Rockbox
Rockbox is a GPL-compliant open source operating system for portable digital audio players (DAPs). The Rockbox Project began in 2002 and was first implemented on the Archos Studio DAP because of owner frustration with severe limitations in the manufacturer-supplied user interface and device operations.
Rockbox can completely replace the host device's operating system firmware and has matured to become an extensible, flexible platform that provides a plug-in architecture for adding PDA functionality, applications, utilities, and games, and has also managed to retrofit video playback functionality onto DAPs first released in mid-2000. Recently, Rockbox now includes a voice-driven user-interface suitable for operation by blind and visually impaired users.
Although Rockbox's official title is "Rockbox: Open Source Jukebox Firmware", in many instances it is not actually installed to (or run from) flash memory. Instead a minimal bootloader is installed in the supported device's flash which is capable of either loading Rockbox from the hard disk or, alternately, the original factory firmware.
Archos devices
Rockbox was first designed for the Archos series of MP3 players and player/recorders. These devices have relatively weak main CPUs and instead offload music playback to dedicated hardware MP3 decoding chips. Rockbox, therefore, was unable to significantly alter playback capabilities. Instead, it offered a greatly improved user interface and added plugin functionality not present in the factory firmware.
Rockbox is capable of being permanently flashed into flash memory on the Archos devices, making it a literal firmware replacement.
iRiver devices
H1xx/H3xx
Beginning in late 2004, an effort began to port Rockbox to the Motorola ColdFire-powered devices manufactured by iRiver, focusing on the H1xx series of hard drive players (H110/H120/H140). In November of 2005, that effort was expanded to include the H3xx series of hard drive player, which is similar to the H1xx except for the addition of a color screen, USB host capability and the removal of the H1xx digital optical in/out jacks. These devices perform audio decoding in software, allowing Rockbox to potentially support many more audio codecs than the original firmware as well as bringing the extensibility and increased functionality already present in the Archos ports. Rockbox is run from the hard disk on these devices, after being started with a custom bootloader.
As of November of 2006, the iRiver port is in pre-release advanced testing. Most major functions are fully supported including gapless playback, ReplayGain, "on the fly" (OTF) playlists, FM radio, remote control, custom UI themes and WAV recording (including FM recording). Supported playback codecs include: MPEG audio (MP3/MP2), Ogg Vorbis, Musepack, AC3, AAC (experimental, not yet real-time), FLAC, Shorten, Apple Lossless, WavPack and uncompressed WAV audio. Plugins include a colour JPEG viewer, the Rockboy Game Boy emulator (not yet real-time) and a number of games.
iFP-xxx
A port to the iFP-xxx flash-based devices (starting with the iFP-790) is underway. When completed it will be the first pure flash device to be supported by Rockbox. The port is currently suitable for developers only.
H10
An active Rockbox port is underway for the iRiver H10. As of November 2006, a pre-release version of Rockbox is available for both the 5/6GB and 20GB versions of the H10, although some features, such as recording, have not yet been implemented.
iAudio devices
A port to the iAudio X5 hard drive player (also powered by the Motorola ColdFire chip) is underway. The port is currently suitable for developers only.
Apple devices
In November 2005, work began on a port of Rockbox to Apple iPod portable players. As of November 2006, support is available for iPod mini (first and second generation), color/Photo, 4g Greyscale, and nano (1st generation only), and first generation 5g (video). Rockbox is not yet available for the second generation Nano or the second-generation Video (sometimes referred to as the "5.5g"), although some users have been able to get Rockbox running on the 30GB version of the 5.5g.
Neuros III devices
Joe Born the leader developer of the Neuros open-source project for a time showed consideration towards allowing Rockbox firmware to be used in a future release of the Neuros III, whether or not it will be possible to run the Rockbox firmware under or within DM320 platform is still up for debate between both groups of developers. The Neuros III is designated to run on Linux kernel currently.
External links
~ Text taken from Wikipedia entry for Rockbox