Archos Jukebox 20 Recorder and MP3 Player

I bought my Jukebox about 5 months...

Strengths: 20 GB Hard Drive

Weakness: Not very user friendly

I bought my Jukebox about 5 months ago because my friend had one and really liked it. He has pretty good luck with his. Maybe I just got a lemon. It worked pretty well for the first few weeks but after that the screen wouldn't keep up with the song that was playing. It was a little annoying but I could stand it. Now many times after I boot it up the screen fails to come up at all. It will still...
Read Full Review

I bought my Jukebox about 5 months ago because my friend had one and really liked it. He has pretty good luck with his. Maybe I just got a lemon. It worked pretty well for the first few weeks but after that the screen wouldn't keep up with the song that was playing. It was a little annoying but I could stand it. Now many times after I boot it up the screen fails to come up at all. It will still play the music fine but you are blindly navigating through 20 GB worth of music. It is very agravating finding the song I'm looking for. I would definetly not have bought this item if I would have known it would be such a hassle.

By slimandyd - Jan 13, 2004

I have had my player for over a...

Strengths: 20GB - Still one of the largest memory capacities after almost a year and a half on the market. Well ahead of it's time. I wish I could have bought my unit for the price it is now.

Weakness: Poor user manual. If you are a moron don't buy this unit. The rest of the civilized world will be able to figure it out on their own. A little unstable in the car, skips or stops every so often.

I have had my player for over a year now, I bought it when it first came to market. It is still one of the best bargains for the ammount of memory you get. How many players give you 20 GB of storage space, even now. I think the unit was far ahead of it's time for the price. I use it for file transfers from work to home and vice versa. I have converted all of my CDs to MP3 format and have just...
Read Full Review

I have had my player for over a year now, I bought it when it first came to market. It is still one of the best bargains for the ammount of memory you get. How many players give you 20 GB of storage space, even now. I think the unit was far ahead of it's time for the price. I use it for file transfers from work to home and vice versa. I have converted all of my CDs to MP3 format and have just about filled the unit to full capacity. The USB 2.0 compatability this unit has is highly underrated in this category of electronics, it is vital for the amount of files you will transfer with this unit, USB 1.0 is way too slow. I used it on a camping trip, plugged it into the auxilary port of my 10 year old boom box and we had tunes for the entire weekend. I didn't need to recharge the batteries for several hours a day for three days of music enjoyment around the campfire. It truly is a portable Jukebox, you can take your entire music collection wherever you go. I have had no mechanical problems in the time I have owned my unit, it is very durable and I hope it lasts several more years. It is one of the best technology purchases I have made. You get a lot of bang for the buck at the price it is at now. I only wish I could have gotten mine at the price it is now, but do not regret my original purchase one bit.

By johnnyicemaker - Nov 11, 2003

Several problems: - some problems...

Strengths: Good storage size. Good battary life.

Weakness: Freezes because of vibration (car on hard surface). Built-in mic poorly designed. XP drivers

Several problems: - some problems with XP drivers. Crashes once in a while. Not too bad though - navigation to make play lists is a bit cryptic. - built in mic records sounds of the hardrive, so expect some clicking noises every 30 second on the recording. - tends to freeze from vibration, such as sitting on a hard surface in the car. - a bit too havy to be use for any sports activities, aside...
Read Full Review

Several problems:
- some problems with XP drivers. Crashes once in a while. Not too bad though
- navigation to make play lists is a bit cryptic.
- built in mic records sounds of the hardrive, so expect some clicking noises every 30 second on the recording.
- tends to freeze from vibration, such as sitting on a hard surface in the car.
- a bit too havy to be use for any sports activities, aside from golfing if you have an electric car to leave it in.

By chekist - Aug 3, 2003

The thing worked ok until I...

Strengths: Large disk space

Weakness: awkwardness, poorly written manual, no support, no updated bsite drivers on we

The thing worked ok until I upgraded to Windows XP. The downloaded drivers do not work, making it next to useless. Tech support does not answer emails. Do not buy this product.

By Bigacito - Nov 13, 2002

I will only elaborate on the...

Strengths: Large 20GB capacity; fast USB 2.0 hard drive; relatively good sound; convenience of recorder; long battery life during playback.

Weakness: Rather heavy; buggy firmware; horrible tech support; slow response; accepts only NiMH batteries; poor built-in mic; short battery life during recording or as a USB HD unless using AC adapter.

I will only elaborate on the negatives, because the strengths speak for themselves. Weaknesses: -I had upgraded to this player from an older 6GB MP3 player, and the first thing that struck me was the slow response the unit had from my button-input. It would sometimes take as long as 2 seconds to move between directories. -Also, it only takes 1.2V NiMH batteries; luckily, we have a bunch of these...
Read Full Review

I will only elaborate on the negatives, because the strengths speak for themselves.

Weaknesses:
-I had upgraded to this player from an older 6GB MP3 player, and the first thing that struck me was the slow response the unit had from my button-input. It would sometimes take as long as 2 seconds to move between directories.

-Also, it only takes 1.2V NiMH batteries; luckily, we have a bunch of these batteries at home, although I can imagine others seeing this as an inconvenience.

-The firmware is also rather buggy, as with most Archos products soon after launch (although it's been a few years now). As if that wasn't bad enough, Archos is also pretty slow about releasing new versions of firmware.

-The built-in mic... well, you should just pretend it isn't there. Why? The engineers didn't bother filtering out the internal noise of the hard drive, among other things. If you record through the mic, you will literally hear only the hard drive writing, clicking, etc. It's LOUD too. The "line-in" port on the unit doesn't have this problem.

-If you plan to use this strictly as an MP3 player, then you'll be happy with the battery life. Otherwise, you will be happy only during playback. I would say that on a full-charge with 1500mah nimh batteries (what it comes with), you might be able to use it as a portable HD for an hour if you're lucky. The same thing applies if you're recording with it. The reason is because for these applications, the HD will constantly be on.

By jenova314 - Oct 20, 2002