# iPod is so freakin cool!



## kloan (Feb 22, 2002)

Man, this has got to be THE best toy I swear..

I've been playing around with an app called AlterPod, which allows a user to back up the graphics then alter them and re-upload them to the iPod by rewriting the firmware. So you can give your UI a personal touch! I made the top bar look like the metal in OS X, changed the volume bar to look like tiles, and changed the battery colour to blue.

Before that I was playing with iPodlinux, and that was fun too.. but the only way I could install it, was to use a method someone made (see here) that required installing older firmware... so I gave up on this because I would lose my nifty graphics I made.

Someone over on the iPodlinux.org forums posted an installer he made specifically for the iPod color/photo (this post) , and I just tried it out. It worked perfectly AND it kept my modded firmware intact!!

Now I can play all the nifty games that comes with linux, view short video clips, AND have a great new looking interface....

What other MP3 player on the market can you do this with?

This is my 5th iPod, and I'm just lovin it more and more.


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

I just installed the installer for iPodLinux on my 2G Mini. Worked seemlessly! w00t Tetris!


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## moonsocket (Apr 1, 2002)

Vexel said:


> I just installed the installer for iPodLinux on my 2G Mini. Worked seemlessly! w00t Tetris!


How did you get it to work on you mini? I thought they weren't supported?


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

I thought so too.. but I read in the post kloan submitted that a user installed it on the 1G Mini, decided to try it.. and it worked perfectly


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

moonsocket said:


> How did you get it to work on you mini? I thought they weren't supported?


i second that question? are there any hacks for 2G mini?


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

This Post which kloan provided.. works on my 2G iPod Mini. Tried and tested. It's working great 

Thanks for the link, kloan


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

so what can we do with hacking linux onto the iPod?


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## moonsocket (Apr 1, 2002)

well aparantly it killed my ipod. totally frozen. can't get it to do anything. won't mount. nothing


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

moonsocket said:


> well aparantly it killed my ipod. totally frozen. can't get it to do anything. won't mount. nothing


ouch! but someone posted in that thread that they got it to work with their 1st Gen Mini.


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## moonsocket (Apr 1, 2002)

quite a few people have actually. i dont know what happened!!!


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

Have you tried a reset of the iPod? holding in the Menu and Select buttons?


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## moonsocket (Apr 1, 2002)

thats weird. id di that before and nothing. but i tried one more time and it worked!!!

sigh. freakin out for nothing!!!!!!


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

did you use the Apple iPod restore to fix your Mini? that's what they say to do on iPodLinux site. it also says it doesn't work with current generations of iPods, including the Mini. so what's going on here?


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

This link.. provides something different than the one that's hosted on iPod linux.. the user created it himself.. it apparently works on all versions.. including the iPod Colors. All I know is it works on my 2G iPod Mini.. no hassles.


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

Vexel said:


> This link.. provides something different than the one that's hosted on iPod linux.. the user created it himself.. it apparently works on all versions.. including the iPod Colors. All I know is it works on my 2G iPod Mini.. no hassles.


so what cool things can i do with iPodLinux? i'd like to know what before i go risk blowing up my 2G Mini!!!


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

I am finding a few bugs.. Date and Time won't keep... and I'm not sure how to get Music to work. I'll have to read up on it a little.. then I'll post some more. It does work though.. that's a good step 


The games alone are worth the installation. I don't have my headphones.. so I'm not sure if recording works or not.. I'll have to test later.


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## kloan (Feb 22, 2002)

Recording AFAIK isn't working yet.. because they don't officially support running it on the current gen iPods, a lot of the cool features aren't yet up to snuff.. but they're getting close.

What's cool about that install is that when the latest kernel & podzilla is released with new features, all you have to do is browse the package contents of that installer and replace the two files with the new ones... ultra cool.. much easier than it was before to update the kernal with the manual install.

Since it seems to work perfectly, I don't understand why they say these aren't supported models and that it won't work, cuz it obviously does!

Btw, if you have a large music collection, chances are it'll lock up if you try to play any music.. hehe..

I just like the geek factor, and the games are great! 

Vexel, when you changed the time/date, did you go to Save settings?


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

kloan said:


> Recording AFAIK isn't working yet.. because they don't officially support running it on the current gen iPods, a lot of the cool features aren't yet up to snuff.. but they're getting close.
> 
> What's cool about that install is that when the latest kernel & podzilla is released with new features, all you have to do is browse the package contents of that installer and replace the two files with the new ones... ultra cool.. much easier than it was before to update the kernal with the manual install.
> 
> ...


Yes.. I tried that aswell.. but I'm uninstalling and reinstalling it this evening. Maybe doing it from the start will help.  I like the geek factor too


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## MacDaddy (Jul 16, 2001)

I want to be able to do Voice Recording on my Mini!!!


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## Jacklar (Jul 23, 2005)

I just installed this on my 60gig Colour Ipod.. works good so far.. but when trying to play music it does freeze up quite a bit. Mainly because I've got almost 12gigs of music on it. That and all my playlists are doubled up in the list which is weird.. yet when i reboot into the normal Ipod interface everything is normal..

BTW

How do you view videos with this?
How do you put new games on it/Where do you put them?

Kloan, did you use a theme for changing your ipod look with alterpod or just changed it yourself?


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## kloan (Feb 22, 2002)

For videos, they have to be properly encoded, or I should say de-coded.. they have to be a certain resolution, 24 bit, uncompressed, inverted and flipped upside down.. kind of annoying to do it.. here's the thread on it: 
http://www.ipodlinux.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2754

You can't add games yourself, well you can, but not like the ones that are on there because they're built into the kernal I believe.. You have to compile them yourself which I haven't learned how to do yet.

