The trials and tribulations of my Archos 101

An Archos internet tablet.

How lucky am I?

Last year I wanted to get one of those internet tablets, so I put away €5 a week and stopped buying junk for a few months.

So after I was so impressed with my brothers new Achos MP3 player and his new Archos ebook that shows films and also doubles up as an internet tablet, last October 19th, I headed down to PowerCity and bought an Archos 101 which I found to be fantastic for €199 reduced from €349. (PowerCity is an Irish retail electrical store.)
It also plays films and music, I can get email and internet and I can even play games on it as well as look at my photos. What else could I ask for?

That lasted for a few weeks and then after beating my high score on Angry Birds,  the Archos shut down, telling me it needed to be recharged. After recharging the Archos over night, I could not get the dam thing to turn again. I tried recharging and restarting, but I had no luck and with me after getting hooked on Angry Birds, I  was forced to bring my beloved Archos 101 back to PowerCity as it was under guarantee. BUT GET THIS, they say they would only exchange it within the first 28 days and after that, Archos take up the warranty. As you can imagine my nose was a wee bit out of joint that PowerCity would not take responsibility for the warranty (consumer law says different) but to a degree I understand as Dunne’s Stores (Dunne's Stores is an Irish retail store that sells food and clothing throughout Ireland and Northern Ireland) started selling the Archos 101 with double the memory for the same price and I suspect customers were trying to cheat Powercity by bringing the one they bought there, back and demanding a refund so they can get the 16gb Archos 101 from Dunne’s Stores instead.

Anyways, Powercity advised me that I had to contact Archos as they would be able to resolve any issue with the product. So I rang Archos and they ran me through a few fixes, but to no avail. The only thing for it was to send it back to them and they would fix or replace it under warranty, but the catch is I had to pay for the postage at €12. So in mid-November I posted it back to Archos and within a few days I got an email saying “product has arrived”.  So I patiently kept an eye on my online Archos account and emails to see what would happen and as it was getting near to Christmas I understood that it may take a while for them to resolve the issue.  I’m normally a very patient guy so it didn’t bother me that much as I had other things on my mind at the time.

So came the 10th of January 2012 and the email I waited for stated that Archos have shipped a brand new Archos 101 8 GB out to me.  I was a little disappointed that they didn’t upgrade it to the 16gb model taking into account the inconvenience and extra cost to me, however, I was glad that this was resolved (although I wished I hadn’t wasted my money and just paid my bills instead).        Well after getting the confirmation that a new item was sent out to me, I ended up having to wait another nine days for it to arrive from the UK. Nine days, I mean?  

 Anyway, after receiving my new Archos 101 8 GB, I checked everything and it all seemed to be working perfectly, just like my first one when I turned it on.  Now, as I was well used to this product and to a large degree, the novelty had worn off, I just charged it and made the recommended firmware update and left it like that. THEN, two weeks ago, I eventually went to use my brand new replacement Archos 101 and turned it on. It worked fine for a few minutes and then out of the blue, it shut down, stating that it needed to be recharged (or words to that affect). Now after recharging the unit, no matter what I do. I cannot get the dam thing to work again and it seems to be the exact issue I had with the old internet tablet. Because I didn’t want the hassle of sending it back again, I instead did a bit of research and went on to loads of web forums and internet discussion groups, just to find out if there was any solution other than contacting Archos again.

I found that there were a few customers that had the same issue as me and they had no choice but to send it back to Archos. However I also found customers that were able to get their Archos 101 to restart after doing a few things. So I followed some of their advice (apart from the guy who said I should sacrifice a chicken on a full moon, while dancing the tango with a 100 year old virgin) Well I tried almost everything from holding the on button for anything from 10 seconds to 10 minutes and tapping the on button ten times before recharging it and I was almost driven to hopping on one leg while blowing up a balloon and wearing high heels, before recharging the device. Let me tell you now folks, that does not work, plus it takes its toll on a guy’s ankles if they’re not used to wearing high heels, or so I would imagine.

So after all that rigmarole, my brand new Archos 101 still won’t work.  So I finally gave in and with my ankles bandaged up (OH that was because I hurt them playing football, Yeah that’s It! I was playing football) I just had to ring the Archos help line once again and inevitably, they advise me to post the product back to them once again and at my expense of around €12 post and packaging.  So that will be an extra €24 that I had to pay for my Archos that was supposed to be such a good deal.  Funny in a way as I thought I was getting a real bargain when I bought it. Now I know why it came down in price so much.

So now I have to hobble off to the post office and send the blasted thing back to Archos. I just hope this is going to be the last time I do this.

The lesson this year is to pay my bills and not buy anything that I can’t afford. Well at least until I find a job, that is. I suppose I didn’t buy that much last year when I consider that I have stopped going out (apart from my date with Slingback girl) and all I bought last year was my Sony laptop, rechargeable battery for my Pure One radio, and that fekin Archos 101 8 GB. What a bummer.

Please leave a comment if you wish.

 Oh! I also bought a small plot of land in the highlands of Scotland that comes with a title which entitles me to be called Lord instead of Mr. 

 But hay, that’s another story.