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Syncing Music Players In Linux?

Posted by kdawson on from the keeping-it-consistent dept.

Daengbo writes "I recently sold my old laptop to a friend, and she asked me to keep Ubuntu on it rather than installing Windows for her. To help her with the transition, I wrote two intro lessons for her, but we've hit a stumbling block. The iRivier Clix (4GB) she's been using syncs with Windows Media Player. My research shows that the model has both an MTP for the sync and a UMS mode which acts as a mass storage device. Rhythmbox's 'Scan Removable Media' doesn't pick up anything from the USB mass storage device, and although Syncropated claims to support these types of devices, it doesn't find any supported devices. Unless you use an iPod, this appears to be a real weak point in the Linux desktop. Do you sync your mass storage devices and music players? What do you use?"

17 of 278 comments (clear)

  1. What do you use? by Rik+Sweeney · · Score: 5, Informative

    Amarok

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    Summation 2
    1. Re:What do you use? by BecomingLumberg · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Listen is a good Amarok clone that is GTK (and a believe less of a resource hog). http://www.listen-project.org/

      --
      If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.-TJ
    2. Re:What do you use? by numbski · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Amarok is good, but I think he's overlooking the obvious here (well...obvious to anyone who's worked with UMS devices at all....)

      What's happening with his player is that it is either - 1, not recognized by the OS as a UMS (doesn't sound like this...he's able to put files on it and mount it, etc), or 2, the application doesn't recognize the device. If the latter, then what he needs to do is get the USB Vendor ID and Product ID of the player, and send it to the devs so that they can add support for it. If he doesn't mind recompiling from source, he can probably locate the file where the USB identifiers are kept, add them locally, and recompile.

      That said, there are a bunch of devices out there that misrepresent themselves as UMS, but in reality are not. I had a camera like this. It took SmartMedia flash, and had a USB cable that was suppose to allow me to plug the camera in and use it as a card reader. Linux, FreeBSD, and MacOSX immediately attempted to load the UMS driver, as the device claimed this, but then failed miserably. The camera came with a driver disk for Windows, which should have tipped me off right away what was happening. Essentially whomever wrote the firmware for the camera had it identify with that class, even though it wasn't true. It triggers the OS to load the wrong driver, and somehow they worked around that for the Windows driver. If he has that going on, he's pretty much SOL. If he can mount the player and copy files, it's just a matter of getting those two ID's into the hands of the developers, and temporarily modifying his own build until the next version comes out.

      This is why Open Source stuff is cool. Your device isn't supported, but is standards compliant? Add it to the sources and recompile. :)

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      Karma: Chameleon (mostly due to the fact that you come and go).

  2. I never liked the iRiver by bssteph · · Score: 5, Informative

    My experience with iRivers is a bit old (it's before there was a libmtp), but here goes.

    libmtp should work, in the normal "well, it's supposed to work" sense, (as listed at http://libmtp.sourceforge.net/index.php?page=compa tibility) but note I've never used that model. The sparse Syncropated page doesn't say if it actually *uses* libmtp, and in fact, I can't see any mention of MTP on their website; it only mentions mass storage.

    My iRiver required some incantation when turning on the device to put it into mass storage mode, I would assume this is still the case. I think you had to hold stop while turning it on, but it's been so long and it was so immediately frustrating that I've purged that experience from my brain. It could have been anything.

    Since this is an Ask article... I use an iAudio X5 (http://www.cowonglobal.com/product/product_X5_fea ture.php). The mother company is Korean, so the website and docs can be a bit funny with the English at times, but otherwise it's a great product. Rockbox (http://www.rockbox.org/) is a safe firmware replacement, and it also, well, rocks. In either firmware, the device is a simple mass storage device (with no funny business other than an obnoxious adapter necessary for USB), and KDE ([insert dig on Gnome]) picks it up immediately.

    For actually syncing, I'm a junkie for simplicity: I use rsync and a directory full of symlinks to the music I want.

  3. It's the Linux (tm) way by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Write your own Driver you n00b!
    Seriously though.

  4. AmaroK. by MoOsEb0y · · Score: 4, Informative

    I use AmaroK. It works with my 4g iPod and my Blackberry Pearl. It will sync any generic mass storage device also. I'd give it a try.

