Yet another e250r thread - can't get into manufacturer's mode

[Xeo]

Hallo.

I wanted to give Rockbox a try, but I'm having a heck of a time with this stupid e250r. I'm fairly positive it's a Rhapsody model and the firmware is 1.0.2.165. It is set to "Rhapsody" mode, (not plays-for-sure, though I've tried it both ways). The Hold switch is set to 'unlocked' (though I've tried that both ways as well).

The problem is I can't get to manufacturer's mode no matter what I do. I turn it off, hold the select button down and plug in the USB (I've also tried the "with sansa turned on" method and the "try the << button" method, neither helped).. what happens is it gets to the standard Sansa "connecting" screen with the little picture of the player and a monitor and freezes (this is with me still having my finger on the 'select' button). After a few seconds, the PC says "USB device not recognized". But it's still not in manufacturer's mode. When I release the button, it goes right into reconnecting and then "Sansa installed and ready for use" pops up.

I tried to manually remove/update/install the driver from Device Manager.. using the "include this location in your search" method it says "Wizard could not find a better match for your hardware." If I try to manually install the specific driver, it says "the specified location does not contain information about your hardware". I even tried just running the patcher just for laughs and of course that didn't work, because I wasn't in manufacturer's mode. Even after Uninstalling the driver, as soon as I unplugged/replugged, it was up & running like normal.

I'm stuck.. apparently the drivers on this thing are freaking bulletproof. At this point I'd be happy to brick the POS just to prove to myself I can get into the damn thing.

[edit: forgot to mention, WinXP Pro, if that makes a difference]

Any ideas?
TIA

Jason

[Chronon]

It doesn't sound like you did this: "turn on the hold switch, hold select and plug in USB while continuing to hold select for about 10s"

[Xeo]

Of all the things I tried, the *one* thing I didn't try was to have the hold switch "locked", the unit off, and THEN plug in the USB with the select button pressed.  I guess I figured since I got nowhere with the thing locked before, it wouldn't work either way. DOH

Worked like a charm, all is installed and functiong well. Had a bit of trouble getting the music loaded and recognized, but eventually I figured that out.

Thanks for the help Chronon! Cool product.

J

[Chronon]

You're welcome!