Questions: Specs of my player, what firmware & theme
 

Hi guys, this is a great site. I am a noob here and am looking for some direction on how to mod my MP4 Player.
I've read some of the stickys but I still need some help

First of I need someone to show me how I can figure out some specifications of my MP4 player

Next what firmware to upgrade to and if it is even worth upgrading firmware

Third what theme's I can load on my player

Last how to backup my firmware

I've never moded mp4 player but I have moded my Motorola e398 phone so I have some knowledge on modding

Thanks in advance to anyone that can help me, here is my MP4 Player, pics and info:

http://idisk.mac.com/saavedr3-Public...oodpiclong.jpghttp://idisk.mac.com/saavedr3-Public...usicscreen.jpg

It's a 1 GB MP4 Player with 1.5" 64K color screen

This is the information I found in the System info option:
2005/12/16
3.5.35
2006/02/10
JTYMDO46V4

rock-star_79, Never try to load another firmware to your player there is a 99.9 pecent chance you will brick it. You can find out your firmware version in the players settings menu under Firmware Version. If it is a 9.0.48 or 9.0.50 version then you will not be able to extract it from your players and mod it as there are no tools available for these versions yet. Any other versions should be ok.

To mod your firmware You need to first extract your firmware from your player using s1fwx.
Download HERE
Guide HERE

Then you can change the images using s1res
Download HERE
Guide HERE

If your player has a 2.0 inch screen then you will need this version of s1res HERE

Then reload your firmware to your player using MP3 Player Utilities Update Tool
Download HERE
Guide HERE

There can be a huge amount of difference between firmware images and layout so not all themes you find in the download section will be compatible with your firmware. You will most likely have to create your own images or edit some of the existing themes to suit your player.

Re: [HELP] Noob Here and Need Some Direction.
 

rock-star_79 , rule number one. Never Ever Ever "upgrade" with someone else's firmware. You will only end up killing your player. You will not gain any additional functions by "upgrading".

To mod the themes, firstly you will need to extract your existing firmware. The guide is Here.
Always ensure that whatever you mod and flash into your player, is always your own original firmware file. This procedure will also create a dump.bin firmware file, which is your firmware backup, keep it safely.

Next, you'll need the S1res tool to mod the text/images. The guide is Here.
You can find various theme packs that others have uploaded into the forum.
Just pay attention to those of 1.5" screen (which is your screen size).
However, not all the 1.5" screen themes would be able to suit yours, as some orientation of certain images are different from each other.

Finally after saving all these changes, you'll need Upgrade Tool to flash in the newly mod firmware. The guide is Here.

Hope this helps.

Re: [HELP] Noob Here and Need Some Direction.
 

Thanks guys for the quick responce. In the post below (the link=What did i buy?....) it says that I have the worst possible firmware
and can't change the layout or background, is this true?:

What did i buy? Is this a real iPod?


I then posted this:

So if its the worst firmware are there any advantages to moding this player.

If we can't change the background or layout can we improve its performance.

For instance it is slow. When I press the next button while I am hearing a song, it takes forever to play the next song.
It also fades out which adds more delay time.
What mods can someone recommend to improve our MP4 player.

Thanks in advance to anyone that help out.

I was hoping that moding this MP4 Player was going to be as rewarding as
moding my Motorola ROKR@E398@ROKR. Was I dreamin?

rock-star_79, i know the firmware you are refer to. In the post you speak of I mentioned the biggest downside to that particular firmware was that the background image did not change from menu to menu so things like iPod menus and most of the other themes are out. You can still mod them with a new background image and feature icons. There are 2 themes for this firmware here
http://www.mympxplayer.org/change-te...and-df243.html
http://www.mympxplayer.org/castlevan...eme-df224.html
The song shuffle delay is a pain but there is no way to change this. I do recall a member posting that he was able to speed his player up slightly by using 16bit images in the firmware as apposed to 24bit. This puts less demand on the cpu so it becomes alittle more responsive but I can't confirm this.

Re: [HELP] Noob Here and Need Some Direction.
 

Thanks man you are quickly becoming my favorite modder.
So I can load these theme by extracting my firmware with s1fwx
then editing it using s1res and replacing the images.
Is their an easier way to do this.

Also how do I make a full backup so in case I screw up my firmware I can retrieve it.

Also the song directory is their a way i can access it easier.
One last thing other then changing the themes is their any other cool mods.

Thanks.

(Sorry for all the questions, I will try do some more searching and reading before I ask)

Re: [HELP] Noob Here and Need Some Direction.
 

rock-star_79 , there is no other short-cut way to replace the images. However, there is 1 such method that i've yet to confirm, but should be able to work. That is to swap the UI30.res file with the new theme that you want. This can be done via EasyFW. But is not recommended as it is yet to be tested fully.
So for the moment, you'll just have to swap each individual image file one by one.

Re: [HELP] Noob Here and Need Some Direction.
 

Can the sound be increased? And can the viewing quality be improved?

rock-star_79, I am not sure about swapping out the UI30.res file so do that at your own risk. There is no way to extract a full firmware as some of the files are not present on the player, these are used to allocate firmware space, scan the player hardware and prepare the memory to load the firmware but are not actually put on the player.

When modding your firmware always use a copy of your firmware never the original that way if you do stuff it which is rare you always have the original.

Images can only be extracted one at a time using the export button in s1res. However you can just dragand drop images for loading them to the firmware.

The ability to browse for files did not become available until the release of 3.5.37 but is not included in all firmware. It is possible to add file browsing to the firmware and "lattesurf" has done an excellent guide on doing this here:
http://www.mympxplayer.org/how-to-en...er-vt2730.html

Can RockBox be loaded on these type of players? I am wondering if I should just be rid of this players as its is slow and takes to long to manage.