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

I bought the GMini 220 because the of the features for the price (I wanted the compact flash interface to transfer pictures). I have had it a week. The unit is compact and sturdy. The user interface is usable but not fantastic. It plays well and I like it. Transferring files is easy (although I don't like the Musicmatch Jukebox software very much, I just copy the files on).

One Small annoyance is that to use headphones other than the ones which came with it, you need a small external adapter (which comes with it).

I haven't tried to transfer pictures to it yet.

Overall, I am very happy with the purchase.

So I took the posts here and cnet to heart that I was taking a chance ordering the Gmini 120. However, at less than $200 with a 20GB harddrive and a compact flash card reader I could not find an affordable alternative.

I wanted to be able to take MP3s with me while traveling, but the main use is tranferring pictures from my SandDisk Extreme 512 MB compact flash card. I have a D-70 and plan to take a lot of picture in Prague. This was a cheaper alternative than buying multiple CF cards or a laptop.

I have transferred the CF card multiple times without any problems.

The only problem I noted was in a 6hr playlist it was crashing. I did some diagnosing and found that it was due to a wma filename with a period followed by and underscore. Changed the filename on the harddrive as well as the playlist and it works great.

Pros:
20GB Harddrive
Compact Flash
<200$ (bhphotovideo)
Plays mp3 and wma
CF Reader and Recording plugins were preloaded and free.
Fast USB 2.0 Connection
No software required for connection to Win xp

Cons:
Playlists:
The playlist is in m3u format which is just a text file that contains the location of each file in the order you wish to listen to them. To create one for the gmini you have to do it on the device since the directory structure is not the same as your computer.

Since I am a progammer, I wrote a small software program to take playlists developed on you PC (in Windows Media Player or the supplied Music Match) and convert it in to one that works on the Gmini. So I have fixed this problem, however, not everyone may have that luxury. I loaded six hours worth of music in a playlist, ran the simple conversion program which saved the new playlist to the archos (even randomizes the songs for you) and the Archos worked flawlessly.

I would recommend this, will update if anything changes.

I really liked the concept of having a portable hard drive AND an MP3 player. I was worried about carrying around a hard drive, due to fragility. It did indeed start acting up about a week after I bought it. However, instead of the hard drive being the source of the problem, the display was getting very garbled and sometimes even completely reversed. I tried tech support before returning it, just to get an idea of how good their support is in case I wanted to exchange it for another Gmini, but I haven't heard back from them in over a week. The store was out of them, and didn't have any on order. I gladly took my money back.

With much trepidation, having read all the bad reviews that people gave it on the 'Net, I bought a Gmini 120. Glad that I did!

This is the first MP3 player that I have bought, although I have used MusicMatch on my laptop for a couple of years.

What attracted me was that it was by far the cheapest player with this size of HDD, with this many features (MP3, WAV, CF card reader, Mic in, Analog + SPDIF line in). It also came with a universal (120-240V) power supply, an audio cable and adapter plug, and MusicMatch Plus 8.0 on a CD.

It came with OS 1.3.0 installed, but I upgraded to OS 1.9.0 straight away. This is currently (Apr 04) a free download from Archos. This includes the Photo Wallet and Recorder plug-ins by default. Easy upgrade. 2 minutes. Sound quality is excellent through the supplied earbuds, although I like a little more bass. Will try later with my big Sennheiser headphones.

To address all the negative points that people wrote:
Comments about the review

The only real problem so far has been getting my 2-year old laptop (HP Omnibook 500, Win2k, Intel 82371AB USB chipset) to recognise it as a HDD. Windows didn't find the drive although the Gmini displayed 'USB connected', and the PC wouldn't shut down afterwards. It took me about 2 hours, hacking about with it, downloading drivers from Intel and Archos and trying to install them. I don't know what I did exactly, as the Intel drivers wouldn't install (already there), but I think I added the Archos supplied driver for a HDD as 'Other Devices' in Control Panel -> Add hardware. Anyway, after a reboot, the PC found the Gmini and no more Windows lock-ups. In contrast, a new Dell desktop PC with WinXP found the Gmini first time, without drivers.

This is an upgrade from the Archos Jukebox 20. I compared this to the Rio Karma and Ipod. The Karma has a 90 day warranty and Gmini220 one year. I chose this player over Ipod for price and versatility. It shows up as another 20GB hard drive on whatever computer I plug it into. (For win2K and XP, no drivers needed.) Ipod is extremely proprietary and requires cumbersome software installs to get at the data. Fast USB interface loaded 15GB of MP3s in less than 40 minutes! The Gmini220 sound quality is excellent with high end headphones. The user interface is excellent and MP3 navigation is easy. The large display is a big plus and there is plenty of useful info displayed. Creating playlists is as easy as holding down the play button on a filename or directory while browsing the music folder. (some quirks fixed by upgrading firmware to rev. 1.6.0 - a very painless task.) With standard screws on the case, I have a better chance at replacing the battery one year from now versus the Ipod which is snapped together. With some online shopping, can be purchased shrinkrapped new for 15-25% off MSRP - my purchase was 25% off MSRP (03-28-2004), 15% less than brick & mortar stores.
The drawbacks are 6 hour battery life, dim backlight, cumbersome cables, and proprietary AC adapter (no way to quick charge or charge via USB.)
I cannot reccomend the FM radio/remote with high end headphones. There is a lot of excessive audible noise created by the digital controls and hard drive when using the FM radio/remote. The remote display freezes occasionally requiring the remote to be unplugged and pluged in again.