Creative ZEN

[pamaury]

Ah that's very interesting. With Windows I wrote down the procedure on the wiki, I think you can always right click on the drive in "Computer" and select format. However if it fails this might indicate another issue, maybe a problem with the storage driver ? Can you try to format with another computer or Linux if you can ?

[chrisjj]

Ah that's very interesting. With Windows I wrote down the procedure on the wiki

My original report of failure is here http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php/topic,13462.msg221249.html#msg221249 , now updated.

I think you can always right click on the drive in "Computer" and select format.

I think not. You have to first do the failing Disk Management format and then do Explorer Quick Format.

However if it fails this might indicate another issue, maybe a problem with the storage driver ?

I have done hundreds of formats using the OF without any failure.

Can you try to format with another computer or Linux if you can ?

Will do.

Meanwhile, if anyone has got the RB port official format procedure for Windows to work on the current bootloader (V1Beta3_3f555f01), please do report here. Thanks.

And if anyone can answer "How may one verify the file system is formatted properly?", I'd be grateful.

[MRJOE8010]

pamaury, I just re-read the bootloader instructions in the wiki and noticed that there are two variants for the Zen firmware.  I am in the US using the prebuilt version of firmware-zen.nk for Windows.  Is this the EU version, and if so could that be a possible cause of the lcd issues only I seem to be experiencing? Thanks for your hard work and I'm sorry to have been a bother.

[pamaury]

MRJO8010:
Actually there is a simple to check that: boot into recovery, select "format" (you will loose all the data) and try to boot the OF. If the LCD works correctly in OF it means in makes nod difference (since this is the EU firmware). I expected both kinds to have the same LCD though.

[MRJOE8010]

pamaury, the screen does work properly booting into OF. Thanks.

[ChronoSphere]

Seeing this build's progress is a pleasant surprise considering my clip+ recently died. This gave me a reason to revive my old Creative ZEN. I must say, for an "unusable" build, it doesn't behave that differently than the clip+ one (not counting the manual installation). So far it's been smooth sailing, except for a crash when I attempted to insert the SD card while in browser mode (but to be honest, I've been having the same issue sporadically with the clip+ so...) which hasn't resurfaced yet.

In any case, this was the kernel panic:

Code: [Select]

*PANIC*
microSD init failed: -2
pc:60060390 sp: 600FCA48
bt end
Can you do anything to remove the loud click/booming sound on power up/shutdown? It sounds the same as pulling the plug on active speakers instead of turning them off, if you don't know what I mean.

Another (I guess cosmetic) bug I noticed is that the charging indicator stops its animation once you connect it to the PC, the charging is still working though.

I'll be following this thread and am willing to assist with any tests needed, thanks for working on this!

[chrisjj]

Re the failure of Windows format:

this might indicate another issue, maybe a problem with the storage driver ? Can you try to format with another computer or Linux if you can ?

More tests done: virtual Win XP computer fails, Win 7 succeeds and Mac OSX succeeds. Original report http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php/topic,13462.msg221249.html#msg221249 updated.

[chrisjj]

loud click/booming sound on power up/shutdown

I too get that.

am willing to assist with any tests needed

If you've tried formatting on Win XP, I'd be interested to hear if you got more success than I.

[ChronoSphere]

If you've tried formatting on Win XP, I'd be interested to hear if you got more success than I.

Well, FWIW formatting works on my VMed winXP SP3. I tried formatting it once when it was already rockbox-formatted and once when it was creativeOS-formatted. Both went fine. It was detected as a removable drive with corrupted filenames in the latter case, but it did format fine.

The button map is very very basic, it doesn't use most of the buttons and anyone willing to help on this matter is welcome.

If "help" in this case means suggestions how to map them, here is how I'd do it:

- play/pause/back/joystick middle key as they are now
- the "menu" "options" key should bring you the "quickscreen" menu (where you can set a quickaction for up/down/left/right), long press to main menu.
- the shortcut key (to the left of play/pause) could jump to the "shortcuts" menu.

Might be a stupid question, but can I view what changed between revisions somewhere?
Processor frequency scaling is still not implemented, is it?

edit: The "Disk usage" section on the wiki has a typo btw: "In its current state, the port can really work along with the OF because of the file system". Should be "can't"

[pamaury]

Frequency scaling is not implemented, I didn't have much time recently but at least I found what causes the "Black screen of death". You can have a look at the most recent changes on the front page of rockbox.org or have a look at the repo http://git.rockbox.org/?p=rockbox.git but it's not specific to the ZEN, it's the entire project. Look for commits containing "imx233" mostly.

[chrisjj]

- the "menu" key should bring you the "quickscreen" menu (where you can set a quickaction for up/down/left/right), long press to main menu.

I think that's the key normally called the Options key - top right. Not to be confused with the Menu/Back key - top left.

Might be a stupid question, but can I view what changed between revisions somewhere?

I've found no way of getting a list of the RB changes to a specific port.  One can manually inspect daily builds. Though Creative ZEN is missing from the Daily Builds page, this URL will provide the list: https://www.rockbox.org/dl.cgi?bin=creativezen .

edit: The "Disk usage" section on the wiki has a typo btw: "In its current state, the port can really work along with the OF because of the file system". Should be "can't"

Thanks for the defect report. Now fixed.

[pamaury]

Here is a new try at fixing the LCD issues: the code is already in the trunk but it needs a bootloader update. You can help by tring this new bootloader: note that for size reasons this build doesn't support dualbooting, so it's mainly for testing purposes: https://www.dropbox.com/s/nlgm4857t0d8btr/firmware-zen-beta.nk.

[ChronoSphere]

I like the quick booting speed of this bootloader. Considering dual OS doesn't seem likely anyway, why keep the option to boot there anyway?

As for the LCD itself, one thing I noticed is that now it doesn't flash white while switching between bootloader and rockbox screens. There is still a white flash on wakeup from idling though. I did about 20 boots so far and no black screen hangs so far. I'm using a 4GB model btw.

[chrisjj]

Here is a new try at fixing the LCD issues: the code is already in the trunk but it needs a bootloader update. You can help by tring this new bootloader: note that for size reasons this build doesn't support dualbooting, so it's mainly for testing purposes: https://www.dropbox.com/s/nlgm4857t0d8btr/firmware-zen-beta.nk.

Thanks for that. Where is an acceptable place to report bugs in this release?

[pamaury]

I guess here since this is a crucial issue which is blocking the port. Apparently ChronoSphere and I don't suffer from the black screen issue with this new bootloader so it would be helpful if you could test on your devices and report. Make sure to use the latest build (always we had a problem with the website this night so I'm not sure they were actually built).