Forum.ArchosFans.com

Is the Archos Fans forum dead or dying?

There have been very few new posts lately. Have prospective Archos customers finally read enough posts from Archos device owners about inferior quality and performance issues that they are moving on?

Archos announces a product, they over promise and under deliver.
They drop support for devices quickly-there have not been any firmware updates for this series of devices in a year.
There is no reason to come to this section of the forum, there is nothing going on.

There's not much going on in any Archos Fans Forum section lately. So I guess there's no reason to visit any forum section.

In short yes. Certainly the G9 section is circling the plughole. I suspect that as the G9s start to fail, die or just grind to a halt users will be offloading them, shoving them in drawers or giving them to children. Archos do seem to be putting out much fewer firmware updates on new kit. Either they've perfected firmware (...?) or they now see their products as near-disposable.

My G9 (512GB/1.2 Ghz/8GB) veers from actually usable (if you reboot, limit background processes to no more than 4 and perform a fairly ruthless kill of open apps) to slower than a weary sloth with two broken legs hooked on Mogadon. At such times I barely restrain myself from using it as a frisbee.

Battery life is now bordering on poor and it needs charging through a day's usage (and I'm mainly using office docs, cloud storage access, email and streaming music to bluetooth headphones, which I have to do since the headphone jack broke....). I recently bought a Chromebook and it's taking over many of the functions the G9 used to fulfil. Plus my smartphone now tends to be my main 'Go To' device. I can see my G9 being exposed to much more rooting and hacking....

Well - my g9 80 16gb - purchased 2 years ago - is still going strong with daily use of around 3-4 hours. batt life is still good and no other failures to date (touch wood). Best tablet I have bought although would look seriously at win8 tablet going forward when this one dies.....

_________________
Andrew
500gb a5a
G9 80 16gb 4.0.28

I been saying it for the past year. Not only is this entire forum experiencing a slow death, so is Archos. The morons running this company have their heads so far up their hineys they don't know whether to fart or wind their watches. I got 6 tablets and although they all work fine I'm dumping them all except for one 70b and moving on to a Windows 8 Toshiba Encore. I've learned to hate Screwgle and their Scamdroid anyway. I'm done with them and I'm done with Archos.

I'm intrigued at the concept of owning 6 Archos devices which all "work fine" being a cause for disgust at Archos. When people get a faulty device or receive poor after sales service (or both) they have a real grievance. When someone gets angry at everything working nicely maybe they only have an attitude?

My thoughts on the forums being less active:

Archos' focus on enhanced multimedia capability in Android tablets used to be something highly unusual and very appealing. I believe marketing drones would use phrases such as "Unique Selling Points" and similar.

The same was true for doing the very decent and correct thing of supplying source code as required by the software licenses. Everyone should do this and things have improved but it's still the case that some companies shipping Android devices disregard the licenses and make their products almost as proprietary, locked and inflexible as Apple's, either by design, ignorance or negligence.

Archos offering an Angstrom based alternative firmware and SDK made these devices very appealing to developers, tinkerers, informed users and so on.

The above three points are no longer so true - lots of companies offer phones and tablets which are easily rooted, are supported by cyanogenmod, and are easily hackable (because source code is available). Several companies use Android as the basis for supposedly high-end multimedia or audio devices (Sony, iBasso come to mind).

Android tablets and phones used to be much more expensive. Now they can often be bought for a similar price as a Sansa mp3 player.

You also have to consider that as hardware gets more powerful and relatively cheaper there are probably far fewer performance issues with recent Archos devices (multi-core, powerful GPU, lots of RAM) than with older generations which had single core processors, relatively modest video capability, and typically the minimum RAM required to run demo mode and get sold.

If you combine increased reliability, a user base far more familiar with similar devices and interfaces, and a saturated market with many almost identical products it isn't hard to see why a community forum gets less traffic. 5 years ago using an Android tablet was a journey into the unknown, a huge change from using a PC desktop or not-so-smart phone. You probably wanted to read tutorials, tips, reviews and so on and had to actually learn and discover some stuff. These days using an Android device is about as unusual as having coffee at breakfast. In the same way people don't visit community forums to discuss how to use a coffee maker they also don't visit here to find out how to use their Archos tablet, and possibly the brand name on the device matters about as much as the brand name on their coffee maker or vacuum cleaner.

