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Archos has just blown the top of our heads clean off with the announcement of two new Android 3.1 tablets. The Archos 80 G9 and Archos 101 G9 differ only in screen size, but it is what’s inside that has us so excited. Both slates make use of Seagate’s 7mm Momentus Thin HDD to give the G9 series a whopping 250GB of internal storage. A 1.5GHz dual-core OMAP 4 CPU provides the processing power. The tablets don’t feature 3G out of the box, but a full-sized USB port can be couple with an accompanying G9 3G WWAN stick for data on the go. A pay-as-you-go plan will be available for the USB dongle. The tablets also feature an HDMI port for 1080p playback.
The 8-inch Archos 80 G9 will retail for only $279, while the 101 G9 is priced at $349. Both will go on sale at the end of September.
[via Engadget]
Pricing seems, incredibly SANE. This almost seems like something I’d actually buy. Can’t be…
exactly. this thing sounds like the cats ass but im waiting for SOMETHING to be very wrong with it lol. this is the pricing id like to see. i would NEVER pay more than 500 on a tablet regardless of specs. anymore and you might as well build a damn desktop or a laptop.
That’s exactly what I did. I bought a Xoom for $600 dollars (originally $800 but I got in on the Motorola store fluke and got %20 off), but realized I didn’t use it enough so I built a high end gaming PC. I ended up spending $800 dollars on the PC though.
Wait…the cats ass is a good thing?
This is an INsane price in comparison of features to other tabs lets hope everyone else gets this message. I’m buying it
Wow! Now this sounds awesome. Especially with all that built in storage, with specs like these you would expect it to cost $200-$300 more.
I would be curious to know if they will still offer their tether functionality, or if they will ditch it in hopes of making money with their 3g dongle.
The chassis looks ugly but other than that, sold.
Very ugly indeed. Why do you think Archos is the first OEM to steer clear of Nvidia?
The press shots look horrible but some of the candid shots that have come out have it looking a lot like the gen 8’s which were not to bad looking. Plus with the flash 16 GB version of the 8 inch coming in at only 465g thats really impressive
http://cdnmo.coveritlive.com/media/image/201106/phpgHiMw3IMG_5974%5B1%5D.JPG
Picture of the tablets in person, they look better in person. IMO
That is insane pricing for the specs on that. Wow. Not looking for a tablet but I now know what I would get if I was looking for one…
Any details on the GPU? Is this thing going to be a fancy touch screen hard drive or will be able to do everything current tabs are doing, with regard to graphics? Those are my questions.
GPU on the OMAP4 is amazing. Very powerful….
Heck Ya! I’m glad Nvidia set it all up with dual-core and the Tegra Zone, but it’s time for something better.
Please correct me if I am wrong, but this uses a moving part hard drive compared to a solid state drive. What kind of battery life could be expected with a device like this?
Thanks,
J
There are also flash memory versions. You can choose
Archos always perform about same battery runtime on HDD and Flash versions, usually though the HDD version also comes with a slightly bigger heavier hard drive, all in all the HDD version is about 100gr heavier.
I expect the battery life to be that of the original Zune.
• Music playback time7: up to 36 hrs
• Video playback time7: up to 7 hrs
• Internet navigation time 7: up to 10 hrs
according to archos site
http://www.archos.com/products/gen9/specs.html?country=us&lang=en
found this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJfuMETQLqs
I have no problems with a mechanical HDD as long as battery life doesn’t take a big hit as a result. The big questions are: what IS the battery life, resistive or capacitive touchscreen, wifi enabled, GPS/Compass/Accelerometer onboard, processor speed, GPU, Specs… Specs… Specs…
All the specs on Archos page. Only missing memory spec. Hope it’s a gig or more.
http://www.archos.com/products/gen9/specs.html?country=us&lang=en
And just how careful will one have to be with a spinning drive in hand?
My 5it has a 500GB laptop hard drive in it and has been dropped while it was on. I haven’t had any issues with the hard drive.
I had an Archos 70 tablet, which I sold because I fell in love with the Nook Color. I would buy and recommend Archos again. When the galaxy tab was selling for $600, the Archos 70 had similar specs (except RAM) for $250. I have heard they have issues with support but I never had to call. They also have not upgraded the Gen8 devices with real Flash support yet which was promised.
I highly recommend if you want to use it to watch movies. Archos provides the best video and codec support of any tablet, including iPad, and obviously the big hard drive will allow you to store a lot of video.
Archos 101 was a great 2.2 tablet for a great price at the time aswell. While it did get some complaints on the devices performance.. one thing everyone complained about and will definatly be an issue with this device aswell is production. Archos does not have the production capabilities that Moto and HTC have.. they just can not keep their most desired items in stock. You can expect this one to be no different. Once its finally released, you may get lucky but most likely you will be waiting 6 months to see this in stock.
I’m not too familiar with Archos, but I find it funny that they are the first OEM to sport something other than the Tegra 2 in a Honeycomb tablet. The OMAP 4 seems like a great SoC. Just makes me realize how much pull the Tegra Zone had on OEM’s choice of SoC.
HTC Flyer? HP tablet? all the other cheap clone tablets are not tegra 2 either…. but if the big manufacturers are moving to new processors and tegra3 then it could be that the cheaper ones can move up a step too…
Its awesome how whats fast now(literally today) will soon be cheap and outdated.
“they are the first OEM to sport something other than the Tegra 2 in a Honeycomb tablet.”
I’m sticking with my guns. Flyer=Gingerbread HP=WebOS
Actually, ASUS is the first OEM to abandon the Tegra 2 for their Honeycomb tablet. The ASUS Memo will be sporting a 1.5ghz duo core Qualcomm Snapdragon and I don’t recal if they mentioned what will be in the ASUS Padfone.
tegra zone has nothing to do with anything. did you ever consider it takes time to develop a product? which chip did honeycomb work on first?
Regarding previous Archos tablets, are Google Apps available?
And most important: is the Android Market installed?
According to screenshots it seems the answers are “Yes”, but I’ll be more confident once I’ll have read it on Archos G9’s specs…
according to this page on archos website yes, android market and google apps. Fully google certified
http://www.archos.com/products/gen9/feat_honeycomb.html?country=us&lang=en
Thanks!
This G9 serie is becoming more and more attractive ;-)
my friends archos tab did have market access.
These things look pretty good. And that much storage? Wow! That is quite a buy for the price point they have. Heck, I was thinking of the Tegra 3 Transformer, but these look fantastic, at least based on the info we have so far.
A truly good (or at least decent) tablet for under $300….SOLD!
I would totally use one of these for storage. I could take all my music, pictures and video on the go, while still enjoying dual-core Honeycomb. Consider me… SOLD.
samesies.
ditto. This could easily replace my laptop since it has 250gig and a full sized usb port. Too bad I love my laptop. Oh well, good to know there is an affordable option out there now if my laptop craps out.
What would REALLY be cool is if Google baked GoogleTV into their phone/tablet OS so we could use them as set top boxes if we want to. Hmmmm …
I would wait and see after it comes out…Im reading alot of comments on other sites and people are saying that while archos may look good on paper, once you get the actual product it tends to suck….They said the original archos tablets were never upgraded and the touch screen sucked
I have owned 2 Archos tablets, the 5imt and 5it. The touch screens are not a problem. I’ve heard them called unresponsive, but I’ve never noticed any problems with mine. Updates are slow, especially after their next generation of products come out, but the 5it was upgraded from Android 1.5 to 1.6. I had been hoping we might see 2.0, but that hasn’t happened. I think it could have taken 2.0.
You get what you pay for.
I like the side handle design, less palm prints on the screen. I want to see this in person though looks kinda fugly haha.
the USB dongle from the video is that a 4g thing or is that more of an empty shell so you can slap in your OWN moblie broadband device?
i know ive seen Tmo selling broadband data sticks and im sure verizon has one too. would that physically fit into the back of the tablet or will you be forced to use the one that came with it and be stuck on whatever speed/plan that thing provides?
im sure it could be remedied with a USB cable snaking out the back of that bitch but thats not something the everyday person wants to do. especially if your on the move.
These look legit. I was considering the Asus Transformer for a while, but couldnt really justify 400 for something I dont totally NEED. IF all these specs are all they’re looking to be, I will definitely be making a purchase.
I think they’re incredibly smart to price these things so low (as long as they’re able to make money at the price) because it will not only widen Android support, but it will bring the price of “high end” tablets down quite a bit. I dont understand why anyone would pay for a Xoom when there are Iconia tabs, Asusteks’s, and Archos pads for hundreds less. And I’ve heard nothing but amazing things about this CPU, which makes me very excited…
I love everything except for the hard drive part. The price, the specs. First tablet worth a serious consideration besides the Asus Transformer but that too pricey.
You can get it with 32GB Flash for the same price if you don’t want the hard drive.
F@ck, why september. I need a gift for my wife in August, who’d really appreciate having kids pics and video kept on a portable thingy like this. Damn, I guess she’s getting it for Christmass then ;)
i would be all over this if it wasn’t archos.
i had an archos once. it was the WORST customer experience i’ve ever had in my life. For that, i will never buy anything of their’s again.
if it was any other company, i would absolutely buy this.
I would def wait until there were plenty of reviews and enough people had their hands on it before I bit. But if the price isn’t an indication of quality in comparison to what’s currently available, then I think I may jump in.
Like others, I can’t justify paying 500-800 on something I don’t absolutely have a need for, but $280-350 for specs like this is exactly what I’ve been waiting for.
Sounds like Archos is testing the waters here. People have shown they want tablets but not at the prices they’re currently going for. If this proves to be a success, I think we’ll start to see a trend.
I think it should have the tether function, it does have Bluetooth so it should work like the 101 so you can use your existing data plan from your mobile. This looks amazing to me, for the price it allows a lot more people to be able to afford a tablet and a powerful one at that. If people don’t want the hard drive they can get the 32gb flash version instead.
Brand matters and it seems as if this company has a bad rep
wooow oooh my god
The best specification I ever see for lower price.
Archos 80, thank you very much…
Archos = bs no updates
I bought two consecutive generations (605 and 5IMT) of archos products when they were released. Both received little support after released and were abandoned when they released the next years model but that’s not what upset me.
Both products had features promised upon release but Archos didn’t deliver.
1.Advertisements inside the box of the 605 promised an fm tuner. That was vaporware.
2.The 5IMT had flash advertisements on the device that promised a digital TV tuner attachment and a 3G attachment. The adverts were removed when they upgraded the firmware. More vaporware. (TV tuner released in UK but not US)
Finally the battery on both devices failed to hold a charge after 1.5 years of use.
Batteries were not replaceable unless you want to invest soldering equipment and special tools.
Do your research before purchasing any products from this company. Dont expect anything more than what you get the day of purchase. Dont expect any support after they start on their next product line which won’t be long.
I don’t post unless I feel I have some information that could significantly contribute to the discussion and I say all this to say ….buyer beware
See i do alot of traveling so this seems really convenient instead of ipad’s chunky monkey at $800, i could get a tv and laptop fort hat price and more memory
250 GB HDD, shit, **partition?** You got an Android tab? Me too, What, an Ipad? me too, a Win7 Tab, shit… Me toO!