Linux instead of Rockbox (was: Some topics related to MP3 players) [LWN.net]

Linux instead of Rockbox (was: Some topics related to MP3 players)

Posted Mar 13, 2008 14:46 UTC (Thu) by debacle (subscriber, #7114)
Parent article: Some topics related to MP3 players

I have a wonderful Cowon iAudio X5 with 30GBs running Rockbox. Sound is great, radio works,
etc. But I'm now selling it on a certain auction site (your chance, three days left, hint,
hint). Mainly, because I'm not totally satisfied with the feature set of Rockbox. E.g. it is
not able to handle more than one genre per track. Implementing such features is (for me) much
easier with Linux, so my next MP3-Player will be an N800 or an EEE PC. I'm just waiting for
32GB SD cards to become widely available under 300. So, if I would design a new audio player
(why MP3?, isn't that the bad version of Ogg Vorbis?), I would let it run Linux, not Rockbox,
just because this is where all the developers are.

to post comments

Linux instead of Rockbox (was: Some topics related to MP3 players)

Posted Mar 13, 2008 15:16 UTC (Thu) by drag (guest, #31333) [Link] (1 responses)

> why MP3?, isn't that the bad version of Ogg Vorbis?


Because everybody and their mom has MP3s. Everybody uses it, everybody supports it (say a mp3
cdrom in a car stereo), you can buy DRM-free songs in MP3 format, etc etc.

I like Ogg Vorbis more, but it's pointless to re-encode mp3 format into o.v. if you can help
it.

> N800 or an EEE PC

You'll want a N800. EEE gets rather (suprisingly) hot and the battery life is way too limited
(2.5-3hr, goes faster then you think it does and it takes something like 5 hours for a full
recharge). I am typing this out on a EEE, btw.

Personally I think the Neo1973 (or whatever they are calling it nowadays) has a good chance at
being my first 'mp3 player'. (or more accurately Ogg/Flac/mp3 player)

Linux instead of Rockbox (was: Some topics related to MP3 players)

Posted Mar 13, 2008 23:18 UTC (Thu) by debacle (subscriber, #7114) [Link]

For the time waiting for the Neo, I'll buy an N800 :~)

Linux instead of Rockbox (was: Some topics related to MP3 players)

Posted Mar 13, 2008 22:47 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] (1 responses)

Um. More than one genre per track in which codec exactly? I suppose you 
could have multiple genre comments in Ogg, but I don't think Rockbox 
currently has infrastructure to handle multiple instances of any tag (sign 
of its MP3 heritage; periodically I think of fixing this and then put it 
off because it seems so unimportant).

Linux instead of Rockbox (was: Some topics related to MP3 players)

Posted Mar 13, 2008 23:27 UTC (Thu) by debacle (subscriber, #7114) [Link]

You can have multiple genres in both Ogg Vorbis and MP3. In Ogg Vorbis it's done by having
multiple tags with the same name and different values, in MP3 it's a convention (but supported
by some programs) to have a comma separated list of values on the genre tag, IIRC.

Of course, few people care about this. The good thing about using Linux or any other
all-purpose OS for an audio player is, that you can choose between a couple of audio playing
applications matching your desires. If no program fits your needs you will find one in your
preferred programming language to hack. This is harder with a specialised system with a
smaller user and developer base, such as Rockbox (which I actually find very impressive
compared to any proprietary MP3 player system software).