New Bootloader and Installation Procedures - please test and give feedback

[linuxstb]

A new set of ipod installation instructions (one page for all users - Linux, Mac OS X and Windows) is available here:

http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/IpodInstallationBeta

The major changes to the previous install are:

1) A new version of the bootloader.  The main difference to the earlier release is that the hold switch is now used to start the Apple firmware - just turn the hold switch as soon as you reboot, and the Apple firmware will start.  Every time.

2) A new (cross-platform) version of the ipodpatcher tool.  This does the job of both the old ipodpatcher (or diskdump for Mac users) and ipod_fw.  Installing the Rockbox bootloader is now a simple two-command process:

ipodpatcher --scan
ipodpatcher N -a bootloader-ipodXXXX.ipod

The --scan option will show you the disk number of your ipod, which you then use in the second command in place of N.

The hope is that the new "rbutil" utility will be able to incorporate the code from ipodpatcher and provide a GUI bootloader install function.

3) Support for the 30GB 5.5g ipod.  The Rockbox daily/bleeding edge builds have supported this ipod for a week or two, and now ipodpatcher fully supports it as well.  This is fully automatic - 30GB 5.5g owners just install exactly the same files as all other 5g owners.  

Sadly the issues with the 80GB still haven't been fixed, so that remains unsupported.

[mightybrick]

I just tried it, and it seems to work great!  The instructions are easy to follow; the new ipodpatcher is nice; the --scan option is great.  Very simple.
The new bootloader works great too.  The "hold switch for original firmware" is a great idea.  I also like the black background and light text- looks great.
It's a job well done.

[vuittion]

I am happy to report that its working great on my 30GB 5.5g ipod using the new bootloader, I can now dual boot with either apple or Rockbox firmware, a big thank you to everyone involved in making this possible

[frause]

Well it does not seem to work for me on my 5.5G 30GB.
EDIT:
It works now, see http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php?topic=7737.msg60652#msg60652

1. With the new bootloader, I get:

Code: [Select]

No partition found
Press MENU+SELECT to reboot
then SELECT+PLAY for disk mode
2. With an unpatched cvs-build from 2006-12-04 and a bootloader (ipodpatcher) from 2006-11-25 (patched ipod_fw), it works.

3. With the old bootloader and a 2006-12-18 build, it seems to boot and then I get:

Code: [Select]

No partition found.
Insert USB cable
and fix it."
4. The original Apple firmware works.

I don't have time to do more testing right now, but I will try again tomorrow. Unfortunately I don't have access to a winputer (gentoo linux here), so an Itunes restore won't be done in a reasonable amount of time. I'll try reformatting or something tomorrow.

[linuxstb]

I don't have time to do more testing right now, but I will try again tomorrow. Unfortunately I don't have access to a winputer (gentoo linux here), so an Itunes restore won't be done in a reasonable amount of time. I'll try reformatting or something tomorrow.

My only thought is that you've done something strange to your ipod in the course of testing various experimental 5.5g builds which is causing the problems.

Do you have a backup of your original MBR (i.e. the first sector on the disk) and the original contents of the firmware partition that you can restore before trying ipodpatcher and the new bootloader again?

[frause]

My only thought is that you've done something strange to your ipod in the course of testing various experimental 5.5g builds which is causing the problems.

Most likely, yes.

Do you have a backup of your original MBR (i.e. the first sector on the disk) and the original contents of the firmware partition that you can restore before trying ipodpatcher and the new bootloader again?

Yes, and I have already tried that.

dd the original MBR back.
dd the original firmware partition back.
Reboot the ipod.
Verify the original firmware works.

Code: [Select]

$ sudo ./ipodpatcher /dev/sda -a bootloader-ipodvideo.ipod
ipodpatcher v0.5 - (C) Dave Chapman 2006
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is NO
warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

[INFO] Reading partition table from /dev/sda
[INFO] Sector size is 2048 bytes
[INFO] Part    Start Sector    End Sector   Size (MB)   Type
[INFO]    0              63         48194        94.0   Empty (0x00)
[INFO]    1           48195      14651279     28521.7   W95 FAT32 (0x0b)
[INFO] Ipod model: Video (aka 5th Generation)
[INFO] Checksum OK in bootloader-ipodvideo.ipod
[INFO] Moving images to create room for new firmware...
[INFO] Reading original firmware...
[INFO]  Wrote 7550976 bytes to firmware partition
[INFO] Bootloader bootloader-ipodvideo.ipod written to device.
= No partition found

It is talking about the second partition, right?

