Firmware 2.3.81 released - report bugs here

[defenderbob]

Still cannot connect to my office WiFi. Awesome.

Looks like I will be install UrukDroid today to see if that does it...

Oh that really sucks, I'd be going crazy!

By the way, Skype video chat still doesn't work, guess we need gingerbread!

Yeah well Installing Urukdroid did me no good either. Still can't connect to the Office WiFi.

Unbelievable... Ya know for once I did something nice for myself and as Murphy would have it I cant even use it for the purpose I wanted to use if for. UGH!!

Any idea what hardware / setup they are using for your office wifi? I'm able to connect to our guest network but not corporate (802.1 EA - but I have not bothered trying to install the certificate required.)

[edit] I think I've read some of your posts prior that had that info - ill check [/edit]

[dougeeebear]

I just tried to go back to 2.3.26 and I get the "this firmware is too old" message.
Can't even go back to another 2.3.xx version.
This is CRAP!!!

[Ach]

Just had my first problems with the new firmware, I'm on my office network, and when the wifi went into power saving mode the device rebooted, tried it a few more times, same thing...

Yipee

[defenderbob]

Just had my first problems with the new firmware, I'm on my office network, and when the wifi went into power saving mode the device rebooted, tried it a few more times, same thing...

Yipee

I havent had this pop up yet - though I am seeing that it doesnt always reconnect, though that is not new to this firmware (workaround is to go back into the wifi network listing and POW, it reconnects).

[luciousgnu]

Updated a few hours ago, I don't have any more issues with audio players stopping when my 43 goes to sleep.

edit:
It worked while I was testing it. As soon as I settled down to listen to some podcasts in Google Listen the screen blanked out and the podcast stopped immediately afterward. Screw you Archos.

[Diknak]

I got my first white screen after wake up. It happened on the old firmware every so often but it appears that issue has not been resolved.


Edit: This has only happened on my work network with wifi on. My work network using ironport security but other than that, it is a pretty standard WPA2 Enterprise network.

[julian67]

I'll try to convert my movies to AAC from now on, thanks for the tip. I'll try that when I get home. The bit rate is only 1000kb/s so I'm sure that is not exceeding the capabilities, especially when the same files worked on all previous firmwares before the 2.3.xx firmwares.

Your existing movies will probably play fine on your Archos if you mux them into mkv container. Free open source matroska (mkv) apps are available from http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoo ... loads.html for Windows, Linux and BSD.

If you're happy to use the command line you don't need anything except ffmpeg

Code: Select all

ffmpeg -i movie.avi -acodec copy -vcodec copy -scodec copy movie.mkv

will take your file movie.avi and copy the audio, video and subs into movie.mkv. Nothing is transcoded so it's about as fast as a simple file copy.

As an aside it's well worth having the Archos cinema plug-in and then you often don't need to encode audio (if it's AC3). AC3 (Dolby Digital) is already highly lossy/compressed and converting 2 channel AC3 to 2 channel MP3 or AAC at reasonable quality doesn't save much space and if you choose lower quality settings it can even sound quite bad.

[Greg_e]

I just tried to go back to 2.3.26 and I get the "this firmware is too old" message.
Can't even go back to another 2.3.xx version.
This is CRAP!!!

Thanks, guess I will not upgrade then. Considering that these are small incremental upgrades, blocking going backwards really is an issue. You are now stuck and you have to hope that there aren't any features that no longer work that you can't live without. And we all know there will be problems.

There may be a way to rewrap 2 channel AC3 to AAC, they are the same/similar basic codec so there may not be much loss. I do think proper mp4 with h.264 video can use AC3 (mono, stereo, multi channel) so it might not be a problem when converting if your converter knows what to do.

And at 100kbps you aren't leaving very much room for the video, I would bump everything up to 2000kbps or maybe 2500kbps for a normal full resolution 720x480 (720x576 pal). it's possible the low bit rate is causing the issues. Or it's possible that the update is causing the issues which is why I can not update my machine, I have a e-learning course on my 43 right now and can not risk loosing video functions. Since those files worked on the old firmware, I think I would call and email to complain. Support has supposedly been overhauled so maybe they now give a damn, they sure didn't last time I contacted them!

[barryem]

If you can convert from AC3 to AAC without recompressing you might not lose much but I doubt there's a way to do this. There might be a way. I don't actually know. But if there's not, the fact that they're similar (if they are), won't matter. When you re-compress you lose more information.

Barry

[berre]

Some good news too... seems my 101 is more responsive, faster even.
I use VTL launcher and every time I played flash and went back to homescreen everything got reloaded. This doesn't happen anymore.

Switching between apps seems also faster.


Bluetooth also fine now.

cheers
b

[Tunker]

We waited this long for so little...yawn. My unit is in the States right now being RMA'd for a faulty USB host and temperamental MicroSD. Wonder if this update will stop these issues from magically appearing down the road on the replacement unit I'll be receiving?

