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Juicebox Hacking

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the because-you-can dept.

magic_user writes "Now that Mattel's JuiceBox can be had for $12 (Target, WalMart), this seems like a perfect toy for hackers. I've found a picture frame hack but what I'm really looking for is a way to play my own videos on it. It runs uclinux so this shouldn't be too hard, right? "

16 of 259 comments (clear)

  1. $12? Hardly... by garcia · · Score: 5, Informative

    From what I can see (walmart.com, amazon.com, and froogle.com) the JuiceBox is about $40 to $50. The only place I can find it quoted for being less is at the blog that this story links to... Perhaps they were on sale, the unit was in an opened package, or the online prices do not reflect the in-store ones. I don't know. YMMV.

    It seems that this would have been a more informative link to include in the story as it gives quite a bit of information about the JuiceBox and links to some of the code from Emsoft.

    It does seem like an interesting device to putz around with but I'll hold out until you can display pics via wlan to it :)

  2. hacking? by justforaday · · Score: 4, Funny

    I wouldn't exactly call it "hacking," but I've been modding juiceboxes for years. All it involves is a straw...

    --
    I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
    1. Re:hacking? by lpangelrob2 · · Score: 4, Funny
      I wouldn't exactly call it "hacking," but I've been modding juiceboxes for years. All it involves is a straw...

      Have you ever noticed what color the hole that you stick the straw is? Silver. That's right. It's tinfoil.

      There's something in these "juiceboxes" that they don't want us to know about, and someday our meddling with juiceboxes with straws will get us in trouble...

      --
      -Rob
      Marriage doesn't have to suck!
    2. Re:hacking? by morcheeba · · Score: 3, Funny

      I modded my juice box in highschool.

      The goal was to make the drink still cold for my long bus ride home in the afternoon. Even when I froze the drink, it got warm sitting in my locker. I started by making a form-fitting styrofoam cooler out of left-over packing material. The walls were probably 1/4" thick. Result: cool, but not ice-cold. So, on my second try, I found some thicker sytrofoam (1/2-3/4") and built a box out of that. Result: still frozen solid - success! Of course I couldn't drink it, but that wasn't the point...

      --
      HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
  3. Arm port of Debian by James_Duncan8181 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Get the ARM port of Debian on there and compile mplayer to an ARM target. Failing that use the debian port of Xine. Does this rate a /. article?

    --
    "To any truly impartial person, it would be obvious that I am right."
    1. Re:Arm port of Debian by AKAImBatman · · Score: 3, Informative

      MPlayer and Xine would probably be too slow. I'm digging through the specs now, but my guess is that this has a built-in MPEG decoder chip. Alternatively, it might just accept the hit in ROM costs and store the video in a poorly compressed format. It would certainly make sense if all you're storing are a few, low-res, low-quality music videos.

      --
      Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
    2. Re:Arm port of Debian by WouldIPutMYRealNameO · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I don't think it will be quite that easy. The CPU in this thing is an ARM7 with no MMU - which is why it runs uclinux instead of regular linux. That means that you can't just drop regular packages onto it. I think that you need to custom locate (in memory) each package that you want to run, and compile it yourself. I could be wrong - but it certainly isn't going to be as easy as just running Debian on it.

      --
      Damnit - I wanted my nick to be "WouldIPutMYRealNameOnSlashdot"
  4. In the words of Meatwad... by The_Rippa · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...do what now?

  5. Noisy website by th77 · · Score: 5, Informative

    You could have warned us that the JuiceBox link leads to an obnoxiously noisy site. Fun way to get noticed at work. Yick.

    --
    Your favorite sig sucks
    1. Re:Noisy website by LetterJ · · Score: 3, Interesting

      See, the fact that you can even hear sound from your PC at work is a foreign concept to me. Everywhere I've worked, hooking actual speakers to a workstation would get you smacked down pretty quickly. If you actually need the sound, they've invented tiny speakers you can temporarily strap to your ears that let you hear the sound without anyone else having to.

      I'd never even think to warn about the sound on a site because I don't have publicly audible speakers connected to any PC I own except the one in my home theater.

      --

      The Glass is Too Big: My Take on Things
  6. If there's anything I've learned... by AKAImBatman · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...it's that hardware intended for kids is usually useless for anything else. I've seen quite a few electronic gizmos in recent years, and every time I look at hacking them into a more general purpose device, I find that they are far too mission specific to be of any real-world use. Half the time you open them up and find nothing more than a chip, small PCB, and some epoxy holding the whole thing together.

    If you're interested in replicating this, it might make a "fun" home project to build one using services like Pad2Pad, Digikey, and a handful of parts. Once you have the design down, you can sell them in bulk for a similar cost. Perhaps even as "developer kits" that allow others to fool around with them. Just don't waste your time on a toy. :-/

    --
    Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
  7. Buy one now by TimmyDee · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Because it won't be a product for very long. Other than for hackers and a few "must have everything" kids, I can't see this succeeding as a product. The number of qualifiers/caveats/limitations of this thing as mentioned in the FAQ are ridiculous. Want to play MP3s? You need to purchase special software. Oh, and the sound quality is limited to 128 K/s, so all those songs you ripped at higher quality won't work. Want to watch movies? Again, special software. To store anything, you'll need an SD or MMC card (not included) to boost the storage past the 32 MB. The game selection is bound to be limited as they are cartridge based and proprietary.

    Oh, and one more thing: It's not cool. By the time kids will be able to use it, they'll be old enough to know they want an iPod/GameBoy SP/PSP/DS/etc. and not some childish thing from Mattel.

    --
    Per Square Mile, a blog about density
  8. here are the technical specs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    2.75 inch 240x160 color LCD
    http://www.elinux.org/wiki/JuiceBox

  9. YES! $12! No need to hack it... by thatguy2g · · Score: 5, Informative

    My co-worker bought one of these for $12 at Target (look in the clearance items). A usefull thing to note: The "mp3 adaptor" is really an SD Card adaptor, and it plays mp3s and mpeg4 video clips. You don't have to "hack" anything, just put a 512MB SD card in with your properly encoded video clip and you're good to go. Then again, you're gonna get what you pay for. The screen can only handle a wopping 6fps. My advice: buy a PSP and a big memory stick duo.

  10. Re:The Wait by afabbro · · Score: 5, Funny
    I'm 25, and she's 11.

    You should be able to take her in another year or so, if you train hard.

    --
    Advice: on VPS providers
  11. Easier and Better - Hacked VideoNow Jr by ewanrg · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Rather than hacking the JuiceBox, you might want to consider getting a VideoNow Jr and hacking that instead. There are filters out there for VideoDub, and if you don't mind a bit of dremeling, you can get it to accept a standard CD-R (get the silvery ones like Sony).

    You can put up to 35 minutes of encoded video on a CD-R at a decent quality (18fps) and sound.

    Why go this route rather than a portable DVD player? Somewhat cheaper, don't have to hold the unit folded open (big plus for my handicapped daughter) and RUGGED (bigger plus for my handicapped daughter). We've dropped ours numerous times on the concrete driveway getting her out of the car, and the unit skips and then keeps playing.

    Of course we're not total idiots, so we've bought a backup unit for the eventual day that the driveway is harder than expected :-)