ipodlinux-devel

[Ipodlinux-devel] which compact flash reader?

[Larry L. <lli...@ya...>]

Bern or others,

what firewire compact flash reader would you
recommend?  i'd like to help implement CF reader
functionality into the ipod linux version.  i read in
one of Bern's earlier messages that his is
inconsistant under linux, anyone care to recommend a
brand?  current choices seem to be lexar and sandisk.

for power, what do people suggest?  firejuice or
powered hub, others?  i probably don't have time to
make a battery powered adapter.  how does the
firejuice setup work - the firejuice seems cheaper
than most powered hubs.

Hopefully someone can offer some suggestions.

Thanks,

Larry


__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
The New Yahoo! Shopping - with improved product search
http://shopping.yahoo.com

Re: [Ipodlinux-devel] which compact flash reader?

[Tom P. <to...@ca...>]

Larry Lien <lli...@ya...> wrote:

>for power, what do people suggest?  firejuice or
>powered hub, others?  i probably don't have time to
>make a battery powered adapter.  how does the
>firejuice setup work - the firejuice seems cheaper
>than most powered hubs.

I don't have a firejuice, but looking at the website, it would seem that they
just expose the power wires on the cable to an external power source while
passing the data wires straight through. It seems they also provide switches
so you can power one, both or neither device.

A powered hub has a power supply and some electronics to act as a repeater on
the bus. It looks like the firejuice has no power supply (you provide your
own) and it certainly has minimal or no electronics, so it would be cheaper.

I would be interested in a compact flash card reader solution for the ipod.
However I was under the impression that the available linux firmware isn't
very useful as an mp3 player. Is it possible to dual boot the ipod? I wouldn't
want to go travelling without music just so I can store photos.

--
Tom Parker - to...@ca...
           - http://www.carrott.org

[Ipodlinux-devel] Re: Linux Firmware and MP3 Playing

[Jim W. <js...@bl...>]

   Doesn't the iPod have a hardware MP3 decoder (/encoder?) chip in it?  
Can it be accessed yet from Linux?

   By "isn't very useful" - what exactly does this mean?  Are we talking 
realtime decoding of full 320bps, 16-bit, 44KhZ, stereo MP3s.  Because 
I've got an MP3 player on the Newton (169 KHz StrongARM or whatever the 
clock speed is) that runs pretty decently with MP3s of 80bps, mono, 
8bit.  I'm told it'll go up to 128 and not choke much.  The main 
bottleneck is probably the Newton's low-level memory system (it doesn't 
seem to like to deal with big VBOs on the stores).  But the iPod's got 
TWO ARMs (hmm, interesting pun..), so could MP3 decoding just be 
shunted to the "back" processor" while everything else goes on on the 
front one?  Do we know how to access both processors and get some kind 
of MP working?

   I guess for the really daring, an interesting experiment would be to 
try to plug a CF reader or whatever directly into the PCMCIA CardBus 
that the hard drive is on.

   (The just hook  it up with two open slots, rearrange the electronics 
to fit in a sligtly bigger case, but a bigger grayscale screen on it 
with a touchpad, figure out how the MMU works, port the damn Newton ROM 
(already in ARM code, that should help a little ;), rewrite the 
TScreenDriver, TVoyagerPlatformImpl. TResistiveTablet, 
PCirrusSoundDriver, and probably several other classes, and we're done. 
  Voila!  New Newton, courtesy of Apple and a lot of hard work..)

Jim

> I would be interested in a compact flash card reader solution for the 
> ipod.
> However I was under the impression that the available linux firmware 
> isn't
> very useful as an mp3 player. Is it possible to dual boot the ipod? I 
> wouldn't

Re: [Ipodlinux-devel] Linux Firmware and MP3 Playing

[Bernard L. <le...@bo...>]

Unfortunately there is still no dual boot.  I was trying to get a tool
that could start the retail firmware from Linux but gave up in the
attempt.  A simple boot loader would probably be better anyhow... does
anyone know of a simple boot loader suitable for porting?

The current Linux port really isn't up to running full time as a MP3
player.  It has a couple of problems not the least of which is that
there is no application with a UI for playing stuff.  The fact that the
MP3 decoding is not full speed could also be seen as a show stopper :)

The decoding speed could be improved, its just a matter of getting in
there and finding out what to fix.  Unfortunately the iPod (at least the
2nd gen retail version) is a real pain to debug with so its quite slow
going.  Patches welcomed...

