Does anyone have an opinion on the Archos 7?

[Legendary_Bibo]

I got a job at my college because I have 6 hours between two of my classes, but I also have to go to school two hours early due to my transportation issues. So in these two hours I'm rather bored, and not in the mood to study as it's early in the morning. I'm getting a netbook, but I need the battery to last for all my classes so I wouldn't be able to use that to screw around on. So I was looking at tablets, and I came across the Archos 7 and it's only $200 which is a good deal. So here are my questions.

1. I know that you have to manually put the android marketplace on it, but are all the applications compatible with the Archos?

2. How is the browsing experience on it?

3. Is a resistive touch screen really that bad?

4. What's the significance of the Android OS version it's running?

I've seen videos of people showing it off and I don't get the big deal about it having a resistive touch screen instead of a capacitive touch screen. Also all the reviews I've seen go like this "WOW IT'S SO CHEAP, BUT ZOMG IT DOESN'T HAVE A CAPACITIVE SCREEN, ACCELEROMETER OR THE APP STORE ANDROID MARKETPLACE OR ANDROID 2.2!!!" They don't really review how well it works, but rather what features the iPad has that it doesn't so I need peoples' opinions on if it's good or if there's a better cheap android tablet. I could wait for the newer android tablets, but they'll probably be pricey, and I don't know when they're coming out, and I kind of can't take boredom for this long.

[formaldehyde_spoon]

I'm not interested in owning a tablet, but if I was I might buy it, I think for that price you can't really complain. Slightly underpowered, not a great battery life, and no Android market, but still ok.

Sounds like your main problem is your choice of netbook ;)
You should have bought one with a reasonable advertised battery life: Wind U110 @15hr, Asus 1005PE @14hr, Asus 1015PE @ 13.5hr, and so on.
I have a 6 cell 1005PE ($350 on Amazon) and can get up to 12 hours from it, running 10.04.

[Legendary_Bibo]

I'm not interested in owning a tablet, but if I was I might buy it, I think for that price you can't really complain. Slightly underpowered, not a great battery life, and no Android market, but still ok.

Sounds like your main problem is your choice of netbook ;)
You should have bought one with a reasonable advertised battery life: Wind U110 @15hr, Asus 1005PE @14hr, Asus 1015PE @ 13.5hr, and so on.
I have a 6 cell 1005PE ($350 on Amazon) and can get up to 12 hours from it, running 10.04.

I'm getting the Teo from ZaReason as soon as I have my student loan money :D, it's just that where I live you have to take advertised battery life with a grain of salt. Basically, higher temp. = shorter battery.

[formaldehyde_spoon]

I'm getting the Teo from ZaReason as soon as I have my student loan money :D, it's just that where I live you have to take advertised battery life with a grain of salt. Basically, higher temp. = shorter battery.

I agree absolutely - you can't ever believe the advertised battery life.
You just have to view them relatively: a netbook with 15 hrs advertised will have a (much) longer battery life than one with 8hr advertised (like the Teo).

It can get up to 45 deg here in summer (113 for Americans), although my netbook hasn't had to experience that yet.

[Dustin2128]

hm, if I were you I'd get an eee PC. They've got great battery life, SSD hard drives, run linux (xandros is crap, but still it means 100% hardware compatibility for debian or ubuntu), are heavily modifiable, and they're dirt cheap at around 100-200$. As far as tablets go, there are plenty of laptop sized versions that you can buy used by the truckload on ebay (never took off until apple made one :roll:) and can modify with a more powerful battery or whatever best suits your purpose. Aside from that- I'd warn against android OS on a tablet... for now at least.

[Legendary_Bibo]

hm, if I were you I'd get an eee PC. They've got great battery life, SSD hard drives, run linux (xandros is crap, but still it means 100% hardware compatibility for debian or ubuntu), are heavily modifiable, and they're dirt cheap at around 100-200$. As far as tablets go, there are plenty of laptop sized versions that you can buy used by the truckload on ebay (never took off until apple made one :roll:) and can modify with a more powerful battery or whatever best suits your purpose. Aside from that- I'd warn against android OS on a tablet... for now at least.

I'll check out eBay. Oh I'm getting the Teo because it comes with 2gb of RAM, and its' battery life is fine, also I'm trying to be more supportive of people who ship Linux.

