New and Improved

Every now and then, in between answering your much appreciated questions, I like to keep you abreast of some of the new technological products that you may find interesting. Think of me as your friendly neighborhood Spiderman, only without the webs, spandex, and the unhealthy preoccupation with arachnids. This week I am going to give you the low down on the AV320 by Archos.
Since the days of the pocket transistor radio, portable devices have left an indelible mark on our society. We have transitioned from pocket radios to Walkmans, to Discmans, to MP3 players. The AV320 represents the new school of portable devices. It is a portable multimedia and data device. If you don’t know what it is, you probably will by the end of the year. Archos says that this device can store up to 300 hours of MP3 quality music, over 200 thousand digital pictures, 40 hours of video, and 30 movies. All of this is stored on a 20 gigabyte hard, which by the way can be used as an external hard drive to store data on. This device is a digital video recorder also. It can record directly from your television.
The AV320 sounded too good to be true so I decided to put it to a real world test. I took it on a recent road trip to learn what are its’ positives and negatives. The device itself has an awkward size. It reminded me of the first portable headphone personal tape players. Not the small Walkman that fit naturally in your pocket, but the larger square one that never fit comfortably into your pocket. Also, it had a feel of fragility that I was not comfortable with. It felt as though an accidental drop could do the device in. I found the installation instructions to be relatively straight forward, and worded in layman’s’ terms. Transferring photos, music, movies, and files to the AV320 was simple. I was concerned that the device became hot while I was loading files to it. Once loaded, the picture, audio, and video quality were exceptional. This was unfortunately eclipsed by the relatively short battery life. The AV320 uses an internal rechargeable battery. It advertises that it has a playtime up to 10 hours. After further inspecting of the owners manual, I found that the more that you navigate between functions and tasks the shorter the playback time becomes. Through trial and error I found that the optimum battery life was achieved by letting the songs or video play in succession.
Overall, I was impressed with the quality of picture that was produced on its’ 3.5 inch screen, the non-complexity of the instructions, and the user friendliness of the device. However, its’ issues with heating up, fragility, playback time, and a price of between $400-$500 force me to recommend that you wait a few years until the price drops and the durability increases before you consider buying the AV320 or any other comparable device.