Rockbox open-source firmware, but more importantly, Rockboy
By Ryan Block 
posted Feb 26th 2005 2:26PM
posted Feb 26th 2005 2:26PM
You're the type to wipe the firmware on your hard-earned MP3 player and reinstall with something a group of complete
strangers whipped up, are you? Well then, get a gander at Rockbox, the open-source Archos firmware with ports to iRiver
and and even the Gmini—oh, and did we mention it's got a plugin called Rockboy that lets you emulate original Gameboy
games on your iRiver? (Guess that means it's only a matter of time before that feature gets added to the iPodLinux
Pproject, then.)
[Via DigitalMediaThoughts]
I've been using this firmware on my Archos Studio 20 for almost two years and I love it. My hardware's too cheap to do any kind of emulation, but just the fact that it's out there is a minor miracle. I'm hoping more manufacturers will allow for this - I could use a better menu system on my camcorder and I dare say I'd like to tweak the Tivo software a bit as well.
they've emulated super mario, and pokemon, among other games. they're also revamping the browser system. ipods watch out!
Wiping the firmware on your mp3 player is stupid, irresponsible and, I'd buy one just to try this.
I have an Archos and the FREEWARE FIRMWARE rocks compared to the factory stuff. I also have an iRiver IFP799 and I did not know that these geeks had branched out into modifing the iRiver firemware. There is a Yahoo Group just for the rockbox.
We could really use somebody doing this on the Creative Xen series. I'm tired of not having plain old drag and drop to copy music files on and off. It's a FAQ but it doesn't look like Creative are ever going to do this.
We need this on the Archos Gmini400 more than ever. I wish the rockbox team cared for my sweet media player.
Because the Rockbox crew have been so good at what they are doing, Archos is very lax at updating their own firmware. I guess you can't blame them, why spend money on developers when there's a whole bunch of them all over the world doing it for free? I hope that Archos realizes how much of a boon the Rockbox work has been for sales of their devices and compensates the developers fairly.
Rockbox makes fairly useless and buggy devices function as we dream they should. I just wish there was support for every type of player.
I don't think the Rockbox team's work has had any such effect on Archos' firmware support. AFAIK, Rockbox started because Archos were terrible at fixing even the most basic of playback glitches. Archos had long since stopped providing firmware updates by the time Rockbox got involved. Rockbox turned an outdated faultering mp3 player into one of the best & most advanced mp3 players out there. Hence.... iRiver.
Where can I download this awesome emulator for my iRiver iHP-140 ?
I can't find it anywhere on the Rockbox website.
You can't just download the emulator, Rafi B., you have to dowload the latest daily build. Then, put your roms on the MP3 player, play them and there you go!
Is there a Rockbox yet for the Gmini XS 200 or XS 202? I've got the XS 202, and it would be nice to see if Rockbox ran on it.