Skip to main content ↑ ↓

Notice

Please note that most of the software linked on this forum is likely to be safe to use. If you are unsure, feel free to ask in the relevant topics, or send a private message to an administrator or moderator. To help curb the problems of false positives, or in the event that you do find actual malware, you can contribute through the article linked here.
Topic: Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC! (Read 24121 times) previous topic - next topic
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Great news in this week for MPC! First the news about MPC going Open Source, which will be official as soon as the Open Source Licence issue has been handled (the source is actually already available from Frank's page), and now this:

c.b.2000 has released MusePack decoder for ARMv4(fixed-point)-processors! It is based on Frank Klemm's musepack decoder source v1.1 but without replaygain and dither. It runs realtime at least in ARMv4 Cirrus Logic EP7309 -based digital player boards.

Decoder libraries and source code:
http://www14.brinkster.com/funambulist/
Juha Laaksonheimo

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #1 –
Quote
I'm trying to writing Vorbis and AAC docoder now.


Tremor anybody?
"To understand me, you'll have to swallow a world." Or maybe your words.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #3 –
Hey, I must be hallucinating  Great news

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #4 –
Nice. Does this increase the chance of someone adding MPC hardware support to the iRiver players through an unofficial (hacked) firmware release?

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #5 –
Quote
Nice. Does this increase the chance of someone adding MPC hardware support to the iRiver players through an unofficial (hacked) firmware release?

Well.. I'm sure that having an MPC decoder that already basically works on that chip certainly doesn't make things any harder

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #6 –
Quote
Well.. I'm sure that having an MPC decoder that already basically works on that chip certainly doesn't make things any harder

... save that, to date, the only successful hacks are those to allow iRiver's original firmware to be used on non-iRiver models (e.g., RioVolt and Soul). That's a simple matter of altering the first few bytes to fool the player into upgrading its firmware; removing and replacing the internal codecs is a much more complicated issue.

  The best approach I could recommend would be petitioning for a "modular" firmware assembler. Here's the idea: Every user would select his or her own preferred audio schemes (MP3, OGG, WV, AAC...) - as long as someone had written a modular decoder to support each - and could add as many as fit within the firmware's specified physical limitation. Then the modules could be sent through a specialized compiler, along with the current firmware shell.

  But that's only a dream, unless a heck of a lot of people can convince iRiver otherwise.

    - M.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #7 –
Quote
Great news in this week for MPC! First the news about MPC going Open Source, which will be official as soon as the Open Source Licence issue has been handled (the source is actually already available from Frank's page), and now this:

c.b.2000 has released MusePack decoder for ARMv4(fixed-point)-processors! It is based on Frank Klemm's musepack decoder source v1.1 but without replaygain and dither. It runs realtime at least in ARMv4 Cirrus Logic EP7309 -based digital player boards.

Decoder libraries and source code:
http://www14.brinkster.com/funambulist/

Woho!!!!#%*, this is great!, replaygain support would make me wake up from my dream.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #8 –
maybe we should suggest this to KISS ? Maybe then we would have a mpc compatible stand alone DVD player

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #9 –
So does this mean that we can use this decoder on PPC with ARM processors? That would be VERY VERY sweet indeed!... I've been waiting for something to come along that could do that for a long time!

-Grant

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #10 –
Quote
So does this mean that we can use this decoder on PPC with ARM processors? That would be VERY VERY sweet indeed!... I've been waiting for something to come along that could do that for a long time!

Yeah, like Zaurus for example: http://www.myzaurus.com/
Juha Laaksonheimo

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #11 –
Quote
The best approach I could recommend would be petitioning for a "modular" firmware assembler. Here's the idea: Every user would select his or her own preferred audio schemes (MP3, OGG, WV, AAC...) - as long as someone had written a modular decoder to support each - and could add as many as fit within the firmware's specified physical limitation. Then the modules could be sent through a specialized compiler, along with the current firmware shell.

That idea simply ROCKS, man! But that also may need iRiver firmware going open source, and I don't know if they would do so...
Maybe also a "iMP 250-350-400 CPU emulator -for windows and Linux-" would be a good idea to test the modular firmware before flashing the real player as you could see the player' limitations or bugs in the compilation.

In my player I would add MP3, MPC and OGG. 

I see...iRiver players integrate an integrated HARDWARE DECODER that can decode it real-time easily......Yeah!!! Now, time to add OGG and MPC! B) .

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #12 –
no need to open source it, just write software which writes the firmware right from the users wishes! Period, maybe hard to do, but is the ULTIMATE solution

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #13 –
Quote
So does this mean that we can use this decoder on PPC with ARM processors? That would be VERY VERY sweet indeed!... I've been waiting for something to come along that could do that for a long time!

-Grant

Yep.

I'm going to be contacting the developers of Opie to see if they can add support for MPC now to their OpiePlayer2.  Opie runs on both the Sharp Zaurus, and on the Compaq iPaq through the Familiar Linux distribution.  OpiePlayer2 is able to play: "mp3, shoutcast, ogg/vorbis, ogg streaming, mpg1, mpg2, divx3, divx4, divx5, XviD, mpeg4, wav" so far.. so I don't see why they wouldn't add MPC now, especially with an ARM port

I'll probably be making a post on their mailing list tonight, I'll post more info if others would like to add a comment for support afterwards

The Zaurus is starting to make a pretty nice little media player really.. and the price keeps dropping.  You can get one for around $300 and they have both an SD memory slot and a CF memory slot.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #14 –
even support for CF II ?