[Llorean]

Is that 7550976 bytes because of the moving of the iPod firmware too? (question aimed at linuxstb)

[linuxstb]

Is that 7550976 bytes because of the moving of the iPod firmware too? (question aimed at linuxstb)

No, it's ipodpatcher writing the combined (Apple firmware and Rockbox bootloader) "main firmware" image back to the ipod.  

[linuxstb]

= No partition found

It is talking about the second partition, right?

Yes, it's saying it can't find (and mount) a valid FAT partition on the disk.  

Your partition table looks fine, so maybe the problem is with the FAT partition itself.  Although it's odd that the Apple firmware is happy with it.

Have you tried reformatting your FAT32 partition, and if so, what was the command-line you used?  You should make sure you use the "-F32" option.

[frause]

Your partition table looks fine, so maybe the problem is with the FAT partition itself.  Although it's odd that the Apple firmware is happy with it.

Have you tried reformatting your FAT32 partition, and if so, what was the command-line you used?  You should make sure you use the "-F32" option.

Code: [Select]

$ grep mkfs.vfat ~/.bash_history
man mkfs.vfat
sudo mkfs.vfat -S 2048 -n IPOD /dev/sda2
Heh!
Thats probably it.  "32 bit FAT(FAT32  format) must (still) be selected explicitly if you want it."

I used the MBR-hack for a while, which means reformatting the partition.
I'll try with the -F32 tomorrow.

Thanks!

EDIT:
After recreating partitions, copying partitions and formatting to the left and right, I finally got it to work. What seems to have been the issue was the sectors per cluster.

Code: [Select]

sudo mkfs.vfat -n IPOD -F 32 -s 16 -S 2048 /dev/sda2 made it work as advertised.
That is, the ipodpatcher works and I can boot to both Apple firmware and Rockbox.

Oh, and the Apple firmware was not happy before, it just didn't say anything. it could create its directories but the file contents were just garbage. I didn't play around enough to catch that before.

[michael.conner]

Kudos -- works great on 1g nano.  Instructions are very clear.  Thanks for the "boot with hold switch on for original firmware" addition to the bootloader.

[dethinc]

RB loads great. Original firmware doesn't. I installed it and when i load the orignal firmware a folder with a "!" hazard box appears telling me to go to the ipod support forums on apple. Any ideas?

edit: I was using the old 1.1 ipod firmware i think. Will that have any significance?

[fasmaie]

It does not seem to work on my iPod 4G greyscale.

I went through the installation instructions from the new procedure. Used the latest (19/12/2006) build. After installation of the bootloader, RockBox boots fine, but I cannot boot into the Apple firmware at all.

When the hold button is on, I get the "booting into original firmware" message, then the process halts and the system reboots. This cycles if the hold button is kept on, and boots into RockBox if the hold button is off (not surprisingly).

It seems like the original firmware is not accessible to the bootloader, and when it is not found, it just reboots.

Just in case this is needed: I have a 20 GB, 4th Gen greyscale iPod. I use it on a mac, but it is Windows formatted.

[Pancho_DJ]

hi I tried this new method  but when I create a backup of ipod's firmware partition, on the cmd screen i got this message:

error openinig disk: ...

i got 5g ipod one year old, firmware 1.2.1 and disk mode enable on itunes

[linuxstb]

hi I tried this new method  but when I create a backup of ipod's firmware partition, on the cmd screen i got this message:

error openinig disk: ...

i got 5g ipod one year old, firmware 1.2.1 and disk mode enable on itunes

Is that the whole error message?  Does ipodpatcher display anything else?

Also, did the "ipodpatcher --scan" option find your ipod?

Also, do you have Administrator privileges?