What about this? (http://cgi.ebay.com/Google-Android-2-2-7-Tablet-TI-OMAP-Froyo-Triple-Core-/250686651761?pt=Laptops_Nov05)

Oh and while we're on it, do you know if netbooks would support at least Wobbly Windows, Cairo-Dock without OpenGL, Gnomenu with transparency, and Alpha blur? I'm not getting the netbook version of Ubuntu because from what I can tell, Compiz doesn't play nice with it.

[formaldehyde_spoon]

hm, if I were you I'd get an eee PC. They've got great battery life, SSD hard drives, run linux (xandros is crap, but still it means 100% hardware compatibility for debian or ubuntu), are heavily modifiable, and they're dirt cheap at around 100-200$. As far as tablets go, there are plenty of laptop sized versions that you can buy used by the truckload on ebay (never took off until apple made one :roll:) and can modify with a more powerful battery or whatever best suits your purpose. Aside from that- I'd warn against android OS on a tablet... for now at least.

You mean the original 7'' Eee right? All of Asus' netbooks are Eee (I think), including the ones I mentioned above, so 'Eee' isn't specific anymore.

Seeing as I want a netbook for when I'm not at home, I wouldn't buy one with less than 10hr (actual, not just advertised)battery life.

I'm curious about the Android comment: how come? I wouldn't have a tablet with any OS except Android ;)
Android's a fantastic OS, and OS's for mice have lots of little elements too small to be comfortable with fingers.
I'll check out eBay. Oh I'm getting the Teo because it comes with 2gb of RAM, and its' battery life is fine, also I'm trying to be more supportive of people who ship Linux.

What about this? (http://cgi.ebay.com/Google-Android-2-2-7-Tablet-TI-OMAP-Froyo-Triple-Core-/250686651761?pt=Laptops_Nov05)

Oh and while we're on it, do you know if netbooks would support at least Wobbly Windows, Cairo-Dock without OpenGL, Gnomenu with transparency, and Alpha blur? I'm not getting the netbook version of Ubuntu because from what I can tell, Compiz doesn't play nice with it.

It sounds like the Teo's battery life isn't fine for what you will be doing....no? Hence the plan to buy a tablet?
I think you can forget about Compiz on a netbook. Apart from being too hard on the little processors, it will also help chew through your battery.

DockBarX works fine on mine though:
$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:dockbar-main/ppa
$ sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install dockbarx

[Legendary_Bibo]

You mean the original 7'' Eee right? All of Asus' netbooks are Eee (I think), including the ones I mentioned above, so 'Eee' isn't specific anymore.

Seeing as I want a netbook for when I'm not at home, I wouldn't buy one with less than 10hr (actual, not just advertised)battery life.

I'm curious about the Android comment: how come? I wouldn't have a tablet with any OS except Android ;)
Android's a fantastic OS, and OS's for mice have lots of little elements too small to be comfortable with fingers.

It sounds like the Teo's battery life isn't fine for what you will be doing....no? Hence the plan to buy a tablet?
I think you can forget about Compiz on a netbook. Apart from being too hard on the little processors, it will also help chew through your battery.

DockBarX works fine on mine though:
$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:dockbar-main/ppa
$ sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install dockbarx

Good point!

I'll live without compiz. In that case I'll just get the UNE then. They do offer to put Kubuntu on it which I thought if it could run Kubuntu, then it could run Compiz.

I'm also curious as to why Android is a bad choice for a tablet. I basically just want a cool gadget to surf the web in comfort, and hopefully have access to android apps. Also it wouldn't hurt to have music and videos on it (I would upgrade to 16gb, that should be fine).

[ColdSun]

I'm running Ubuntu with Compiz on my ASUS 1005PEB right now and it is perfect. I even have advanced effects enabled. Wobbly windows and all. This netbook does use a newer chipset than some of the ASUS mentioned in previous posts (this chipset is the Pinetree). I'm running 2GB RAM and 250GB hard drive.

I absolutely love this OS over Windows 7. It looks and performs so good. Ask any question you want about what I'm running or if you want me to test something and I'll be happy to help. By the way, I got my netbook at Best Buy for about $299 on sale. I think it normally sells for $349.

