MP3/AAC player w/ built-in FM transmitter

I had read the non android archos 5 and 7 had built in FM transmitters, but apparently the most recent firmware upgrade removed them unless you have the $30 car mount. I had asked this same question on the anythingbutipod.com forums and none were familiar with the Latte branded products. I did see some Nationite and Ainol players on mp4nation.net which had built in fm transmitters, I think I am going to wait for the Archos 7o with Android 2.2 personally. If you are just looking for something simple, the Archos Key model should do the job.
 
I saw the Archos models... they are basically Android phones without the phone. Way overkill for what I want, but interesting nonetheless. I may have considered them, but their limitations turned me off:

1.) Everyone says the built-in GPS is near worthless. This is a feature I would want to work properly.
2.) No access to the standard Android App library, you have to use Archos' library and it's vastly smaller. There are workarounds, but not all apps work.
3.) No built-in transmitter... you have to buy the car mount for ~$35 to get FM transmit capabilities.
4.) The current models won't be able to upgrade the Android OS to newer versions.

I saw the new versions coming out, but again they seem to have flaws that limit their appeal. Archos COULD have a great product on their hands but they don't seem able to design one that fits my niche.

I ordered the 16GB Latte Espresso... we'll see how it goes.
 
I read a blog where a pair of developers have android 2.2 working on the Archos5, they finally got the WiFi working over the weekend which was a huge hurdle. By their own estimate, it won't be stable for months, probably after the new Archos line is released.

please post your experience with the Latte unit, not much info available on them.
 
Will do... it's scheduled for delivery next Wednesday.

One of the reasons I'm not interested in the newer Archos units with Android 2.2 is that they removed the GPS! I would have preferred they resolved the issues with a weak GPS signal rather than scrap it as that would have been a major selling point for me. They have so much potential here but they don't seem to 'get' what makes their units interesting to people like me.
 
Alright it is here and I've had a little while to futz with it. Thoughts as follows:

Screen - Is about what you'd expect out of an $89 mp3 player. It gets the job done but it's not top quality. It's bright enough, but it's a TN or something because if you hold it close the angle is such that you are seeing the difference in brightness caused by differing angles so it looks off. Hold it further away and it's mostly ok but you'd think it was great if you were missing an eye...

FM Transmitter - You must have the headphones plugged in as they act as the antenna. This is a little disappointing but not unexpected. The sound quality is very decent however and the FM transmission works for ALL files, video and voice recording included. This is good.

Sound quality - No complaints.

Size - It's small but blocky. A more slender form factor would be nice but it's small enough not to be a real concern.

Touch Screen - Can be difficult to use near the edge, where they tend to put scroll bars. This could get annoying quick.

File Transfer speed - Abysmal, tops out at about 5MB/s. At that rate it would take about 1 hour to fill the player.

File format support - Copied my Itunes files over and it doesn't recognize them. Since the player supports AAC I may need to rename them from m4a to AAC in order to it to recognize them perhaps? As far as video goes, it choked on a 720p wmv file of "The Old Republic" Trailer from Bioware and it also couldn't play an mp4 file of the Discovery Channel's "Boomdeyada" video. It can't open PDFs which would have been nice.

Rating: 4 out of 10. It's not perfect, but given it's price and the fact it is the only player with a built in transmitter means it should work just fine for me... as long as renaming m4a files to aac works!
 
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Addendum to my previous post:

Renaming itunes m4a files to aac lets them show up on the player, but a file format error is given when trying to play them. I need to contact Latte support about this because itunes files are perfectly valid AACs and make up the bulk of my music collection.

If it can't play itunes AAC files it will be returned.
 
thnx for the follow up. I have been considering pulling the trigger on an Ainol PMP. most seem to be in the $150 range for 16GB with microSDHC removable storage built in FM transmitters. I am really close to ordering the v9000HDA but for another $50 or so there are some decent android based MIDs with wifi... really agonizing over the decision.
 
Ryom said:
Renaming itunes m4a files to aac lets them show up on the player, but a file format error is given when trying to play them.
Click to expand...
It's possible it just doesn't like the MPEG-4 container they're contained within. It would be surprising, but possible. Get a hold of an LC-AAC (Low Complexity AAC) file sans any container and see if that plays back correctly.
 
Perhaps it would as it states it plays AAC. However that isn't the issue... the problem is that it should support the most popular digital music store format out of the box. My car's deck can play Itunes AAC files just fine and it only has generic AAC support so I would expect the same out of a device like this.

In short, there should be no hoops to jump through here. Not supporting unprotected Itunes music files when you advertise AAC support is nuts.
 
Update:
I am deducting another point for the customer service. It was stated to respond in 48 business hours, but they have not. Still waiting for reply.
 
just FYI-

Ainol released new firmware for their SC9800 chip based units which improved the FM transmitter among other things (I bought the v6000 HDT). Watching movie files and listening to the audio through my car speakers FTW =)
 
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