C
HAPTER
11. A
DVANCED
T
OPICS
109
so do not rename your old firmware files with names like
ajbrec.ajz
.
old
and so on,
because it is possible that the player will load a file other than the one you intended.
11.4.1. Using ROLO (Rockbox Loader)
Rockbox is able to load and start another firmware file without rebooting. You just
“play” a file with the extension
.ajz
.
This can be used to test new firmware
versions without deleting your current version.
11.5. Rockbox in Flash
11.5.1. Introduction
When you bought your Ondio, it came with the Archos firmware in flash ROM. When
you power on your player, this Archos firmware starts, and then loads an updated
firmware from disk if present (
ajbrec.ajz
). An ordinary Rockbox installation only
replaces the on-disk firmware, leaving the flash ROM contents intact. That means the
Archos firmware still controls the boot process.
The main reason to change this is to improve the startup time of your player. The
Archos bootloader is rather slow. With Rockbox in flash, your player will boot much
faster, typically in three to five seconds. Furthermore you might prefer a clean Rockbox
environment, with as little remnants of the Archos software as possible.
Warning:
Flashing your player is somewhat dangerous, like programming a mainboard
!
BIOS
,
CD/DVD
drive firmware, mobile phone, etc. If the power fails, the chip breaks
while programming or most of all the programming software malfunctions, you’ll have
a dead box. We take no responsibility of any kind, you do that at your own risk. How-
ever, we tried as carefully as possible to bulletproof this code. There are a lot of sanity
checks. If any of them fails, it will not program.
Warning:
After flashing Rockbox, never try to ROLO the Archos firmware versions
!
1.31f or 1.32b! These versions are flash updates themselves. If they are applied when
Rockbox is flashed, you’ll end up with a garbled flash ROM and hence a dead box.
There’s an ultimate safety net to bring back boxes with even completely garbled flash
content: the
UART
boot mod, which in turn requires the
serial
mod. With that it’s
possible to reflash independently from the outside, even if the flash ROM is completely
erased. If the first
≈
2KB of the flash ROM are flashed ok,
Minimon
can be used for the
same purpose.
11.5.2. Terminology and Basic Operation
Firmware:
The flash ROM contents as a whole.
Image:
One operating software started from there.
The replacement firmware contains a bootloader and two images. The first image is
the
permanent
rescue software, to be used in case something is wrong with the second
T
HE
R
OCKBOX MANUAL
A
RCHOS
O
NDIO