owned.

This player is really nice. I bought this for the ability to download JPEGS from Compact flash cards. I was suprised that it hang on downloads from my two CF cards. I tried my buddy's cards and they downloaded without a problem. Please note that I have upgraded the firmware. The cards that did not work are the lower priced, heavily discounted cards such as PQI 256 (bought at Fry's) and a SIMPLETECH 512. The better brands such as Kingston 64MG, Sandisk ULTRA 256, and VIKING 512MG all worked without problems. A call to ARCHOS tech support resulted in the tech support person not being aware of any compatibility issues.

That's the reason I am giving it 3 of 5 stars.....