Home > Consumer Reviews > Archos Ondio 128MB MP3 PLAYER

The Ondio is great value for an mp3 player and very competetively priced with others that have similar features, yet there are several things that make it stand out on its own.

Firstly it not only incorporates an fm radio but also allows you to record off it - at very good quality if you've tuned in your channel presets right.

Secondly it has line in recording as well - which I tried out connecting the supplied analog lead to my friends guitar amp and recorded his jamming session just like that.

The third reason that quite important for me and a feature lacking in most mp3 players - it works as usb flash drive without any drivers on both windows xp and mac os 9/10.

Since macintosh support is, well, undersupported to say the least I'd say that was what sold this to me - along with the compactness of the box fitting in all those wonderful and fun features.

Well worth the current price, a must have gadget that also has room for expansion in the future.

The MMC slot works quite happily with a 1GB card, but does not support SD.

The unit doesn't have a backlight, but maybe this isn't so bad. I had another MP3 player with a back light which just wasted battery power (Even on auto mode). It was switchable, but the only time you wanted to switch it on, was when you couldn't see to switch it on!
The radio is a bit poor. It is too easily affected by interference. Still, it is good enough to listen to, but I doubt you'd want to record from it, if you could help it.

The supplied case, made out of diving suit material (fabric covered foam) looks really nice, but is slightly too small,so the buttons won't line up with the holes. It is getting better as I use it so it may be okay in a few weeks.

When I don't have any MMC card in it saves all my settings fine. But with a MMC in it will not save any settings. But on the up side you can safely remove and insert without switching off. Even when attached to your PC.

The unit can record from three different sources: radio, Line in or from the integrated microphone.
All recordings are in VBR (Variable Bit Rate) which maximises the quality and minimises the disk usage.
There are loads of different settings to allow selection of various quality vs size settings.
Recordings from radio can be started 30 seconds before you press the record button (retro recording),as the unit can buffer the last 30 seconds. In theory allowing you to record a song without missing the start.

It is surprisingly light, even with three AAA batteries installed. It can happily sit in a shirt pocket. The three battery configuration is a little annoying, as packs of batteries and battery chargers invariable deal in even numbers.

At first I noticed quite a few bugs, but these were almost all alleviated with a firmware upgrade from www.archos.com. This is not at all scary, you just down load a file from the website, and copy it onto the player, as you would with an MP3
file. The next time you switch on, it'll upgrade automatically for you.

The headphones are okay, with in-line volume control, in addition to the volume control on the unit.

The USB cable provided wasn't the best I've ever seen, the connection is a little shaky. Fortunately I had another USB device
with the same connector, so was able to use that cable instead.

As well as recording in VBR, it can playback VBR recordings too.

It behaves as a standard mass storage device, so work fine with Linux >=2.4 kernel.

I can't comment on software supplied, as it is all for Windoze/Mac. But with no printed manual, the manual on the CD is essential to find all the available features.

It has a file browser, which allows you to create your own playlists and read text files.

All this functionality comes at a price - the user interface it not the most intuitive. Maybe not suitable for a technophobe, but fine if you're willing to spend a little time exploring.