Rockbox Player - Project to design and build a Free/Open hardware audio player

[casainho]

First pictures of finished prototype. The schematic is on Lyre SVN.

I didn't solder yet the battery because I don't have yet firmware to handle the charge. Characteristics of this hardware:

    * i.MX233 ARM9 32bits @ 454MHz
    * 32MBytes SDRAM
    * low power, black and white LCD, Nokia 5110 clone, 84X48 pixels
    * audio IN and OUT
    * 6 users buttons
    * 2 memory card: 1 uSDCard from where system boots and 1 SDCard
    * USB mini (for operation as USB Mass Storage Device)
    * Operates from USB or Li-ion battery, and charges the battery when connected to USB
    * JTAG connection for debugging
    * 3D printed enclosure

I will now start porting Rockbox 








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Finally I have all the hardware needed to build my own player:





That LCD cheap (6€) and I bought if on Ebay - there are many sources for it. The advantages are the simplicity to wire it to board, his low power, low price and easy to source. Disadvantages, well, it's a black and white LCD of 84x48 pixels.

Selling a DIY Lyre player

I am planning to assembly by hand and sell on Ebay and Etsy for 200€. I plan to also design and print the enclosures on my RepRap 3D printer. I will ship the player running Rockbox and the uSDCard full of music (CC licensed music) and with source files of Rockbox firmare, hardware and 3D file on the 3D printed enclosure.

Maybe I will design the enclosure as being an audio cassette :-)

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About Lyre project and using actual IMX233 ARM9 @454MHz board, I need to use Rockbox as firmware, since the board have as maximum 32MBytes of RAM and Android needs much more.

I am looking for a device just dedicated for audio and if possible, easy to share the audio files - for now, the easy way is to use the SD memory card or connect the device to a PC where it will act as a USB flash drive.

I am not looking for web browsing, facebook, etc. Maybe in future use the USB Host capabilities to add a USB<->Wifi adapter, for connect to Internet to listen radio stations or something like that. Right now, the straight way is to play music from the SDCard (which is realistic to develop/do in 6 months).

[scharkalvin]

Adafruit has this nice touch screen LCD.
http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=37&products_id=335
Looks like a nice addition to a homebrew player.  iTouch clone anyone?

[casainho]

Adafruit has this nice touch screen LCD.
http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=37&products_id=335
Looks like a nice addition to a homebrew player.  iTouch clone anyone?

This project is idle for now, because:
- I am not being able to develop/code for the imx233 bootloader (1st bootloader), to load the Rockbox bootloader (2nd bootloader) from SDCard and run it. I don't have knowledge to do that. Bob Cousins seems to be busy and can't help either.

- Lack of a business plan for the project. Although, I did plan to produce and sell a few units, but since I can't develop the prototype, I can't go further. Neither I have money to pay someone to develop the prototype.


BUT, there is some light!! Lady Ada from Adafruit Industries, is planing an Open Source Audio player :-) -- Lady Ada have the shop/business/clients, so I am sure he will have success!! However I don't know if their hardware will be able to run Rockbox. I asked her to please think on an hardware to run Rockbox and I told her about Lyre project. I even offered help to port Rockbox (in what I can, which is not to much...). Lady Ada is selling "Chumby Hacker Board", which is a general board running Linux with the imx233.

[casainho]

Finally I got it working

I got the "system_init" code which setup the clock to 454MHz and the 32 Mbytes SDRAM, running on internal RAM. Right after, Rockbox bootloader is loaded to SDRAM and runs (right now is just a blink LED code).

I got help from Pamaury Rockbox dev. and from Sean from Chumby

Next task is to put Rockbox kernel working, by using an interrupt...

After LCD, after buttons and in the end, the uSDCard.

[zone22]

Woot!

[lolsack]

I want one lol, dats a sexy player.

[phr]

Looks very nice, though somewhat large and expensive (understandable given the low quantities it will be made in).  I like the monochrome LCD since it identifies the player as an audio player, something few mainstream manufacturers dare to make (they all put useless video in players for marketing reasons).   Main things I'd hope for are:

1) high quality audio codec
2) SD socket should electrically support SDXC cards (FAT32 or Linux file format is fine)
3) should use commodity AA or AAA battery (1.2V NiMH or 1.5v alkaline) instead of lithium, even if that makes the package bigger.  Ideally a single AA cell with a dc-dc boost converter, but two or three cells (AA or AAA) is fine.  If you have to use lithium, a commodity cell phone battery is probably the best choice.
4) Bluetooth audio would probably be useful (for wireless headsets)

[os10]

good job man! i'd like to see how this turns out.

[notlistening]

Thought people might be interested in this, maybe even the guys at rockbox:

http://opencores.org/donation

What do people think?

[friendlyzookeeper]

notlistening, I think it's confusing on the tools that is used on this platform. Java and Perl? Online C conversion or simulator?

What is the pci 32?

[geekabit]

Is this project still alive? What is the current status?

[WeaselBones314]

I'm holding my breath for this project. I've always wanted a player built to use rockbox. I was just thinking this morning (while looking at players that pretty much all suck without rockbox) how cool it would be to have a player with native rockbox support or with open-source firmware.
I disagree on the battery recommendation, and I think that first the project needs to get off the ground before things like bluetooth are even considered. Li-ion is so much more energy dense and compact than a cylindrical cell. For a few millimeters of thickness, the player could have a 20 hour Li-ion battery whereas even a high capacity (2500mAh) Ni-Mh cell would be at <10 hours.

I hope the project is still alive. The latest date stamp I see is from 2011.

[[Saint]]

History suggests, that you should not do so.

The idea, is a great one, but so far the Lyre Project has just proven (a few separate times) that it is a massive undertaking, incredibly expensive, and cannot compete with mass produced hardware that already exists (build quality, cost, turnaround, etc.).

I know that sounds very defeatist, but it's just facts.


[Saint]

[JdGordon]

We've seen nothing recently to suggest this is still happening.

[LADave]

Instead of designing and building hardware, why not use "obsolete" smartphones?  Only used iOS- and Android-based used phones have any real value.  The rest -- PalmOS, Windows, Blackberry etc. -- are roadkill headed for landfills or toxic scrap mills in China.   On eBay they sell for an order of magnitude less than a RockBox-able player.

But once you dig below the various O/S the hardware is familiar: ARM CPU, 64MB or more RAM, some hardwired flash ROM plus a slot for more on an SD(HC) card, a microphone, ADCDAC, a joystick and a keyboard, QVGA or better display, micro-speakers and headphone jack, rechargeable lithium, and do forth.  If chips aren't identical to RockBox targets they probably are near cousins.

Replace the various O/S-s with the RockBox kernel and a lot of complexity goes away.