Archos 18 Vision

Budget music and video players crammed with too many features are often underwhelming: jacks-of-all-trades and masters of none.

The Archos 18 Vision, priced at £40, can play music and video, tune into FM radio stations and display photos. It has a colour screen, fits neatly in a pocket and comes with either 4GB or 8GB or storage. Unfortunately, it doesn't do much well.

The interface was poor, with ugly icons and text. Menus were easy enough to navigate but the buttons on the device were confusing. In some situations the back button took us back to the previous screen, while on other occasions it did nothing. The menus were also inconsistent in layout – for instance the settings menu used a tick symbol to represent two different items interchangeably as we navigated through the different options.

There were other odd quirks that cropped up in our tests. We tried to go through some pictures on the device while listening to music only to find that when we selected a picture the music instantly stopped – an irritating oversight. The quality and size of the screen also made viewing pictures and video on it a chore rather than a pleasure – colours were washed out and the detail was small and hard to make out.

In general, sound quality was fair. The supplied headphones were poor but sound quality improved to an acceptable level once we attached a decent pair.

The device itself felt flimsy. We were able to bend it without trying too hard and the case split apart quite easily too. We certainly wouldn't want to leave it in a back pocket where if could be accidentally sat on.

The FM radio was decent and it uses the supplied headphones as an antenna. However, as was the case throughout the device, the menus were confusing.

The extensive range of features may look impressive but the Archos 18 Vision doesn't do any of them especially well.

For the price, the Apple iPod Shuffle and Sony NWZ-B152F are better, though neither plays video, and the Philips Gogear 4GB is a better choice overall.