Hmmm as for turning it into a Newton, sounds like fun.. not! :)  The
Portalplayer chip actually has an IDE controller on board as well as
support for various removable media (see
http://www.portalplayer.com/products/products_01.htm).

cheers,
bern.

On Wed, 2003-10-08 at 20:13, Jim Witte wrote:
>    Doesn't the iPod have a hardware MP3 decoder (/encoder?) chip in it?  
> Can it be accessed yet from Linux?
> 
>    By "isn't very useful" - what exactly does this mean?  Are we talking 
> realtime decoding of full 320bps, 16-bit, 44KhZ, stereo MP3s.  Because 
> I've got an MP3 player on the Newton (169 KHz StrongARM or whatever the 
> clock speed is) that runs pretty decently with MP3s of 80bps, mono, 
> 8bit.  I'm told it'll go up to 128 and not choke much.  The main 
> bottleneck is probably the Newton's low-level memory system (it doesn't 
> seem to like to deal with big VBOs on the stores).  But the iPod's got 
> TWO ARMs (hmm, interesting pun..), so could MP3 decoding just be 
> shunted to the "back" processor" while everything else goes on on the 
> front one?  Do we know how to access both processors and get some kind 
> of MP working?
> 
>    I guess for the really daring, an interesting experiment would be to 
> try to plug a CF reader or whatever directly into the PCMCIA CardBus 
> that the hard drive is on.
> 
>    (The just hook  it up with two open slots, rearrange the electronics 
> to fit in a sligtly bigger case, but a bigger grayscale screen on it 
> with a touchpad, figure out how the MMU works, port the damn Newton ROM 
> (already in ARM code, that should help a little ;), rewrite the 
> TScreenDriver, TVoyagerPlatformImpl. TResistiveTablet, 
> PCirrusSoundDriver, and probably several other classes, and we're done. 
>   Voila!  New Newton, courtesy of Apple and a lot of hard work..)
> 
> Jim
> 
> > I would be interested in a compact flash card reader solution for the 
> > ipod.
> > However I was under the impression that the available linux firmware 
> > isn't
> > very useful as an mp3 player. Is it possible to dual boot the ipod? I 
> > wouldn't
> 
> 
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------
> This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program.
> SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects.
> See the people who have HELPED US provide better services:
> Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php
> _______________________________________________
> iPodlinux-devel mailing list
> iPo...@li...
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ipodlinux-devel
> 

Re: [Ipodlinux-devel] which compact flash reader?

[Bernard L. <le...@bo...>]

Hi Larry,

I have both a Sandisk and an Lexar reader.  The sandisk was not working
under Linux (last time I checked...) and the Lexar needs a powered hub
or a gender converter as it has a fixed cable (I only have a
firejuice).  I just picked up a firewire disk enclosure so I'm hoping to
give that a go with the iPod (unfortunately it seems the manufacturer
was too cheap to power the second port on it so I still can't try the
Lexar).

The Firejuice + sandisk combo works well except that the reader wasn't
(isn't??) supported by the Linux ieee1394 drivers.  I was also seeing
problems with the iPod firewire driver but that may have just been
problems due to the lack of support under Linux anyhow.  The nice thing
about the Firejuice is you can power it from the Apple charger which you
would have with you on the go anyhow.

cheers,
bern.


On Wed, 2003-10-08 at 05:17, Larry Lien wrote:
> Bern or others,
> 
> what firewire compact flash reader would you
> recommend?  i'd like to help implement CF reader
> functionality into the ipod linux version.  i read in
> one of Bern's earlier messages that his is
> inconsistant under linux, anyone care to recommend a
> brand?  current choices seem to be lexar and sandisk.
> 
> for power, what do people suggest?  firejuice or
> powered hub, others?  i probably don't have time to
> make a battery powered adapter.  how does the
> firejuice setup work - the firejuice seems cheaper
> than most powered hubs.
> 
> Hopefully someone can offer some suggestions.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Larry
> 
> 
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> The New Yahoo! Shopping - with improved product search
> http://shopping.yahoo.com
> 
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------
> This sf.net email is sponsored by:ThinkGeek
> Welcome to geek heaven.
> http://thinkgeek.com/sf
> _______________________________________________
> iPodlinux-devel mailing list
> iPo...@li...
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ipodlinux-devel
>