Well here's MY ebay MP4 story! I bought a MP4 player on ebay and it arrived, I found it could play MTV files and there was a link offering free downloads, so I went there
(here) only to discover it was not in English :-( the MP4 player looked EXACTLY like this one
here where it is referred to as a BC-662, but see the pictures below.. it's easier
The back.. there was a sticker here saying 512M which covered the screws
and the side with the buttons - the other side not pictured says DIGITAL AUDIO PLAYER and has a picture of some headphones and it has a second headphone socket, a small oval silver sticker saying 65K and a Chinese symbol covered the screw on that side.
I also found an American reseller who had the same item listed as a "Blue Thunder Hawk" or something equally dramatic.. but I've misplaced that page.. they had no software downloads so it's irrelevant really. Then I went to http://filext.com to find out what an MTV file was (they list all file extensions there - bookmark it people, it comes in handy!) before I eventually came across these forums http://www.moviecodec.com/topics/7595p34.html
where I also learned some players could play AMV files! I downloaded one of the converters, and made both MTV and AMV files, and finding the AMV's quite a bit smaller, I thought it would be nice to upgrade my MP4 player so it could play them :-) .. (I used the MTV converter version 3.10 that came on the driver CD, and the AVM's were done with version 3.57 which I downloaded from somewhere else.)
Now being the nervous sort, and VERY wary of firmware upgrades.. and reading all the trials and tribulations of owners who'd attempted firmware updates unsuccessfully, I decided to read ALL of this forums posts (address above) from the beginning to the end, taking careful notes as I went.
Before I go further, I should detail my players capabilities as they were when it first arrived..the main menu offered settings > music > ebook reader > recording > voice > telephone book > fm > picture viewer, not necessarily in that order (I'll get to that later!).
Under system settings (in order) it offered :
clock
lcd
language (second down was English - take note, this is important!)
power off
replay
online
memory info
firmware (also important!! :)
firmware upgrade (THE most important menu item!)
exit
the firmware was listed as:
ACTS16D_13
2005/06/01
3.2.13
2005/04/20
I saw quite a few posts talking about this firmware, and a potential upgrade to ACTS16D_16 which would play AMV files, but as I said before, I wasn't about to go tampering with firmware without being COMPLETELY sure what I was doing.
OK, so I headed back to the amusingly written manual that came with the MP4 player, and taking out my microscope, I read the what, 0.5 point font, and came away none the wiser, except for the fact that there was some vague reference to a possible upgrade to the firmware on the driver CD. About this CD - there were three folders inside and a bin file labelled "Upgrade the procedure.bin" .. quaint.. the three folders were:
1.Colourful hold S16D new tool 3.10.
2. Driver
3. Upgrade the tool
nice.
Hmm.. what's the chances that the "Upgrade the procedure.bin" firmware would give me a few more features?
Not wanting to cock things up completely, I downloaded and attempted to run the s1fwx.exe firmware backup program spoken of in the forums.. but without success. Maybe I had to be in the "firmware upgrade" setting on the MP4 player at the time, I don't know.. I didn't think that far ahead.
so figuring I had nothing to lose by upgrading to the NEW firmware that was on the CD, I decided to load the "Upgrade the procedure.bin" firmware.
I fiddled about until I realised that the MP4 player had to be set to "firmware upgrade" on the setup menu BEFORE being plugged in. OK, now I launched the program (I think it was "MP3 player utilities 3.10" software) that I had installed from the CD - the same prog that has a convert to MTV program, but I set it to upgrade the firmware and sat back for a few seconds until it was done.
forgive me being a bit vague about what I noticed next, even when I take notes my memory is a bit iffy ( a few too many blows to the head over the years !) Anyway, when I turned on the blasted thing it was in Chinese, so it took me a while to navigate my way through unfamiliar menus to get it back to English - hence the reason I've listed the menus above in case someone else needs to find their way back to English!
OK, back to English.. but wait - my telephone book has now gone - and so has my ebook reader! I dive into the menus and discover my firmware has been 'upgraded' from version ACTS16D_13 to version ACTS16D_08 !!!
arrrrrrggggggg!!
I now have firmware version:
ACTS16D_08wtf??
damn. I've gone backwards and LOST features :-(
After I put all the furniture in the house back together, I sat down with my pen and paper and began making notes about what I'd done (to the best of my recollection) and what I was about to do. Unfortunately I forgot where I put my notes (bloody brain!), so most of this is reconstructed from my abysmal memory.
I thought oh well, mebbe I can get back to where I started so I found this page: MP4 Hospital and downloaded the 3.2.13 firmware, imagining it was the same as my original firmware.. (the telephone software on this page worked fine in the ORIGINAL configuration though). I ran my MP4 firmware update software again, installed this firmware and sighed, assuming I was back to where I started, and I swore that was it, I was going to accept the player with whatever limitations it had.
