AIGO EROS Q / AIGO EROS K / IRULU Surfans F20 / AGPTek H3 / HIFI WALKER H2

[dconrad]

I like your idea of the car aux input impedance being too high to be detected ... except that I've just disproved it!

I looked with a 'scope at the line out (cable unconnected to anything else) and I can see 'music' waveforms. I haven't generated a sine wave .flac to check but I am pretty sure it is audio - stops when I press pause etc.

I can also confirm that the level does not change with the H2's volume controls, so as you say this must be a recent FW change.

That's... unexpected. Not sure what's going on, to be honest! Usually "hardware" issues with these players are user error, but... maybe you "won" the lottery?

I am reasonably confident about installing RockBox - I am actually a SW developer amongst other things, and I have installed it on an Xduo XX and X3ii. However this involves updating the bootloader on the H2's flash doesn't it? If I end up returning the device then I would not want to have fiddled with it in that way. I couldn't find mention (in a fairly cursory read of the docs) of how to save the current bootloader and revert it afterwards; if you can point me at that I will probably try that.

Thanks for the information about the scroll wheel 

Ok, well if you're a software dev then that makes it easier. You can actually use jztool to load the bootloader over USB into the ram of the player without writing it to the internal flash. Usually you would do this, then use the bootloader to install itself into Flash. But if you instead select Rockbox from the menu, you simply boot into Rockbox without touching the internal flash.

So basically, you would:

• Make sure the card is FAT32
• Put a rockbox build on the card (make sure it's "erosqnative", not "aigoerosq"!)
  
• with the device off, hold Menu while plugging in USB. The screen should stay off but the blue light should come on.
• Download jztool and the correct bootloader.erosq (they differ based on hardware revision), and do "jztool erosq load bootloader.erosq"
• Disconnect USB
• Select Rockbox from the bootloader menu

The normal instructions are on the wiki at:
https://www.rockbox.org/wiki/AIGOErosQK#Manual_Native_Port_Installation_40the_jztool_way_45_for_special_circumstances_41
https://www.rockbox.org/wiki/JztoolInstall.html
(keep in mind these instructions assume that you want to actually install the bootloader, not just load it temporarily).

(I hope that all makes sense)

[jkn]

FWIW: I can confirm that the Headphone output works 'fine' (within limits, of course) when connecting to my car stereo Aux.

I also played around with my current player, the Xduoo X3ii. I had not realised, or had forgotten, that it too does some switching between h/phone and Line outputs. And I think it occasionally gets it wrong ... now and again I have to power cycle it to get any output. I am now guessing that it *sometimes* gets the switch wrong ... but the H2 always gets it wrong?

(I had presumed that both outputs were always 'on' - but I guess this is not done for power reasons)

Anyway, thanks a lot for the summary above. I am also going through the various documentation elsewhere. One thing ... you mentioned there being a saved image of the Hifi Walker H2 v2.0 bootloader? Is this the file at

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1myl8DU7DuAuJQfS_EaCV_zJJ0RD7rWXs  # update-hifiwalkerH2-v2.0-rbuninstall.upt

I was trying to match this with the documentation on jztool mentioning to backup the bootloader onto the SD card.

Thanks, J

[dconrad]

That's a stock update file (direct from the manufacturer) which has had the (stock) bootloader marked to be installed. That's the "new" way to uninstall Rockbox from these players - via the original firmware's own recovery tool.

When the jztool documentation talks about a backup, it's talking about the backup that it makes itself, which is just of the bootloader section of the flash. The bootloader includes a tool to backup the existing contents to a file named erosqnative-boot.bin and a tool to read back that file and restore it to the flash. Not really necessary if you're not actually installing the bootloader, but it's not going to hurt.

I can't speak to the X3ii, but the H2 has a stereo switch in the audio path, which means that both outputs cannot be on at one time (hw1 players notwithstanding - on those the line-out was directly connected to the DAC).

[jkn]

Right, a fair bit of progress...

I have successfully installed Rockbox on the H2! This included saving the original bootloader .bin file somewhere safe. I must say it was a relief to see the familiar Rockbox menu!

And I can report that with the output mode set to 'Line out', I do indeed get output from that jack, and can play on the Car's Aux input!

Somewhat strangely, I am not not sure if the Headphone output works correctly. 'Auto' switching doesn't seem to work for the Line out socket, at least, I will experiment a bit further.

I was mis-understanding one thing ... on the Xduoo X3ii port, the Rockbox bootloader allows booting into either the original (HiBy) firmware, or Rockbox firmware. That doesn't seem to be the case for this H2 bootloader, is that correct?

And I have realised that nothing has happened to the original H2 v2.0 firmware, I presume it is still living in Flash on the H2. So if I were to want to revert, I just have to use the recovery menu and re-flash the original bootloader image I saved (renamed...), and the H2 will boot into stock v2.0 firmware. Correct?

