I feel like I should apologise for how this has been handled, although I didn't have any part in it. It bothered me.
I cannot broadly apologise for the Rockbox project, nor assume guilt for the actions of others, but I can offer my own support and acknowledge that this definitely could have been handled much better. Rockbox is a complex community and the actions of one do not reflect the intentions of the group as a whole.
I understand that some first time users may be incredibly cautious during installation and want to avoid any potential misstep. And I don't think this caution or want for a clear explanation should be a barrier to the use of Rockbox or a cause for apparent hostility.
Both the manual and the automated installer direct you to
this SanDisk Forums page, and to some what you need to acquire from this page is not immediately apparent to some users. There are two offers to the user on this page, the one we are interested in is the section:
"Manual Firmware Update (All Regions) -
Click here to download"
Which will provide you with a clipzip**.**.**.zip file, from which the firmware bin is to be extracted.
I hope this has made things clearer for you, and I again apologise for your introduction to this community.
[Saint]
Edit: Note - "**.**.**" represents the firmware version string, at the time of this writing the current firmware version string is 01.01.18