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #15 –
Quote
even support for CF II ?

Yes.  And of course, you can also use a very wide variety of cf hardware also, like wlan cards (I use one on mine and it's great), lan cards, modems, etc.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #16 –
Quote
c.b.2000 has released MusePack decoder for ARMv4(fixed-point)-processors!

thank you so much for your work, c.b.2000!!

I want MPC hardware players!  (w00t)
A riddle is a short sword attached to the next 2000 years.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #17 –
Mmmmmm! I want!

What is the price on the Zaurus in Europe?

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #18 –
Quote
no need to open source it, just write software which writes the firmware right from the users wishes! Period, maybe hard to do, but is the ULTIMATE solution

Well, in all case, de-compile the binary firmware provided by iRiver....
The problem is that, as there isn't any instruction interpreter OUT there (I heard that some coders are trying to understand how does iRiver players' firmware work),
I fear that iRiver engineers have some software (hardware emulator) that does -in part- the easy job, I don't think they start coding away blindly every time they create a firmware update...

Agh! My english sucks, excuse me, but I'm Spanish    .

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #19 –
Decoding MPC files doesn't require much horsepower, needing only like an original 20MHz Pentium or 486DX-33 to decode in real-time. You could waste a lot of CPU cycles by employing emulation and it still wouldn't matter.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #20 –
Quote
no need to open source it, just write software which writes the firmware right from the users wishes! Period, maybe hard to do, but is the ULTIMATE solution

Thanks for seconding the idea, Benjamin Lebsanft. I've been hoping for a modular firmware compiler for a long time now... but so far, no one else seems to have taken the idea seriously.

  I personally know next-to-nothing about programming, but if anyone else knows how and feels up to the task of decompiling iRiver's firmware releases for analysis then you have my full and enthusiastic support. Anyone?

    - M.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #22 –
Quote from: Benjamin Lebsanft,Oct 28 2002 - 10:45 AM
maybe we should suggest this to KISS ? Maybe then we would have a mpc compatible stand alone DVD player  QUOTE]
hey, that sounds damn great, the only thing left would be 6ch MPC files, i believe MPC going open source will give it the hardware support it needs, and give ogg some serious trouble...

Imagine 6CHan MPC + DivX5  (w00t) 

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #23 –
Hmm... now if we also had a way to re-compile the modified files, we might be on to something! I've downloaded the decompiler and verified that it is indeed processing the firmware files as advertised, because I can now find references to "MP3," "WMA," "ASF" and "M3U" withing the resultant *.bin image; in addition, there seem to be a couple of "internal warnings" related to WMA headers. Much more than I'd ever been able to decipher from iMP-250.hex, as it was.

  For those who might want to experiment, the decompiler claims compatibility with the following models:  iMP-100, iMP-250 (IRiver-2), iMP-350 (SlimX), RioVolt SP-100, SP-250. If the compilation method is the same for related products, it might also work for the iMP-400, although the RioRiot (a hard-drive based unit) might differ... it requires an installation utility, so they might have also changed the structure of the firmware itself.

  To get test firmwares, here are a few helpful sites:

    iRiver: For "Select Your Product Category" use "IMP," and for "Select Your Product" take your pick. If anyone figures out one of them, it should be the key to unlock the rest. The current firmware for models iMP-100, iMP-250 and iMP-350 is v2.10; the firmware for the iMP-400 has not yet been released. Russian versions of the iMP-250 and iMP-350 firmware can also be found on the site Negative Zero mentioned. Note! Be sure you only use the "Type #1" firmware. "Type #2" is designed for the Chinese/Mandarin version, and will flat-out KILL any Western iMP/Rio models.

    Rio/Sonic Blue: So far the RioVolt firmware releases have been spotty and inferior to iRiver's, but here is a link to their firmware site. For the SP-250 the current release is v2.05, which corresponds to an older version of the iRiver firmware; for the SP-100 it is called v2.10, although this firmware is not on the same numbering system as iRiver's.

  Hope some of this ramble is useful!

    - M.

Embedded Decoder Brings Hardware Support For MPC!

Reply #24 –
Hmmm. Could the reigncom2hex.zip file at this page be the recompiler we're looking for? I just did a quick test with it (iMP-350 Type 1 v2.10), and it converted the raw BIN file back into a HEX file that has the exact same size as the official iRiver firmware file. This is a good start, but I'm still not sure if the newly generated HEX file is a bit-for-bit identical copy of the official iRiver release.

I don't know if you're aware of this, but there is an up-and-coming project (over at sourceforge.net) which aims to modify the iRiver firmware. It only has a few members at the moment, but the more people that know about its existence, the better. If you want to be added to their mailing list, the URL to visit is https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinf...irmware-general.

One last thing... there's a thread over at the MP3.com hardware message board that talks about the contents of the iRiver firmware. It can be found here.