Thanks a lot for all of this - at the very least it has answered my original question - it is some sort of issue with the stock v2.0 firmware not switching correctly - and it has got me up to speed with Rockbox installation on the H2.

Thanks a lot for your help with this.

Regards, jon N

[rednakes]

Right, a fair bit of progress...

I have successfully installed Rockbox on the H2! This included saving the original bootloader .bin file somewhere safe. I must say it was a relief to see the familiar Rockbox menu!

And I can report that with the output mode set to 'Line out', I do indeed get output from that jack, and can play on the Car's Aux input!

Somewhat strangely, I am not not sure if the Headphone output works correctly. 'Auto' switching doesn't seem to work for the Line out socket, at least, I will experiment a bit further.

I was mis-understanding one thing ... on the Xduoo X3ii port, the Rockbox bootloader allows booting into either the original (HiBy) firmware, or Rockbox firmware. That doesn't seem to be the case for this H2 bootloader, is that correct?

And I have realised that nothing has happened to the original H2 v2.0 firmware, I presume it is still living in Flash on the H2. So if I were to want to revert, I just have to use the recovery menu and re-flash the original bootloader image I saved (renamed...), and the H2 will boot into stock v2.0 firmware. Correct?

Thanks a lot for all of this - at the very least it has answered my original question - it is some sort of issue with the stock v2.0 firmware not switching correctly - and it has got me up to speed with Rockbox installation on the H2.

Thanks a lot for your help with this.

Regards, jon N

Hi!  Regarding reverting to stock bootloader, check my post from two pages earlier, from a few months ago.  I had made a “custom” stock v2.0 image that will restore the bootloader back to the original.  So you won’t need to worry.  I had a couple others test it successfully when I was helping them out on Reddit.

[jkn]

Hi!  Regarding reverting to stock bootloader, check my post from two pages earlier, from a few months ago.  I had made a “custom” stock v2.0 image that will restore the bootloader back to the original.  So you won’t need to worry.  I had a couple others test it successfully when I was helping them out on Reddit.

Thanks, I see those posts now. The link in post #456 is no longer there BTW; is it superseded by the one in post #458?

For interest ... what is the relationship between a 'backup' bootloader erosqnative-boot.bin file that I created and the update.upt file that is mentioned there?

Regards, J^n

[rednakes]

Hi!  Regarding reverting to stock bootloader, check my post from two pages earlier, from a few months ago.  I had made a “custom” stock v2.0 image that will restore the bootloader back to the original.  So you won’t need to worry.  I had a couple others test it successfully when I was helping them out on Reddit.

Thanks, I see those posts now. The link in post #456 is no longer there BTW; is it superseded by the one in post #458?

For interest ... what is the relationship between a 'backup' bootloader erosqnative-boot.bin file that I created and the update.upt file that is mentioned there?

Regards, J^n

It should be the link in post #458 which was also uploaded on this site.  The update includes the correct stock bootloader plus the stock rom. Unfortunately if you make your own backup of your device’s original bootloader it won’t be able to be restored. It will brick your device, because I tried it before.  You can restore it to the  Rockbox bootloader though

[jkn]

Oh. So the discussion in the jzinstall docs about saving the bootloader .bin, eg. so that you might later restore it, does not (currently?) apply to the H2?

[rednakes]

Oh. So the discussion in the jzinstall docs about saving the bootloader .bin, eg. so that you might later restore it, does not (currently?) apply to the H2?

Correct. You can do that if you want, but the image I posted has everything you need to restore back to brand new.

[jkn]

(back after being away for a couple of days)

Thanks, that worked fine!

[dconrad]

Right, a fair bit of progress...

I have successfully installed Rockbox on the H2! This included saving the original bootloader .bin file somewhere safe. I must say it was a relief to see the familiar Rockbox menu!

And I can report that with the output mode set to 'Line out', I do indeed get output from that jack, and can play on the Car's Aux input!

Somewhat strangely, I am not not sure if the Headphone output works correctly. 'Auto' switching doesn't seem to work for the Line out socket, at least, I will experiment a bit further.

I was mis-understanding one thing ... on the Xduoo X3ii port, the Rockbox bootloader allows booting into either the original (HiBy) firmware, or Rockbox firmware. That doesn't seem to be the case for this H2 bootloader, is that correct?

And I have realised that nothing has happened to the original H2 v2.0 firmware, I presume it is still living in Flash on the H2. So if I were to want to revert, I just have to use the recovery menu and re-flash the original bootloader image I saved (renamed...), and the H2 will boot into stock v2.0 firmware. Correct?

Thanks a lot for all of this - at the very least it has answered my original question - it is some sort of issue with the stock v2.0 firmware not switching correctly - and it has got me up to speed with Rockbox installation on the H2.

Thanks a lot for your help with this.

Regards, jon N

Good deal! You can boot into the stock firmware by holding Play while booting, or the bootloader menu by holding Volume Up while booting.