Strange Thing With A New MP3 Player
 

I've been reading posts on the site for hours but as it's running a little slow at the moment it's like wading through treacle. So, I thought I'd post here - apologies if the subjects have been covered before - I couldn't find them.

Anyway, I just bought a nice new 1Gig Imatsu MP3/AMV/FM Player and the in-built speakers do not work. I popped back to the store and they are all the same so it's not just mine.

I did a search for Imatsu on the net and found nothing, but I did find the exact 'same' model HERE though it's called a 'Mingle' on there and is 512MB whereas mine is 1Gig. Apart from that mine is identical.

Anyway, with the earphones in, it works perfectly but unplug them and you get no sound from the inbuilt speakers.

As I assume that electronically, most of these things have the same internals and different companies just have their own firmware inside and badges on the outside. Effectively, inside they are all the same right?

If so, what are the chances of the speakers working if I upgrade the firmware?

The firmware upgrade tool says that my player is an S1 MP3 Player from Wilson Co. Ltd (pretty standard for these things as I can see) and the firmware is version 3.2.16.

BTW - on the same subject, I can't seem to find any way to make a backup of the firmware already in it. Any suggestions please?

Finally, a quickie - when you put an MP3 album in a folder, what do you have to do to make the player play them back in the correct order 1, 2, 3 etc. ID3 tags and filename don't seem to make any difference.

Sorry for my long first post! :)

TenBaz

[Edit] Forget the question about backing up the firmware - I just found the article in the Knowledge Base! :)

Re: Strange Thing With A New MP3 Player
 

TenBaz ,
You may have to switch the speaker on, I have one player that I need to hold down the record button for a second or two to turn the speaker on.
The internals can vary greatly between players with different board types, chip types, LCD types etc so finding a compatible firmware can be difficult.
Unfortunatly version numbers like 3.2.16 are almost meaningless know as there are hundreds of variations of each version and only a small percentage will be compatible with your player.
I doubt it is a firmware issue and would not advise trying to change firmware as you have more chance of killing your player than fixing it.
To backup your firmware you need to use s1fwx HERE and there is a guide to backing up HERE. s1fwx will only work with Windows 2000 and up.
Files will play in the same order they were copied to the player which can be a pain, I have uploaded a small app called FolderSort HERE which allows you to re-sort the files on your player by name, date etc. works great.

Re: Strange Thing With A New MP3 Player
 

OK, thanks for that! :)

TenBaz