Attitude? Sure. Why not. I have 6 Archos Android devices which are no longer supported. Two of them lost support 6 months after they were released! Another two lost support a year after release! No firmware updates, no bug fixes, nothing. And just because a product works fine doesn't mean there are no bugs that could be fixed or a desire to be updated so more CURRENT APPS would be COMPATIBLE. Not to mention tablets with the same exact name and model numbers but with totally different and incompatible firmware, firmware updates that wreaked havoc, etc., etc.

Archos is notorious for shoddy firmware and abandoning their product. Even if you're fortunate to have product of theirs that works ok you have to deal with them dropping it as though it never existed. I don't fancy spending 200 or 300 bones on an Android device and 6 to 9 months later or a year later they say "sorry, we're not dealing with that anymore". That's what you call "poor after sales service". This forum is, or was, full of people that gave them years of a loyal following but like me, finally gave up when we realized that, not only were they not going to change for the better in product and service, but they were actually getting worse. And you're right about the fact there are more alternatives out there now. WAY BETTER ALTERNATIVES. And who abandons their product like that? Who? Not even the lower end Coby and Vizio companies do that. My wife has a Vizio tablet that Vizio stop selling 2 years ago and the bloody thing still connects to the Vizio servers and does updates, two years after they stop selling the thing! That's what I call "after sales support"!

And if you think the sole or main reason for slow down here is because of the availability of alternatives you're delusional. All one has to do is spend an hour or so skimming over this entire forum to see there's an infinite number of complaints and disgusted users with non-stop issues, failures, destructive updates, bugs that never get addressed let alone fixed, almost zero "out-of-box working right" experience without having to do some work around-hacking-fixing, etc., etc., etc. I'm a member of several other product forums and have looked over dozens and dozens of others and I have NEVER seen the massive amount of complaints, issues and outright disgust at user experience and manufacturer lack of support that I've seen on this forum over the last 5 years. Never.

I hope that satisfies your "intrigue".

Lots of companies stop doing firmware updates quite quickly. It's mistaken to think that Archos is unique in this, they are actually very normal. For example my Nokia phone lost online features (proprietary maps/navigation service) pretty much immediately on being end of line (and still available to purchase!) and stopped receiving any kind of updates shortly afterwards. The same was true of my Nokia tablet. I bought my Asus EeePC in 2011. It was supplied with Windows XP. XP will lose support in a matter of months and the bios and driver and utility updates from Asus stopped a couple of years ago. My Lenovo laptop has an unusual audio config and was supplied with drivers for XP only. Audio doesn't work either on Win 2000 or Win Vista/7/8, only on XP. Luckily it works fine with GNU/Linux without any asistance from the manufacturer. No Windows driver or bios updates are available. I bought a Sansa Fuze+ audio player last year, these have not received a firmware update from Sansa for a couple of years now despite having some quite serious problems (luckily Rockbox is available). This is all normal. If you buy an electronic product in the EU it has a mandatory 2 year warranty and you can expect repair/replacement within that time by law and other software/firmware fixes and enhancements at the manufacturer's discretion. Anyone demanding by right anything beyond that is the person who is delusional, especially when it comes to stuff which is at the budget end of the market. You might get better support but it is definitely the exception. With some companies significant non-bugfix upgrades have to be purchased (Apple and Microsoft come to mind).

Archos actually did OK with the gen8 imo because they supported the devices for a couple of years and made major improvements and numerous fixes in that time and the last firmware is feature complete, performs as well as older firmwares and didn't introduce new bugs. What more is left to be done? The devices absolutely can not run Android 3 (honeycomb) or 4 (ice cream sandwich or jelly bean) because the hardware doesn't meet minimum system requirements. Gen8 can just about run Gingerbread such as the cyanogenmod gen8 firmwares but actually gen8 doesn't meet the minimum requirement of 512MB RAM so it's completely unrealistic to expect an official firmware. If there is something more that can be achieved with these devices then that is what the SDK and developer firmware are for. I think I have tried all the various third party firmwares and in the end the best performance is still from the Archos firmware, with a bit of extra capability added by being rooted. This suggests to me that Archos, for all their faults, actually did a pretty decent job of engineering the firmware, if not in exercising manufacturing QA or in dealing with warranty issues in a timely and helpful manner.

My tablet was released in 2010, I bought mine in February 2011. It's now February 2014 - what exactly am I supposed to be getting from Archos now? I don't have any warranty issues and to cry "ABANDONED!" because my budget tablet is the same as 2 years ago is plainly nonsense.

