FYI: Sansa C200 no USB settings and problems with MSC

[mpmontero]

Hey Everyone.... Not sure if anyone has posted this yet, but I just installed this on my Sansa C250. (C200 with a 2GB chip)
I have the newer firmware, so the USB settings are disabled. This makes it difficult to connect the Sansa as a Mass Storage Class device.
Only as an MSC will windows assign a drive letter to it, making it possible to install rockbox.

I have read a lot about downgrading firmware, but there is an easier way.

with the device off, engage the hold switch.
press and hold the rewind button.
Plug the device in your computer.

If done correctly, the Sansa will automaticly install as an MSC device.

Hope this helps, and sorry if someone already posted this..

-Manny

[Llorean]

Static information belongs in the wiki, and if it's important to installation like this, should be posted in the patch tracker as a modification for the manual.

The forums are for support issues, not posting static info.

[mpmontero]

Sorry... New to the forum...

-M

[Strife89]

Well, here's some "interactive" (if you will) information for you:

I just got a 1GB microSD card and promptly popped it in my Sansa c250. However, upon connecting it to my computer in the original firmware (remember, it runs Ubuntu 7.10), ..... nothing happened; the Sansa didn't mount. The battery indicator started moving (meaning it was getting power and charging) but my computer wouldn't see the thing.

Bewildered, I turned my Sansa off and removed the card, then tried again. Presto. It mounted as it usually does (in MSC mode, naturally).

Knowing that, on Windows XP, plugging in the Sansa produces two drives (whether a card is present or not), I figure that Ubuntu does not yet recognize multi-volume devices (excluding partitioned internal HDDs).

Thankfully, I have a standard SD card reader, so I used that and loaded up. Still, it would be so much simpler to just connect the Sansa and get the transfers done that way.

What do you guys know about this situation?

[mpmontero]

Have you tried a manual mount? Usually USB drives are sda1 and so on.
I would try a simple mount command and try to mount sda1 and sda2 to see if the computer even sees it. Although Ubuntu is pretty user friendly, the plug and play features still have a long way to go.

-M

[AlexP]

Plugging in an e260 with a SD card in the OF in Ubuntu 7.10 automatically mounts two devices for me - the e200 and the card, so Ubuntu is quite capable of doing it.  Whether you have an Ubuntu problem or a OF problem with the c200 though I don't know.

[pixelma]

Knowing that, on Windows XP, plugging in the Sansa produces two drives (whether a card is pcresent or not)

For me connecting my c250 with an inserted microSD on my WindowsXP doesn't establish a data connection. But when I take the card out and plug USB I get the two drives and can just insert the microSD again (and it seems I'm not the only one to experience this - it was already mentioned in the forums and someone thought it was worth to put it on the c200 port page in the wiki).

[Strife89]

I tried plugging it in today, and this time it worked. I haven't fiddled with anything; I just booted to the OF, then plugged it in.

Maybe Ubuntu didn't see it because the card was empty, but the c250 wasn't.

Thank you all for the advice, though.

[Llorean]

In my personal experience, my c200 sometimes mounts in ubuntu, sometimes mounts as read only in ubuntu, and sometimes doesn't mount. When it does mount, it's MSC. Under Windows, it mounts as MTP. There's not an MSC vs MTP option in the menu.

The only way I've convinced it to be consistent is to use the MSC trick on it.

[Strife89]

Mine has the option of either "Auto Detect" or "MSC" USB modes. The "version" (as seen under "System Info") is 01.00.04A.

No mounting problems have ever occurred (except, of course, last night).

@ mpmontero: What's the terminal command for mounting a device? (Obviously I don't need it now, but I might later.)

[mpmontero]

If you run fdisk -l it should list the usb drives.... (sda1, sda2..etc..)
Then mount dev/sda1 or whatever the device is.

Its been a while, so I could be missing part of the ocmmand.... but you can google it and get the proper syntax if im wrong. Also make sure you are running commands as root.

-M