[Legendary_Bibo]

I'm running Ubuntu with Compiz on my ASUS 1005PEB right now and it is perfect. I even have advanced effects enabled. Wobbly windows and all. This netbook does use a newer chipset than some of the ASUS mentioned in previous posts (this chipset is the Pinetree). I'm running 2GB RAM and 250GB hard drive.

I absolutely love this OS over Windows 7. It looks and performs so good. Ask any question you want about what I'm running or if you want me to test something and I'll be happy to help. By the way, I got my netbook at Best Buy for about $299 on sale. I think it normally sells for $349.

Looks good, but it only has 1GB of RAM if the Amazon page is correct. Perhaps the guy in charge just copy and pasted th info because there were so many models. Did you upgrade it? I'll have to look into it. How is the battery life?

[ColdSun]

Looks good, but it only has 1GB of RAM if the Amazon page is correct. Perhaps the guy in charge just copy and pasted th info because there were so many models. Did you upgrade it? I'll have to look into it. How is the battery life?

I upgraded the RAM myself. Took less than a minute. Cost about $50 (you have to replace the 1GB with a 2GB). Battery life is amazing on this netbook. Look into the 1005PE or PEB (which is the Best Buy model same as the PE just sold only at BB). The whole Pinetree chipset is designed to have longer battery life with good performance. In Windows 7 with just the 6 cell standard battery I get 8-9 hours with wifi on and being used. I would say in Ubuntu it is closer to 6-7 hours with wifi. Not sure why, but I'm willing to lose the time and use Ubuntu (I'm new to Linux and thrilled with it). Some folks are reporting 10-12 hours with the 6 cell, but I'm a brightness hog so I guess I don't last as long as they turn down performance and brightness. There are quite a few pinetree chipset netbooks out there, but I think the whole tablet explosion is going the wrong way.

I don't think Android is the best choice for tablets at all. It is an OS made for a Smartphone. Sure, it does some cool thing on a tablet, but you won't get a good tablet for a reasonable price that runs a good version of Android. For example - the Archos 7 runs Android 1.5. Not good. Plus, Archos has shown no signs of upgrading that tablet's OS to a newer version. They are already producing new models. The Archos 5IT has been out longer, uses a faster cortex processor, and is STILL Android 1.6. I have one. It wasn't worth the price I paid for it when I could have just purchased a netbook for nearly the same price that does a lot more. Or pay more and get an iPad, but I'm not a fan.

If you really want the tablet form factor, wait a little longer for atom-based tablets. You will be able to dual-boot windows/linux. You will have great performance for reading, video, music, and surfing the net. Most of all, you can get an OS that truly supports the tablet experience - be it Windows 7 (bleh), a Linux distro, or something like MEEGO.

[drawkcab]

I got a job at my college because I have 6 hours between two of my classes, but I also have to go to school two hours early due to my transportation issues. So in these two hours I'm rather bored, and not in the mood to study as it's early in the morning. I'm getting a netbook, but I need the battery to last for all my classes so I wouldn't be able to use that to screw around on.

I'm sure you can manage with one of these:

http://cache.smarthome.com/images/4239tw.jpg

So that you can save your $250 and put it towards one of these:

http://www.intownbicycles.com/images/products/bicycles/single-speeds/raleigh-rush-hour-09.jpg

[formaldehyde_spoon]

I'm sure you can manage with one of these:

So that you can save your $250 and put it towards one of these:

An unnecessary comment, I think. Most people would prefer not to be dependent on power outlets, and not to lug their power cord all over the place.


...
Battery life is amazing on this netbook. Look into the 1005PE or PEB (which is the Best Buy model same as the PE just sold only at BB). The whole Pinetree chipset is designed to have longer battery life with good performance. In Windows 7 with just the 6 cell standard battery I get 8-9 hours with wifi on and being used. I would say in Ubuntu it is closer to 6-7 hours with wifi. Not sure why, but I'm willing to lose the time and use Ubuntu (I'm new to Linux and thrilled with it). Some folks are reporting 10-12 hours with the 6 cell, but I'm a brightness hog so I guess I don't last as long as they turn down performance and brightness.
...

