Rockbox Replaces Archos Firmware 187
bagder writes: "The guys in the Rockbox project have just released the first working firmware replacement for the Archos portable hard disk-based MP3-players. The software is all GPL. Every tiny bit was reverse engineered, disassembled and then re-written from scratch. You can go download your own firmware right now!"
Re:But does it play ogg? not yet (Score:4, Informative)
Q17. I don't see you mentioning ogg files on your list of ideas. What about supporting those?
A17. At the current time we belive this is not very likely (though we are not completely closing out this possibility). The Micronas chip (MAS3507) decoder in the archos does not natively support ogg decoding and there is very little program space in the player to implement it ourselves. The alternative would be to write a software decoder as part of the RockBox firmware. However, as much as we love our players, the computing power of the Archos (SH1 microcontroller) is not fully sufficent for this need (Once again, this is not a definative no. The world is full of brilliant people. We just aren't hunting down all the ones not already involved with the project right this instant).
kudos! (Score:3, Informative)
the cool thing about these players it you don't have to actually flash the rom, they boot off of the internal rom for a second and immediately look for a file in the root for updates, if the file's not there they just continue to boot from hardware.
Nope (Score:4, Informative)
Actually if you understood elementary physics you'd not have asked that. The platters are gyros, the effect is not a twitch, but actually a slight resistance to being moved. They do, of course, 'twitch' very slightly when the power is turned on.
The real problem is that it's difficult to make the other parts move as close to those platters as they need to, without being so close they 'crash' into the platters when you bump something.
EUCD == European DMCA (Score:1, Informative)
Costs - was:Mirror (just in case) (Score:3, Informative)
My recollection is that I saw a Studio, or Recorder version with a 20G drive for approx $350 last month at either Micro Center, or CompUSA. BestBuy currently has the Archos Jukbox Recorder 20, listed at $319 (my purchase price was listed at $299 when I put it in my cart) URL is http://www.bestbuy.com/detail.asp?e=11101124&m=48
Prices apparently have come down. BestBuy also has the recorder in a 10G capacity, so you might find that workable instead. Price given for that is $259. Free shipping on all portable mp3 players.
Then again, I have relatives who either do or have worked for BestBuy. If you can find a better price somewhere else, and I think you probably can, go get it at the better price.
-Rusty
Re:Reverse Engineering == trouble (Score:4, Informative)
I don't. Since Archos is selling the hardware, it's doubtful that it's worth the time and effort to pursue a claim. In the bnetd case, on the other hand, people were using an off-shoot of the software to play pirated copies of the Warcraft 3 beta.
Furthermore, this project has nothing to do with bypassing a copy protection device. That's the major part of the DMCA that most people seem to be worried about, and it just doesn't apply. Even better, the DMCA explicitly allows reverse engineering for interoperability purposes.
Re:What exactly is the big deal? (Score:5, Informative)
As an Archos 20 owner I find this project immensely encouraging and hope that it will soon be in a position to make this Archos unit of mine desirable. As it stands, I hardly use the thing because it's so frustrating.
To quote from my epinions review [epinions.com]:
Re:The question is... (Score:4, Informative)
This has been a big point for me from the beginning. Some people wanted us to distribute patched versions of the original firmware (language fixes, charset fixes etc), but that would have violated Archos' copyright so we never did that.
Re:The question is... (Score:3, Informative)
Reverse engineering means examining a product to find out how it works. Disassembling the firmware is merely one tool used in that examination. Oscilloscopes and logic analyzers are other tools we have used.
We have written every single byte of the Rockbox firmware. But we could not have written the software without first researching how the hardware was put together, i.e. reverse engineer it.
All of this is completely legal.
If you define "from scratch" as writing software without first researching the surrounding interfaces, then no software has ever been written from scratch.
Not going to sue (Score:3, Informative)
Somoene writes Linux drivers. They post a link on their web site so you can download them.
Someone puts up a web site detailing how to install a larger hard drive. The site states that such activity will void the warranty. Archos offers 10 and later 20 gig devices so you can have the larger capacity without voiding the warranty.
I'd be shocked if Archos cared if people were hacking their firmware. All it does is create a developer community and expanding uses for the hardware, which they are still selling.
If you want to mod an Archos, you still need to get a hold of one, which means buying it.
This is a win-win for Archos, unless some jackasses start calling Archos demanding tech support for the Open Source Firmware. Then it becomes a nuisance.