I don't think the lack of activity on this board has anything at all to do with quality control or after sales service or firmware updates because most people who buy a device find out about this stuff afterwards so it's barely relevant. The big difference from two or three years ago is that you can now put a PAYG smartphone in your pocket brand new for £20. I went browsing in town today and I can buy a new Alcatel smartphone with similar specs to an Archos gen8 but running gingerbread for £19.99. That is cheaper than the cheapest dumbphones. I can buy a new LG Optimus running Jelly Bean for £50. A small Samsung or Sony running Jelly Bean will set me back £70. A tablet running Jelly Bean can be had for £50. If I want a "phablet" with quad core CPU and fabulous 6 or 7 inch screen I can get something absolutely top class for next to nothing up front on a monthly contract. This is a really huge change from even two years ago. The market is highly saturated and extremely competitive and the big, famous players have moved from being premium price only to also gobbling up the budget end and everything in between. It's not exactly rocket science to work out why this forum isn't busy with thousands of people looking for help with their unfamiliar Android tablet - they are on their second or third or fourth upgrade and have an iPhone or a Galaxy or an Xperia or an Optimus or similar.

delusionally yours etc

Well Julian, I used to be an Archos "fanboy" (Apple in the U.S. come to mind) like many others on this board were. I finally came to my senses. To suggest that most companies put out buggy firmware and firmware updates that totally wreak havoc on their product like Archos has consistently done and most companies abandon support in less than a year like Archos has done so often and most companies produce product that doesn't really work properly "right out of the box" like Archos has done, is just a 5 gallon can of wrong. Like I said, go back and spend a hour or 2 and review threads and posts on this very forum. Then go to a Samsung, Asus, LG or Toshiba forum for any of their tablets or phones and you won't see such a massive amount of pissing and moaning over not properly "working out of the box" and "update killed it" and "why aren't they addressing this or that". You'll find barely a fraction of those complaints compared to this forum. That's a fact. There's a reason for that. In fact, just go to Amazon.com (U.S. site) and read user reviews for the 80G9 or 101G9 or newer Archos tablets and just look at the massive amount of people throwing up all over them. And then compare that to the user reviews for Asus or Samsung or Toshiba tablets. Night and day difference. There's a reason for that also. Are all those people delusional?

Here's a classic example of the crap Archos pulls:

They said right away that they won't update the 70b w/Honeycomb to ICS because the hardware won't support it. BS! I have an older LG phone with nearly identical specs, in fact, the exact same single core cpu and the same amount of ram and it was released with ICS and runs perfectly. Archos dropped updating the 70b (Honeycomb) 3 MONTHS AFTER RELEASE! JUST 3 MONTHS! (Look at the update history on the firmware page) Know why they wouldn't update to ICS? To force you to buy another newer tablet if you want ICS! So they lie to you that the 70b (Honeycomb) won't run it and abandon it after only 3 freaking months after release! Bro, you really think that's normal? Sorry, but I don't.

Fanboys: "Hey Archos, why don't you give us a fix for the accelerometer bug on this new 70b so we don't have to keep going into settings and reset the Auto-Rotate Screen function all the time."

Archos: "Sorry, after releasing this $200 tablet 3 months ago we just don't have any time for it anymore. Eat it."

Remember, this is a FAN forum. It means Archos is LOSING their fans. Why? Because there are too many alternatives now? Really? Really??? Apple has fanboys and fan forums and despite the ever increasing alternatives, Apple fans aren't leaving Apple in droves like Archos! Why not? Because Apple makes a consistently solid product. From the first Ipod to the latest iPhone and iPad they make a consistently solid product. That's why, for the most part, their fan base stays loyal.

I'll give you this though, it's very possible you have experienced a much better support system from Archos where you are located (Europe?) but here in the states it's been a total crime. That in itself may account for at least some of our very differing views. And I apologize if I sound too unreasonable but after nearly 5 years of being an Archos "fanboy" I just could no longer ignore my own and other's complaints and negative "out of box" experiences. Never had this kind of negative experience with Samsung, Acer or LG. Actually, now that you've reminded me, HP does come close. Real close. After they bought my nice Palm and my nice WebOS and then completely dump it? They totally did one up on Archos there. You do have a valid point there!

Well cyberpunk....

