More Linux Portable Media Players On The Way

An anonymous reader writes "According to LinuxDevices.com, Taiwanese motherboard maker FIC will unveil a Linux-based portable media player (PMP) at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week. FIC's 'Vassili' includes a 3.6-inch color LCD screen and a 20GB hard drive, and supports files in MPEG 1-4, MP3, WMA, WAV, ASF, AVI, and JPEG format. Speaking of Linux-based PMPs, Archos will also showcase its lastest PMP, the Pocket Media Assistant PMA400 at CES, and other Linux-based PMPs have recently been announced by iRiver, Veritouch, and Zupera."

Comments

But the real question is...

[mohrt]

can I hack it to run MAME?

But is it OPEN?

[orthogonal]

Serious question: does that mean they are open source?

I mean, as an end user, I don't much care if something is "linux-based" or "foot fungus-based" if I can't open it up and re-do the way that works best for me.

I had an Archos, and the guys at rockbox.org went to considerable trouble to reverse engineer it (and I contributed my own smidgen of code to that project), but Archos apparently saved a bunch of money on assembling their machines, and the damned thing broke down (and mine was far from the only one to break down -- I'll no longer buy anything from Archos).

And Archos's firmware was so ridiculously bad (the Rockbox guys sped up directory browsing alone by a factor of perhaps 50) that I no longer want to buy an mp3 player that I can't hack. Having hacked with teh Rockbox software, I know what I want in an mp3 player -- and I figure I'll have to do it myself.

I want a new mp3 player, indeed my mom wanted to buy me one for Christmas and asked what kind I wanted, but I wasn't anymore versed on what is open source and what isn't but is reversed engineered and what is totally closed, so I couldn't tell Mom what to buy.

Loss for me, loss for the electronics store, loss for the manufacturer.

So "linux-based" I don't really care about -- open source, I care about.

So reply if you know: what hard-drive based mp3 players have hackable source or open source firmware replacements?