[mreljefe0000]

was it different with any other firmware? what type of headset do you use? (for htc/apple or nokia/samsung phones?)[/quote]

it was the same with the previous one as well im using monster beats

[gottahavit]

ok so i've played very little,but first thing i hit is if my a101 sleeps immediately after boot, it will not wakeup and i have to hard boot. happens every time. if i turn the screen off and on once before it sleeps on its own thrn its fine.

[Ach]

ok so i've played very little,but first thing i hit is if my a101 sleeps immediately after boot, it will not wakeup and i have to hard boot. happens every time. if i turn the screen off and on once before it sleeps on its own thrn its fine.

YES same exact thing here!

[gottahavit]

ok so i've played very little,but first thing i hit is if my a101 sleeps immediately after boot, it will not wakeup and i have to hard boot. happens every time. if i turn the screen off and on once before it sleeps on its own thrn its fine.

YES same exact thing here!

oh and i forgot to add i did a full reset after i installed it.

[MarcusMarcus]

I'll try to convert my movies to AAC from now on, thanks for the tip. I'll try that when I get home. The bit rate is only 1000kb/s so I'm sure that is not exceeding the capabilities, especially when the same files worked on all previous firmwares before the 2.3.xx firmwares.

Your existing movies will probably play fine on your Archos if you mux them into mkv container. Free open source matroska (mkv) apps are available from http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoo ... loads.html for Windows, Linux and BSD.

If you're happy to use the command line you don't need anything except ffmpeg

Code: Select all

ffmpeg -i movie.avi -acodec copy -vcodec copy -scodec copy movie.mkv

will take your file movie.avi and copy the audio, video and subs into movie.mkv. Nothing is transcoded so it's about as fast as a simple file copy.

As an aside it's well worth having the Archos cinema plug-in and then you often don't need to encode audio (if it's AC3). AC3 (Dolby Digital) is already highly lossy/compressed and converting 2 channel AC3 to 2 channel MP3 or AAC at reasonable quality doesn't save much space and if you choose lower quality settings it can even sound quite bad.

Thanks
I did a full wipe/reformat and still not fixed. That software you suggested switched one movie from avi to mkv, still same video and audio codec, plays fine now. Would be nice if they fixed the avi playback though. Guess I'll start converting all my movies now.
Also. After the full wipe, tablet still locked up. Did not have anything installed other than stock apps either. Still seems more stable than previous firmwares though.

[barryem]

I installed the new firmware on my A70/250 meg. It came with the previous firmware, whose version I can't recall at the moment, but it was the one just before this one. Everything seemed to go okay at first but I can't get it to play files with AC3 audio.

I do have the cinema plugin, which I had previously bought.

I tried resetting Android. I tried re-installing the plugin. It plays MP3 files just fine but when I try to play a video with AC3 it acts like it's going to work but it never begins playing. Sometimes it crashes when I try. Mostly I can back out and play something else as long as it doesn't have AC3 audio.

I called Archos support and the guy said it has to be a bug in the firmware. I'm not sure I trust that. I had the feeling it was to get me off the phone because it was just before closing time but I'm not sure of that. Maybe there is a bug. He didn't indicate this was a known bug but he just decided from my description that that's what it has to be.

Frankly, I've been watching the news on the Gen 9 tablet and I was pretty excited about that 8" but I don't know now. I've been buying Archos products for years and they've always been a bit flaky but they had good features so I put up with it.

With the gen 8 tablets I thought they finally got it right. But they sure do know how to screw up getting it right. I have to decide if I want to stick with them or get something else.

I really like this thing but there's just too many problems.

Barry

[mailinglists4me]

Woo Hoo. Positive Results Here

I held up from installing the last two firmware because I saw people who had problems with Music Apps (especially MOG). That was a no go for me so I stayed on 2.1.08.

I installed the newest fw yesterday and though everything else worked MOG wouldn't play any of the songs I had downloaded for offline use. I decided to try deleting the songs (I had way too many anyhow), re-downloaded my playlists and (fingers crossed) everything works fine now and it is much faster. That could be because of the upgrade but probably is because of the pruning of cached music.

So, put me on the happy side

BTW, MOG is a great app and though it is currently officially unsupported I have had very few problems with it other than the inability to add to or edit playlists from the app. Small price to pay but my name is on the list for the U.S. spotify launch just in case.

[mir17]

Upgraded mine 101IT from 2.3.26 (with complete reformat) and was very disapointed:
- network shares not working any more (can not access win7 network shares; still possible
through ES file manager.LAN.add serever)
- included youtube app still renders video misplaced
- charged over night twice; and each time charge indicator displayed 92%

[TheWanderingEye]

Thanks for the heads-up on the broken AC3. Since the log has no word on fixing bluetooth issues, I guess I'll hold off on updating.