I was never an Archos fanboy. I'm sure that makes a difference. If I got a firmware update that wasn't satisfactory (and there have been a few) I didn't have an emotional episode or claim Archos "wreak havoc". What I did was find a way to go back to earlier firmware versions until the issues were solved, and it was a bit irritating but no havoc was wreaked (nor lives lost, cities devastated).

You keep using the term delusional, you describe people as morons, you wildly overstate and exaggerate your grievances yet you describe owning 6 Archos tablets which work as intended, and that you are disposing of all except the one which apparently made you the most angry!

Archos' reputation was just the same 10 years ago when they made very interesting hard disk mp3 players which were notoriously unreliable with terrible support and firmware that didn't even exploit the capabilities of the hardware (which is what led to Rockbox being started). I don't think Archos' reputation for bad support or quality control has anything at all to do with a fan forum losing traffic.

You misunderstand. I wasn't suggesting that you were a fanboy, I was fanboy. It wasn't my 70b that frustrated me so much as Archos abandoning it after only 3 months of release and after lying that it's hardware won't support ICS when they know it would. Tons of apps and even app updates that would be real nice to use but sorry, not compatible with Honeycomb. And no reason for that other than after 3 months of release Archos says "screw you, buy our next new one"!

And what complete group of morons gives two products with different O/S's and totally different incompatible firmwares the exact same name and model number? Exact same! 70b and 70b, different O/S and incompatible firmware! 7 Home Tablet and 7 Home Tablet, different O/S and incompatible firmware! Not to mention them shipping the same unit but with totally different hardware components because they just decided to change the hardware down the line on that unit only to find out later that the firmware updates caused more problems or were not even compatible with many of them because they changed the hardware!!! Who does crap like that? You think that's normal? Really? Most other companies do that? Really? Really???

For the past couple years or so these complete morons have been throwing everything they can against the wall to see what sticks. And guess what? Things are no longer sticking. Not even this "Fan Forum"!

I rest my case in calling them morons! Get over it. I've moved on and listed my reasons. Don't agree with my reasons? Fine. No problem. But get over it.

I didn't misunderstand, I was drawing a contrast between your fanboyism (and fury) and my non-fanboy experience which clearly involves more realistic expectations and less emotional volatility.

I don't need to get over anything because I don't have an emotional problem with products which work as described, nor do I believe that the health or traffic levels of a fan site are explained or informed by, or illustrative of, my personal emotional state.

I haven't seen anything that persuades me otherwise so still think the board's activity levels are to do with the products, the competition, the retail and consumer environment and not much else.

This link puts everything I've said in a "nutshell". I couldn't have written this better if I made it up myself. A more recent thread of one of their newer tablets.

viewtopic.php?f=92&t=68690

Read the first blokes post and especially the 3 short ones after. Take you a minute. This is a classic example of what I've been saying regarding Archos product and the Archos company's behavior the past couple years. This is not what I would call "working as described". And at least 80% of the posts and threads on this forum is about "NOT working as described". I don't think any of these blokes have emotional problems, I think they're just frustrated and have "had enough".

Bro, if you want to believe this has nothing or very little to do with this forum's slow down (actually dying) AND the fact that Archos' sales and profits have plummeted (operating in the red) since 2011, then ok, that's fine. But I think the two are very related. The difference in our opinion is simply I believe that their poor, inconsistent quality and poor service is what has given them a bigger hit the past 2 years than any competitive environment has. People aren't leaving Archos to buy competitive products that cost less or even the same. They're buying competitive products that cost MORE. The reason is obvious. The link above is a classic (and not isolated) example of that.

Just look at Apple, especially in the U.S. They have faced a glut of competitive products in the last 2 years with even some of the competition (Samsung and Microsoft) targeting them in their crosshairs and making fun of Apple in their TV ads. And yet Apple has barely lost any ground (a few percentage points) the past 2 years and their fan base has remained solid, even though Apple is by far the most expensive product! Why? Because, for the most part, Apple's product is consistently solid and they consistently work "out of the box", every time. If Archos product worked half that good or at least consistently worked "out of the box" they wouldn't be operating in the red the past 2 years.

Actually, our opinions aren't really too far off from each other, they're just opposite.


Archos financials:

http://investing.businessweek.com/resea ... ncy=native

http://investing.businessweek.com/resea ... ncy=native

Lets see, 4 posts in the last 7 days. Archos Fans Forum dying much!

Forum is surely dead.