Archos PMA400

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Archos PMA400

Postby kipper on Sun Feb 13, 2005 2:04 pm

Well, it's always the way isn't it. You go overseas and see something you were all hyped over before your trip and buy it, only to come back and find out there is practically a new an improved version of what you've bought about to come out.

I ended up buying the Archos AV-420 while I was in the UK duty free for about $740AU and bought a spare battery plus a 1-3year international insurance/warranty against droppages etc - total cost $800AU. It's pretty good and has a nice clean interface and viewing images is really nice on the screen. You just press ok/enter to magnify and use the arrow keys to move around so you get the feel if the image is ok. Reads my CF cards which are Sandisk Ultra II 512mb cards. So if I do Raw + JPEG when shooting I can get the option to view as I shoot and to also use it as a portable photo album.

Anyway that's getting off the point, the PMA-400 is identical to the AV-400 series devices but with a few added features:

* PDA with touch screen
* Linux Qtopia based OS with SDK
* WIFI support
* USB - to - Ethernet so when docked it will be internet ready
* USB Keyboard support
* USB 1.1 and 2.0 support

The price of this device will most likely be around the $1200AU mark. So unless you're going to use it as a PDA aswell it might not be for you. I'll probably wait until these come out sell off my PDA and my AV-420 and do away with having two devices :)


http://www.archos.com/products/overview ... 2osbcjcyf4
kipper
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Archos PMA400

Postby mchampio on Sun Feb 13, 2005 4:54 pm

Just a few questions.

What is the capacity (in GB)?

You say that it reads the Compact Flash cards. Does it have a direct interface, or do you have to plug a card reader into the USB?
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Postby kipper on Sun Feb 13, 2005 6:46 pm

Hmmm interesting, I notice the specs don't mention CF reader but I know the AV-400 series had this on the left side of the unit. The PMA-400 is suppose to be the AV-500 series so a new improved model of the AV-400. So I hope they haven't removed it!


<i><b>Edit:</b></i>

Yes I think you're right, it looks like you either have to use a USB card reader that is USB OTG compliant or a USB OTG compliant digital camera.

http://www.photozone.de/7Digital/portableHD.htm


That's a bit of a let down. So in the end I don't think I made a bad choice in the Archos AV-400 after all.

Please forgive me, jet lag caused me to overlook the CF reader was missing :(
kipper
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