I unplugged the Mp4 player and tried to turn it on. nothing. Poked a few buttons, again nothing - With panic rising, I plugged the MP4 player into my USB port, it was recognised as a removable disk - but the LCD still showed no response! oh crap - I've completely stuffed it now!
Miserable at having turned my one day old, kewl toy into an expensive and bulky memory stick at 11 pm at night, I had to explain to my wife who'd just come home all excited from her cricket club (where she'd been announced as being the new vice-captain AND a selector!) why I was not as enthusiastic about her news as I should have been. We sat down to watch a movie since it was Friday night and she was all excited still
I went to sleep, deciding that there was little I could do when I was tired, cranky and a little teary at having watched Jersey Girl - no wisecracks people.. it was sad!
Saturday morning and I've forgotten almost everything I've done with the player to date, I go to this page http://s1mp3.secret.com.br/en/downloads_tools.php and download S1res.exe which allows me to look over the firmware that I've downloaded, as well as the amusingly named "Upgrade the procedure.bin" from the CD. After looking over ALL the logos and contents of the firmware, I realised none of it was the same as the original firmware and I'd probably be best getting this idiotic sounding firmware back onto the thing so at least I have SOME degree of functionality.
http://s1mp3.secret.com.br/en/docs_deadrec.php was the page I turned to, where it is explained in great detail how to reset MP4 devices.. I read it through THOROUGHLY and grabbed my soldering iron, a magnifying glass and a screwdriver. I desoldered only the positive lead of the battery, then set to finding the appropriate pins of the Samsung chip to short out to reset the device.
Hmm, holding a bright torch to the chip, a screwdriver to the teeny terminals while connecting the MP4 player to the device proved tricky, but what I found worked well was to:
1. connect the MP4 player to the USB port (the computer recognised the disk and registered it as a drive)
2. short pin 30 and 31.. or any pins in that general vicinity and then..
3. the drive disappears from 'My Computer' momentarily and a box popped up saying something like 'device is reset and ready to have the firmware installed'
Oh yay! It asks for the location of the firmware so I browsed to the CD and pointed it toward what I now gratefully appreciate being called "Upgrade the procedure.bin"
it tottles off and begins to install the firmware and announces it's success, whereupon I unplugged the MP4 player, resoldered the positive battery lead back in place then started it and navigated the menus to put it back to English (see, above I noted the menu structure so I could get back to a coherant language set :-)
I'd still like that original firmware back, so if anyone has it
( ACTS16D_13, 2005/06/01 , 3.2.13 , 2005/04/20 ) , either downloaded successfully from their MP4 player (the SAME one, not something vaguely similar) I'd really appreciate it.To those who've written guides on the various forums - my thanks. To those who've generously put firmware, software and tools up to help the stupid (me) I'd like to express my grateful appreciation.
To those contemplating upgrading their firmware, please think twice unless you are careful and KNOW what you're doing or, extremely patient in possession of good eyesight and adept with a soldering iron and a screwdriver.
to the owner of this page - a http://s1mp3.secret.com.br/en/docs_deadrec.php thank you SO much
which I did, and after working hard to overcome Gmail's hatred of attachments he sent me the firmware. I opened it with s1res_v13 and looked it over, finding the icons to be different from my original version (I got cute girls this time!) I thought 'this looks pretty close' and so again overcoming my fear of firmware I fired up the update software and flashed the MP4 player, disconnected it, reconnected and formatted it and bingo! I now have the ebook reader and the phone book back again :-)
The volume buttons on the front just flash now when they're pressed and nothing happens volume-wise, though pressing the play/pause button on the side makes the volume go either full on or full off - so I'm still not quite there yet, but I'm closer :-)
ANOTHER update! well Lukasz got back to me again (ain't the net wonderful!) and found me this
http://www.bit-com.pl/baza/Mp4_firmware.zip which was exactly hat I was after!, it came from this site
http://www.usboem.com/info.asp?id=237 and it is for player "yagu 708cf+ "
wow, we now have this same model listed as a 'Blue Flame' (or whatever the American distributor called it)
http://www.uetechnology.com/productdetail.asp?id=182 lists it as a UE-M4004
http://www.uetechnology.com/detail.asp?id=15 and http://www.yesuntec.com/ call it a VIP-4 player
http://junsuntech.en.alibaba.com/group/50080559/MP3_and_MP4_Players.html lists it as a MP4-02
and now we have it as a "yagu 708cf+"
again, thanks to everyone who's helped either directly or indirectly :-)
4:51 p.m. - 2005-09-26
Recent entries:
get up maddness - 2011-10-15
iMobiler - 2011-09-19
pirates! download piracy.. and Pirates! - 2010-03-19
Climategate reward - 2009-12-04
so you want to be a pirate? - 2009-04-21
My profile
Archives
Notes
Diaryland
Random
RSS
others: