Some Good Points About The Archos 504

archos 504

By Anne Ahira

Back in 2006, a nifty gadget called the Archos 504 hit the market. While a lot of the electronics and technology folks gave it great review, the product went right under the radar of most consumers.

At the time, it was probably a little more technology than most people were wanting and the price was a bit steep. Today, picking up the Archos 504 personal media player could be a good idea. Here are a few reasons why.

Impressive Capabilities

The Archos 504 is a lightweight device that pretty much does anything you’d want a portable media player to do for you. Let’s say you want to listen to music. The 40 GB model available on Amazon lets you store up to 20,000 songs which is an impressive library and more than the average user probably has in total.

The Archos 504 does not just play music, however. This portable media player also allows you to store pictures, movies, and even DVDs on its hard drive so you can access them at any time for viewing on the impressive 4.3 inch LCD screen. That’s quite large compared to the screens on the iPod Nano and the Microsoft Zune.

Most of the major formats of music and video are supported, except for the proprietary formats from other companies. However, any MP3s, JPEGs, and WMV files you have will work perfectly.

And, of course, battery life is very important, too. The rechargeable battery can give you about 17 hours of music listening (about 5 hours less than most of the players on the market today) but more than 5 hours of video viewing (more than the standard for players today). Whether the battery life is good or bad, really depends on what you plan to be doing with it.

Another great feature of the Archos 504 is that you can purchase a docking station that attaches to your television or home theater so you can watch or view anything stored on the device on your television.

That could be a great way of sharing video footage from your wedding or photos of your vacation with other people. It could also be an easy way of bringing along your favorite movies to enjoy in a hotel during a business trip so you don’t have to pay a fortune in in-room rentals.

Buying Considerations

On the downside, this media player is a little on the old side. For example, it was designed to work with Microsoft XP not Vista. That shouldn’t cause any problems but it gives you some insight into the age of the product. The good news is you can still readily buy accessories for them, including the docking station, through Amazon and other retailers.

Now one drawback is the only model sold through Amazon is the 40 GB model for $377. Other options, including the 80 GB model, are available through some of the site’s sellers in either new or used condition for varying prices.

An article by Anne Ahira you may be interested in reading: Sansa m250 and Sansa c250