Rockbox...pros? cons?

[YoungClayB]

Whats the big deal about Rockbox? Are there any pros other than gapless playback on the 4G? I dont care about FLAC - Apple Lossless is fine for me. And I love the convienience of iTunes...are you still able to use iTunes once Rockbox is installed?

I'd love to hear everyone's pro's and con's.

-Clay

 

[kikkomang]

the interface sucks. also for the iPod, the battery life isn't as good as with the original apple firmware though that will most likely change soon.

 

[Grey Massacre]

Hi YoungClayB,

With Rockbox you can basically tweak your iPod so it work the way you want it to work.

I basically changed the theme for something really dark because I mainly listened my iPod in bed so I wouldn't be blinded every time I decided to skip a song or browse my files. Oh and I also changed how my LCD behaved, less LCD usage = more battery life.

When Rockbox is installed you can upload your songs without having iTune installed which I personally find really a bloated software. Your player acts as a UMS device, so you just upload the files in a folder instead of being manipulated by iTune for you to browse them.

You can adjust the sound, you get a customizable EQ and enough options to fine-tune the sound quality to your liking.

Better battery usage.

Well these are a few reasons that comes on the top of my head quickly. It has been a while since I used my Nano.

Charles

 

[craiglester]

Better battery life with rockbox, completely customizable interface (theres loads of different themes), gapless, better eq's, doom... lots of reasons. oh and on an ipod i believe it's dual bootable, so you can choose which one you want. The sound quality is supposedly better too.

 

[TheMarchingMule]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kikkomang /img/forum/go_quote.gif the interface sucks.

Mouth before brain, eh?

Rockbox offers a bevy of options that make it seem like foobar2000 at times in terms of flexibility for sound, control, and looks.

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

The only con I can think of is, of course, the battery life, which is about half of what you normally get if you are using an iPod.

 

[cpk]

I am getting ready to download rockbox on to a newly refurb 4g imod. Are there any links you could refer me to? I have read the rockbox site manual, however it looks a little complicated. After this is loaded where do I download flac v4 at or whatever is currently better?

 

[user18]

I had always read that the battery life using rockbox was worse than using the normal iPod interface. Has this changed now?

 

[cooperpwc]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheMarchingMule /img/forum/go_quote.gif Mouth before brain, eh?

I was thinking the same thing but perhaps with politer brainwaves

.

Quote:

Originally Posted by user18 /img/forum/go_quote.gif I had always read that the battery life using rockbox was worse than using the normal iPod interface. Has this changed now?

Battery life is better than the original OS on the H140 but still quite a bit worse on an iPod. They don't have disc caching optimised yet. It's still well worth it though. MarchingMule put it well: it's like having Foobar on your PAD. What I like most are:
1) the amazing dynamic playlist. Blows the on-the-go iPod playlist away; and
2) being able to properly control my own directory structure (which also makes it a backup to my computer for my MP3s. Gee that's a smart feature!)

Crossfeed and EQ are both excellent too (although I'm not currently using either). Hardware EQ of bass on the iPod through control of the Wolfson DAC is especially fine.

It's all about user control. The iPod OS, by contrast, is absolutely idiot proof which is very impressive but - to my taste - ultimately annoying.

 

[epaludo]

As the name says, Rockbox literaly rocks!!!!!! It's a very powerful and customizable tool, which improves your DAP capabilities a LOT. That includes while playing screen, battery life, codecs supporteds, awesome playlist support, etc. I always suggest people to try Rockbox ...

 

[TheMarchingMule]

Quote:

Originally Posted by epaludo /img/forum/go_quote.gif I always suggest people to try Rockbox ...

As long as you don't try it to the people at my school. All they cared about was the "pretty stuff" and the games it comes with.

 

[vYu223]

But isn't it annoying that you have to "shut down" the iPod (with rockbox) everytime you want to turn it off? With the original OS, it just goes on "standby." With rockbox, you have to wait for the OS to boot up again.

 

[TheMarchingMule]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vYu223 /img/forum/go_quote.gif But isn't it annoying that you have to "shut down" the iPod (with rockbox) everytime you want to turn it off? With the original OS, it just goes on "standby." With rockbox, you have to wait for the OS to boot up again.

Good point. This is also with itself a huge sapper of battery life (lose around 8-10% of battery life every time you boot it up).

 

[warrior05]

I will say first and foremost - I'm a big Rockbox fanboy. But to the OPs query I would probably say that Rockbox isn't for you. If you are happy with iTunes and ALAC lossless, you don't care much about gapless playback and fine tuning your sound is not for you then I say stay with Apple's firmware. You are only going to get annoyed at the decreased battery life if you switch.

There are only 2 reasons I have an iPod - the iMod and Rockbox. The iMod for obvious reasons. Gapless playback is very important to me due to the CDs I listen to where tracks typically lead into the next seamlessly. Also FLAC support was a big deal for me since it isn't proprietary and supported by other DAPs. And finally, the UMS support is huge because I really don't like iTunes' bloatware and its invasiveness.

 

[ppl]

I installed Rockbox in place of the Stock os on the IHP-120 and I was unable to read the new micro print that the display now had about 1/4 the letter hight of the stock OS. I went back to the stock OS because of that issue alone was unable to be resolved. in addition the generic USB driver can cause issues with some PC's and Mac's.

I don't know if these issues have been improved over the last year or not, If they have then Perhaps it might be worthwhile to revisit the rockbox at least on the IHP-120 and i would assume the 140 would also be similer

 

[tyrion]

I'm trying to decide whether Rockbox is worth it to me. I installed it on my
4g imod this past weekend. It's a little overwhelming with all the features. It's also a little difficult to read for the over 40 crowd. I've tried to find a way to increase the font size but no luck yet. I also notice that the first song I play pauses one or two times during playback and each time it resume play after a few seconds. It doesn't seem to happen on each song. It's very random. Finally, the battery life does not seem to be as long as with apple firmware. I had a full battery this morning using apple firmware and when I booted to RB the battery indicater was already showing a loss in battery life. I am going to test how long it last in RB compared to apple today.