  5. I haven't tried it but ... by eldavojohn · · Score: 4, Informative
    ... this doesn't work?

    From that project:

    Unless otherwise noted, projects support all iRiver iFP devices. Users have reported successfully accessing models iFP-1xx,3xx,5xx,7xx,8xx,9xx and N10. We don't anticipate difficulty supporting future models.

    (Note: iRiver offers 'UMS' firmware for some iFP models. Devices running UMS firmware are compatible with generic USB Mass Storage drivers, and do not need any of the drivers mentioned here.)
    Personally, (most) MP3 players I've hooked up to Linux through a USB have been recognized as just plain old drives. You put the MP3 in the right folder (sometimes takes testing) and there it is, ready to play.
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    My work here is dung.
  6. Re:Please -- Mount Man by grev · · Score: 4, Informative

    Mounting won't do it for a lot of players. I have a Samsung YH-925 and although it functions as a UMS, when files are copied to the player they are not indexed, meaning you can't play any music without syncing it through a program like Windows Media Player.

  7. Try looking on... by Zwack · · Score: 4, Informative
    Anything but Ipod The forums are very helpful...

    Some people in the Sandisk Sansa E200 Linux forum have run MTP Mode on Linux...

    Z.

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    -- Under/Overrated is meta-moderation, and therefore is Redundant.
  8. Using the irivier Clix on Linux by GRW · · Score: 3, Informative

    A quick Google search got me this: Using the irivier Clix on Linux

  9. can't blame you for trying by flynt · · Score: 4, Funny

    From the bottom of the first tutorial...

    Cassandra said...

            this is awesome Dan thanks!! you OBVIOUSLY have way too much time on your hands...lol but i'm glad to benefit from it!

    In other words, DENIED! Sorry, man, we've all been there.

  10. Re:Please -- Mount Man by wiggles · · Score: 5, Funny

    My thoughts exactly.

    It's obvious that this girl is interested -- otherwise, why else would she switch to Ubuntu?

    Advice to the geek who posted this: This is not about the OS or her mp3 player or whatever. This is about her wanting to get with you. That's why she kept Ubuntu, because she wants to show you she's open to the things you like. She could give a rat's ass what OS she uses otherwise.

    Go get some.

  11. My solution by JustNiz · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I buy players wisely first. I make a point of researching beforehand and only buy players that:

    1) Appear as a generic storage device when plugged into USB and doesn't require drivers or other software to be installed on your PC.
    ( this gets around any Windows-only and most DRM limitations, and also means I can use it as portable storage for other files).

    2) Supports ogg ( and FLAC if possible )

    3) Doesn't contain DRM

  12. Amarok again by Apreche · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I don't use KDE, but I use Amarok. Honestly, it is the only media player on Linux worth anything. Banshee and others look fine at first, but you will realize they are unstable pieces of junk if you try to add more than 50 songs to the library. Also, if you use an iPod, you can get it to work with Amarok or other Linux apps quite easily. However, the experience will never be as smooth as iTunes. This is a serious problem. This is why even though I run Linux on all my machines, I still use an iPod with a Mac mini for podcast listening. There simply isn't any other solution that works as smoothly.

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  13. Re:Please -- Mount Man by sYkSh0n3 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Advice to the geek who posted this: This is not about the OS or her mp3 player or whatever. This is about her wanting to get with you. That's why she kept Ubuntu, because she wants to show you she's open to the things you like. She could give a rat's ass what OS she uses otherwise.

    Slashdot: Relationship advice from my mother's basement, next caller please.

  14. You are positively batshit insane. by mrsbrisby · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Unless you use an iPod, this appears to be a real weak point in the Linux desktop.
    iRiver doesn't work very well on a Macintosh either, so I bet you consider it a weak point in the Macintosh desktop as well.

    How about this: if iRiver doesn't work in Linux, complain to iRiver.

    With Linux, you could also fix the problem yourself. You could also pay someone to fix the problem. If the iRiver is popular enough, you could also wait and someone else will fix it for you.

    With Windows, you don't have those options, so I consider that a weak point in the Windows desktop.
  15. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 4, Informative

    Comment removed based on user account deletion