With AlterPod, I just imported whatever graphics I wanted to change into Photoshop and saved them. For some reason, Photoshop can't save in the .ppm format, so I had to click Save, not Save As.. so I had to copy them over to the 'modpics' folder that I created as per the instructions. One thing that sucks about using it is that I can't change the background colours for Brick and Parachute.. I think they'd look soooo much better with black backgrounds, but there doesn't seem to be a graphic for those.. must be hidden somewhere inside the firmware.


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

okay, i THINK i installed it onto my Mini. i selected it to boot iPod firmware by default. so how do i get it into iPodLinux? i did a reset and held on to the rewind but it still boots into the iPod firmware.


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

That's odd.. it should go into linux if you hold in the rewind button. Works for me anyway. Did you hold it long?


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

well, right after i do the menu+select and it reboots, i immediately held the rewind button. i held it till the Apple logo shows up on screen and it boots into the iPod menu. after that there's no point holding it anymore! so to answer the question, yes! 

 maybe it didn't install onto my Mini correctly. i'll try it again tonight after work.


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

I suggest uninstalling it first, then re-installing.  Maybe something didn't copy properly or something.. just make sure you delete what's already there first.. just so there's no errors in the future.


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

Vexel said:


> I suggest uninstalling it first, then re-installing.  Maybe something didn't copy properly or something.. just make sure you delete what's already there first.. just so there's no errors in the future.


okay … maybe a dumb question. how do i uninstall? i don't know if it even installed. how do i check?


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

The same application that you installed it with comes with an uninstaller. You did get the one from the link in previous posts right?


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## satchmo (May 26, 2005)

MacME said:


> so what cool things can i do with iPodLinux? i'd like to know what before i go risk blowing up my 2G Mini!!!



Doom for iPod

http://www.ipodlinux.org/Doom#Video


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

Vexel said:


> The same application that you installed it with comes with an uninstaller. You did get the one from the link in previous posts right?


ah okay. yeah i got the app from the link. just not at home to play. and no Macs at work.


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

satchmo said:


> Doom for iPod
> 
> http://www.ipodlinux.org/Doom#Video


damn, that looks quite good! but how do you move around with a click wheel? no colour screen for us Mini owners though!  

ouhhh ... are there any driving games? that be cool steering with a click wheel!


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## jicon (Jan 12, 2005)

I finally received my iPod with Color Screen from Apple yesterday. I was hesitant to move up from my 3G to the 4G model due to the Linux support apparently not being as great as the 3G.

Looks good, no problems. Can't play music on it, but then again, that ability was sparse at best on the 3G.


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## Vexel (Jan 30, 2005)

Apparently, Linux doesn't support podcasts very well/at all. If you roll back iTunes, it allows you to play music without a hitch. Or, so they say. I haven't tried this yet. Don't know if I will.. I may just wait for the update to iPodLinux.


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## dona83 (Jun 26, 2005)

This thread ain't nothin but a geek affair  I would understand putting Linux on x86 systems instead of Windows, but why ruin Macs, Palms, and iPods with Linux?


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

dona83 said:


> This thread ain't nothin but a geek affair  I would understand putting Linux on x86 systems instead of Windows, but why ruin Macs, Palms, and iPods with Linux?


ruin? how's it ruin? it's ALWAYS good to have other options available. and it's not like we can't switch back and forth either! i love being able to do things other than what the original manufacture intended! gives more value back on the money you invested in the product!

btw, does it matter what iPod firmware i'm running on my Mini? i currently have v1.4 on it.


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## Jacklar (Jul 23, 2005)

I think this will be nice to play games and use as eye candy/geek show off material but so far it doesn't like playing my slightly large music collection too well. But I've only played minimally with it.


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

question … why the hang up on iPodLinux not being able to play your songs considering you can just easily switch back to the Apple iPod OS to play your music?


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## dona83 (Jun 26, 2005)

As I said, it ain't nothin' but a geek affair.  I used to like tinkering with that when I was a kid, getting too old for it now.


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## Jacklar (Jul 23, 2005)

not hung up over I just switch it back =D

I'm wondering how it affects the the HD life by playing games etc on it? Does it affect it too much?


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## kloan (Feb 22, 2002)

I don't think it does any more than playing games with the Apple OS..

Playing movies on the otherhand drains the battery so fast!! I still haven't been able to prepare a video properly, it still plays with inverted colours.

More than anything though the one feature I really look forward to is recording, since Apple limits recording quality to such subpar levels, there's no point using it. But when it's finally released in linux, it'll be sweet for recording.


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

k ... this thing isn't working on my 6gig Mini. installing with either primary or secondary boot doesn't seem to matter.

does the kernel being 1.4 and/or the fact that i formatted to Windows (for file transfers) have anything to do with it?


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## kloan (Feb 22, 2002)

Shouldn't matter. If you used the same installer I used without updating the kernal, then it has the same one mine has.

If it's formatted for windows, that might have something to do with it. Mine is mac formatted..

Do you have disk mode enabled?


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## lp_chris12 (Sep 19, 2004)

Does installing Linux on your iPod make the warranty void? Or does Apple still consider it under warranty?


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## jicon (Jan 12, 2005)

What Apple doesn't know won't hurt it.

You can always reinstall the Apple firmware, wiping Linux off the iPod.


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## MacME (Mar 15, 2005)

kloan said:


> Shouldn't matter. If you used the same installer I used without updating the kernal, then it has the same one mine has.
> 
> If it's formatted for windows, that might have something to do with it. Mine is mac formatted..
> 
> Do you have disk mode enabled?


disk mode, as in using the iPod for transferring files correct? if so yes, that's why it's windows formatted.

darn ... i guess i have to re-format it yet again, back to Mac so that i can see if that's my problem!


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