Download

Synchronise with your PC
Autosync with Windows Media Player 9 or 10, easily transfer songs and playlists from your PC. Download and play all your music files (including protected WMA PlaysforSure downloaded files) to your Gmini XS 202 using the USB 2.0 high-speed interface (USB 1.1 compatible). For more information about PlaysForSure, Click here.

Play music files

Play MP3, WMA and WAV music files. Fill your ARCHOS Gmini XS 202 with up to 10,000 songs1 from your own CD collections or downloaded from the Internet. and Go for the Music
Browse and organise files
The Double Browser is an easy-to-use music file management system to organize your files. Delete, rename, copy, move files and even create folders directly on the Gmini XS 202. Quickly create playlists on the go, no computer needed thanks to the ARCHOS double browser. Organize songs with the ARCHOS ARClibrary and customize your view by album, artist, genre, title and year (ID tag compatible). No specific software needed.
Capacity: Display: Music playback: Audio connections: Interfaces: Battery life: Scalability: Minimum system requirements:
20 GB* Hard drive - store up to 10,000 songs1 2" level gray scale LCD, 128x128 pixels, 9 lines of characters. Intuitive menu with icons. Stereo MP3 decoding @ 30-320 kb/s CBR & VBR, WMA, WMA (PD DRM download) and WAV (PCM) ID tag 3 compatible. Stereo analog Earphone/ Line Out jack USB 2.0 high-speed device, compatible USB 1.1, PC & Mac. Up to 17 hours2. Download firmware updates from www.archos.com Windows ME, 2000 or XP - Mac OS v.10.2.4 computer with USB 2.0 interface (compatible USB 1.1 at a lower speed). For protected WMA (PlaysForSure downloaded) files: Windows ME, 2000 or XP with Windows Media Player 9 or 10. Internal: Rechargeable Li-Ion Battery. External: From USB computer port. Approx. 7.6 x 5.9 x 1.9 cm / 2.9" x 2.3" x 0.7" Approx. 120 g (4.42oz) Gmini XS 202, USB 2.0 cable, AC power charger adaptor, headphones, quickstart guide (in-depth manual on Gmini XS 200 HD)
Power source: Dimensions: Weight: Package includes:

(*) (1)

1GB = 1 billion bytes, formatted capacity is less. On average. Music capacity based on a 20 GB* hard drive, based on 3.5 minutes per song and 64 kbps WMA encoding. For better quality 128 Kbit/s encoding or more recommended. (2) Battery life may vary with use.

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Essential Reports

Choosing an

MP4 player

Our top-scoring MP4 and MP3 players Headphones and accessories Where to download music and video

B BEST AYUY ERS

MP4 PL

OUR TOP

INDEPENDENT EXPERT ADVICE YOU CAN TRUST

Inside

Letter from the editor
Welcome to the Which? guide to choosing an MP3/4 player. Digital music players let you take your music collection with you wherever you are; and many even will display your photos and play films. Weve tested the latest models so you can have the best multimedia experience on the move. And weve taken a look at speaker docks, too, so even when youre at home, you can get the best from your MP3/4 player. Whether its giving advice on taking photos or choosing the right television, Which? gives you all the facts you need to make the decision thats best for you. We test more products more rigorously and in greater depth than anyone else, so you can be sure that youre getting the best information available. And we cut through the techno-babble to give you clear, no-nonsense advice thats easy to understand. But the most important thing about us is that we are totally independent. Nobody pays us we take no advertising or freebies, and we buy all our products at full price, just like you. Were funded by consumers, for consumers. So we can tell it like it is and give you the straight facts good or bad. Neil Fowler Editor, Which?

Contents

03 Sound and light 04 How to buy
Music and video on the move What to look out for when buying a player The top 15 of our Best Buy MP4 players
14 Table of all players tested
A table of the 245 MP4 and MP3 players we put to the test Where to get music and video for your player Three Best Buy headphones, and our recommended plug sets
16 The lowdown on downloads
05 Which? Best Buy MP4 players 08 Which? Best Buy MP3 players 10 How Which? tests players 11 Features explained
Putting the machines through their paces Connections, capacity, formats and more Common questions answered Seven Best Buy MP3 players from 112 tested
18 Upgrading your headphones 20 Headphone features explained
How to choose between in-ear, plug, wireless and noise-cancelling sets Commonly asked headphone questions Enhance your listening experience

21 Headphone FAQs

12 MP3 and MP4 FAQs
22 Souping up your player

About Which?

Which? is a non-profit-making organisation that aims to make consumers as powerful as the organisations they deal with in their daily lives. Which? campaigns to get a fairer deal for all consumers on a wide range of issues, tests more than 2,000 products a year and publishes the results of this rigorous testing and expertise in a wide range of magazines and books, and through an online subscription service and new digital store. Which? is entirely independent we take no ads or freebies and pay full price for everything we test. As a result, Which? is the number one independent source

Independent expert advice you can trust
of buying advice in the UK, with more than one million customers. services that achieve the highest results after rigorous testing by Which?.
WHICH? DONT Dont Buys BUY These are products

Best Buys

Which? aims to help you choose the best goods and services. The nationally WHICH? BEST recognised Which? BUY Best Buy is awarded only to products or
that perform extremely poorly in one or more of our key tests, or that achieve very low test scores.
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Features explained

More features and greater capacity are the order of the day. Our useful guide will help you decide between a large screen or longer battery life

Storage capacity

There are two types of MP3 and MP4 player: hard disk and solid state (memory). Larger-capacity players use a hard disk for data storage, like a computer. They tend to be bulkier than solidstate players, but you can fit more music or video on to them. Solid-state players are so called because they have no moving parts all the files are stored in memory. This means the players can be small and light, but in most cases you cant store a huge number of songs on them. To work out the storage capacity of your player, a typical pop track recorded at reasonable quality uses about 4.5MB of memory or disk space. So, a 4GB memory will store around 900 tracks. batteries without removing them. Solid-state players typically play for longer than hard-disk models, providing on average a little more than 21 hours of music play time per charge. Larger capacity hard-disk players last for an average of around 16.5 hours. Charging takes on average three hours, but some of the players with larger battery capacity can take more than four hours.

Video formats

MP4s are compressed video files, so called because their file name extension the part after the full stop in the file name is mp4. The compression method used in MP4s is called Mpeg-4 part 14 (see below). However, video files can come in a range of flavours so, as with music, be sure that the file format is compatible with your player (or can be converted using supplied software) before buying any content. I Mpeg-4 The Moving Picture Experts Group has standardised a series of compression formats. Mpeg-4 part 14 builds on their earlier successful Mpeg-1 and Mpeg-2 formats with increased quality versus smaller files sizes, better error handling and Digital Rights Management. I DivX This is a different implementation of Mpeg-4. It is particularly good at compressing long videos into small sizes while maintaining relatively high quality. I Xvid DivXs main competitor: DivX is proprietary software, Xvid is free and open source (can be freely distributed or given away), and is compatible with many operating systems. I WMV Windows Media Video is a generic name for video technologies developed by Microsoft. I Mov The QuickTime Movie file format was developed by Apple. All Apple systems ship with QuickTime already installed, but it is also available free of charge for Windows systems. I Real Video a proprietary video format developed by RealNetworks, which is supported on many platforms, including Windows, Mac, Linux, Solaris, and several mobile phones.

Audio formats

Digital music is available in different formats MP3 is the best known and most flexible. Other formats include: I AAC a file format used by Apple I ATRAC Sonys equivalent format I WMA a Microsoft format, which is compatible with Windows Media Player I Flac and Ogg free (open-source) formats.

Large screens

A colour screen means that you can watch video and view photos, and see your track listings and album covers in colour. However, you may be able to view photos and videos on a player, but that wont be much use if the screen is too small, so ask for a demonstration in the store. Players with screens of a couple of centimetres across (measured diagonally) didnt fare well in our video tests they are just too small to watch video properly.

Connections

You connect your MP3 or MP4 player to a computer using either a USB or FireWire cable. Most new players come with a USB 2.0 connection, which transfers data at almost the same speed as FireWire.
Many players have an alarm so your MP3 or MP4 player can double as an alarm clock on holiday, meaning one less thing to pack. And you can wake to music if you have speakers, see p23.

Battery life

Most models come with rechargeable batteries, and with most models, you can recharge the
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Table of all players tested

Price Score Price Score

BEST BUYS SHOWN IN

WHICH?

Price Score
MP4 PLAYERS AIGO E858 1GB AIGO E858 2GB APPLE iPod classic 160GB APPLE iPod classic 80GB APPLE iPod nano 4GB APPLE iPod nano 8GB APPLE iPod touch 16GB APPLE iPod touch 8GB ARCHOS 105 ARCHOS 404 ARCHOS 604 ARCHOS 504 160GB ARCHOS 504 80GB ARCHOS 605 160GB ARCHOS 605 20GB ARCHOS 605 30GB ARCHOS 605 40GB ARCHOS 605 4GB ARCHOS 605 80GB ARCHOS 704 WiFi 40GB ARCHOS 704 WiFi 80GB ARCHOS 705 180GB ARCHOS 705 80GB ARCHOS AV 700 100GB ARCHOS AV 700 40GB ARCHOS Gmini 402 20GB ARCHOS Gmini 500 40GB ATMT V-Play 1GB ATMT V-Play 2GB COWON A3 30GB COWON A3 60GB COWON D2 2GB COWON D2 4GB COWON iAudio 7 4GB COWON iAudio 7 8GB CREATIVE Zen V plus 1GB CREATIVE Zen V plus 2GB CREATIVE Zen V plus 4GB CREATIVE Zen V plus 8GB CREATIVE Zen Vision 30GB CREATIVE Zen Vision W 30GB CREATIVE Zen Vision W 60GB CREATIVE Zen Vision:M 30GB DANE-ELEC Meizu Mini Player 2GB DANE-ELEC Meizu Mini Player 4GB EPSON P-3000 GIO MP4 Player 1GB GIO MP4 Player 2GB GIO MP4 Player 4GB

GOODMANS GMP34G6

82 315
SAMSUNG YH-J70 20GB SAMSUNG YP-P2 2GB SAMSUNG YP-P2 4GB SAMSUNG YP-P2 8GB SAMSUNG YP-T10 2GB SAMSUNG YP-T10 4GB SAMSUNG YP-T10 8GB SAMSUNG YP-T8 1GB SAMSUNG YP-T8 2GB SAMSUNG YP-T9 1GB SAMSUNG YP-T9 2GB SAMSUNG YP-T9 4GB SANDISK Sansa e250 SANDISK Sansa e260 SANDISK Sansa e270 SANDISK Sansa e280 SANDISK Sansa View 16GB SANDISK Sansa View 8GB SONY NW-A805 2GB SONY NW-A805 4GB SONY NW-A805 8GB SONY NWZ-A815 SONY NWZ-A816 SONY NWZ-A818 SONY NWZ-S615F SONY NWZ-S616F SONY NWZ-S618F SUMVISION Ice 800 THOMSON EM2801A THOMSON EM2802A THOMSON EM2804A TOSHIBA gigabeat 20GB TOSHIBA gigabeat 40GB TOSHIBA gigabeat 60GB MP3 PLAYERS ACER MP-330 20GB AIGO A215 1GB AIGO A215 2GB APPLE iPod Shuffle ARCHOS 104 ARCHOS 204 20GB ARCHOS Gmini XS 100 3GB ARCHOS Gmini XS 202 20GB ATMT DAB MP3 BANG AND OLUFSEN BeoSound 6 CREATIVE MuVo T100 2GB CREATIVE MuVo T100 4GB CREATIVE MuVo TX FM 256MB CREATIVE MuVo V100 0.5GB

239 285

IAUDIO 6 IAUDIO A2 20GB IAUDIO A2 30GB IAUDIO U3 1GB IAUDIO U3 2GB IAUDIO U3 500MB IAUDIO X5 30GB IRIVER B20 1GB IRIVER B20 2GB IRIVER B20 4GB IRIVER Clix 2GB IRIVER Clix2 2GB IRIVER Clix2 4GB IRIVER Clix2 8GB IRIVER U10 1GB IRIVER U10 2GB IRIVER X20 2GB IRIVER X20 4GB IRIVER X20 8GB LG FM-37 2GB LG FM-37 4GB MAXFIELD MAX-IVY 1GB MAXFIELD MAX-IVY 2GB MAXFIELD MAX-IVY 4GB MEMUP SenSo 2GB MICROSOFT Zune MICROSOFT Zune 30 GB MICROSOFT Zune 80 GB MINISTRY OF SOUND MOSMP100X10 MOBIBLU Boxon MOBIBLU Cube2 1GB MOBIBLU Cube2 2GB MPMAN MPCS255 256MB NEO Zazz Music 2GB NEO Zazz Music 4GB NETAC A200 ORACOM UB-890 2GB PHILIPS SA3105 PHILIPS SA3115 PHILIPS SA3125 PHILIPS SA5115 PHILIPS SA5125 PHILIPS SA6015 PHILIPS SA6025 PHILIPS SA6045 PHILIPS SA6145 PHILIPS SA9345 RCA Jet Stream SAMSUNG YH-999 20GB
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