LB, did you not read my posts? This is the same netbook I have, that I can get 12 hours out of, running 10.04 (I wiped the W7 install it came with).
Of course I'm not using it like Coldsun does when he only gets 6-7 hours: I have the screen brightness at 10% (indoors), wifi off, and a bunch of other power saving tweaks that I researched when I bought the netbook but can't remember now - although most of them come from powertop, I think. A great little program.

I'm usually just using xmind or geany, nothing strenuous, a little bit of compiling, maybe turning the wifi on for a minute to commit my code to svn (and no compiz ;) ).
So most of the time I'm consuming between 5 and 6 watts, according to powertop, which is great.

My two cents on Windows (or even Ubuntu) tablets: bad, bad, bad. They're designed for mouse input, and just don't fit with fingers. As they are I doubt we'll ever see one get really popular. And current ARM chips have more than enough power for reading, video(1080p), music, and surfing the net.

EDIT: scratch that, the PE and PEB do NOT have the same specs. Almost, but not quite. The main difference is the battery. There are two different 6 cell batteries for the PE (not PEB, it has a different battery), an 11hr and 14hr(like mine) for the PE-M and PE-PU respectively I think - but don't quote me on those sub-models.
As far as I can tell the PEB battery is only advertised as 9hr, but I have also seen someone say 11hr, and I can't find the voltage or mAH so I can't say for sure which is correct.

So even with the same use the PEB isn't going to last as long as a 14hr PE.

[ColdSun]

The PEB is like the Best Buy budget version of the PE. Still, I am very happy with mine and the performance is fantastic. The bottom line is that most of the newer atom-based netbooks are going to have better battery life than just about any tablet/slate running Android right now. Yes, even more than any Archos. The Viliv portable devices are all Atom-based and not running Android.

[Legendary_Bibo]

I'm getting both a netbook and a tablet, but I'll look into those netbooks. I've never done hardware modifications, is it difficult?

As for the Archos, I've been going over reviews, and as long as it browses the web, I'll be fine. I don't want to use the schools' computers because people will always look over your shoulder to see what you're doing, and I don't like to use touch pads. With the netbook it's fine because I'll just to writing text documents so I won't need it very often. I'll probably get the Archos, its been a while since I've had a cool gadget.

[formaldehyde_spoon]

The PEB is like the Best Buy budget version of the PE. Still, I am very happy with mine and the performance is fantastic. The bottom line is that most of the newer atom-based netbooks are going to have better battery life than just about any tablet/slate running Android right now. Yes, even more than any Archos. The Viliv portable devices are all Atom-based and not running Android.

EDIT: just actually read what I quoted! Not so, even the new Atoms won't match ARM chips for efficiency. Intel has a long, long way to go before they catch up there.
I have been waiting for almost two years for cheap, powerful (relatively) ARM based netbooks to be released, but got tired of waiting so bought the Eee1005PE.

As soon as an ARM netbook with say a 1.5Ghz Sanapdragon, and a battery life to match or beat what I already have is released I'll run out and buy one (or two).

ARM is far superior when it comes to efficiency.

[formaldehyde_spoon]

EDIT: just actually read what I quoted! Not so, even the new Atoms won't match ARM chips for efficiency. Intel has a long, long way to go before they catch up there.
I have been waiting for almost two years for cheap, powerful (relatively) ARM based netbooks to be released, but got tired of waiting so bought the Eee1005PE.

As soon as an ARM netbook with say a 1.5Ghz Sanapdragon, and a battery life to match or beat what I already have is released I'll run out and buy one (or two).

ARM is far superior when it comes to efficiency.

Hmm, maybe the Toshiba AC100 will do. http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/21/toshibas-ac100-8-hour-smartbook-runs-android-2-1-on-a-1ghz-tegr/
Price isn't fantastic, and it needs a bigger battery, but I still want one...
Amazon UK is taking pre-orders now...

Hey LB, have a look at these:
New generation of Archos tablets on the way (Android 2.2): http://armdevices.net/2010/04/12/archos-generation-8-android-tablets-prices-and-sizes-rumored/
WiiPad (cheap 7'' Android 2.1 tablet): http://liliputing.com/2010/08/first-look-at-the-wiipad-190-android-tablet-video.html#more-25176
Android market for Archos: http://archosfans.com/2010/01/22/video-shows-you-how-to-install-the-google-marketplace-for-archos-hack-on-firmware-1-7-33/