Firmware Pros And Cons?

[jaesond]

Hello everyone. Recently I ordered a GP2X, and while waiting for it to ship I decided to check out software as well as firmware updates. I have a Sandisk 512MB card, which should allow me to flash the firmware.

While checking out all of the different firmwares, I noticed that different versions tend to add things, but break others (as an example, a comment on the 1.4.0 firmware tells me that overclocking is broken, but the photo viewer works better with large images,) and I'm curious as to whether someone has possibly compiled a list of all of the pros and cons of each firmware.

I myself have that fear that every time I flash the firmware, the device has a huge chance of screwing up during the flash and bricking my GP2X, and I'm sure there might be a few others out there that might feel the same way. I want to see if I can make a list of all of the pros and cons of each firmware, to help others like myself who are scared of even flashing their firmware once make a good decision. I'm hoping that you all as a community will be able to help me out here as to which option might be the best for me.

Of course, I could've just asked "What's the best firmware?" but I'd rather take a look at what's good and what's bad of each firmware, and I'm sure others might like this information as well. For example, I'll probably be using emulators most of the time, but there might be others that would rather use their GP2X to play music and videos instead, so one of the firmwares might be helpful for them, but not for me or others that would rather emulate things.

I'm hoping you guys can help me out here, and I apologize if it seems like I'm ranting. I also apologize if there's already a created list. I tried the search function, but it didn't exactly help me out.

 

[Shikaku]

Firmware 1.0.1:

From what DaveC says, it's not bright. There are no bonus features in anything, and battery life is lower. Movieplayer works perfectly, Image viewer is fudgy, and text reader is mostly the same as 1.4.0, minus a few bonus things.

Firmware 1.2.0/1

The screen became brighter in this version. Movieplayer sync is ruined on lots of movies. SD cards are not working and you might have to check both .0 and .1 to see which ones work with your SD card. Image viewer became very nice in this version as well.

1.4.0

Battery life improved, and battery light indicator now works. Movieplayer sync fixed, and resume function added to movieplayer. The movieplayer can also be underclocked to save battery (save=100 normal=166 full=200). Text viewer now has choosable colors and the ability to use your own .ttf font. There is now an LCD tweaker in the settings as well, although it does not compare to the original LCD tweaker. LCD tweaking/overclocking cannot be directly done, it requires a script to be run. There are guides on how to do this. Explorer now has delete/move/copy functions, and the LCD can be turned off in the MP3 player (is this new in 1.4.0 or has it been always there?)

Hope it helps..

 

[jaesond]

Thank you, this should help a lot.

So between all of the firmwares, there shouldn't be anything that completely breaks some applications?

 

[Shikaku]

Thank you, this should help a lot.

So between all of the firmwares, there shouldn't be anything that completely breaks some applications?

​

1.4.0 breaks Tileswitch's SOUND, and of course overclocking, but otherwise nothing else found so far...

 

[mooseknuckle2000]

I can turn off the lcd in mp3 player w/ version 1.2.0 Also, don't forget that w/ 1.2.0/.1 the tv out function for emus and games became avial.

 

[jmetal88]

I've been able to turn off the LCD in the mp3 player ever since 1.0.0.

 

[woogal]

While checking out all of the different firmwares, I noticed that different versions tend to add things, but break others (as an example, a comment on the 1.4.0 firmware tells me that overclocking is broken, but the photo viewer works better with large images,)

​

Clocking isn't broken, you just have to do it differently. Anything that makes an unofficial change to the way a system works runs the risk of not working in exactly the same way with later firmwares. In this case the menu resets the clockspeed everytime it runs so you can't just run the clocking app, return to the menu, then run a different app at the new clockspeed. Instead you must tell the system to run the clocking app then run the other app straight afterwards. Makes things a bit silly, but I'm sure it will be changed once/if the menu source becomes available.

 

[Nickmon]

I've been able to turn off the LCD in the mp3 player ever since 1.0.0.

​

Can emulator authors not use this as a second pause option?

I often pause my Gp2x as I change trains, would be good to turn off the LCD as well to save on battery power...

<_<

 

[Greenchili]

While checking out all of the different firmwares, I noticed that different versions tend to add things, but break others (as an example, a comment on the 1.4.0 firmware tells me that overclocking is broken, but the photo viewer works better with large images,)

​

Clocking isn't broken, you just have to do it differently. Anything that makes an unofficial change to the way a system works runs the risk of not working in exactly the same way with later firmwares. In this case the menu resets the clockspeed everytime it runs so you can't just run the clocking app, return to the menu, then run a different app at the new clockspeed. Instead you must tell the system to run the clocking app then run the other app straight afterwards. Makes things a bit silly, but I'm sure it will be changed once/if the menu source becomes available.

​

I thought people were saying also that the lcd is all out of wack when manually setting the clockspeed and after exiting the app.

 

[DaveC]

Firmware 1.0.1:

From what DaveC says, it's not bright. There are no bonus features in anything, and battery life is lower. Movieplayer works perfectly, Image viewer is fudgy, and text reader is mostly the same as 1.4.0, minus a few bonus things.

Firmware 1.2.0/1

The screen became brighter in this version. Movieplayer sync is ruined on lots of movies. SD cards are not working and you might have to check both .0 and .1 to see which ones work with your SD card. Image viewer became very nice in this version as well.

1.4.0

Battery life improved, and battery light indicator now works. Movieplayer sync fixed, and resume function added to movieplayer. Text viewer now has choosable colors and the ability to use your own .ttf font. There is now an LCD tweaker in the settings as well, although it does not compare to the original LCD tweaker. LCD tweaking/overclocking cannot be directly done, it requires a script to be run. There are guides on how to do this. Explorer now has delete/move/copy functions, and the LCD can be turned off in the MP3 player (is this new in 1.4.0 or has it been always there?)

Hope it helps..

​

FW 1.01 screen is not bright, as in too bright. It is perfect in 1.0.1 giving dark blacks and deep color. All other firmwares are TOO bright giving washed out black and faded colors. I think the screen looks AWFUL in the new firmware as it is way too bright giving poor color depth. It is part of the ignorant philosophy that "more is better" but it rs not better it is worse. They ruined the screen contrast which is why I won't upgrade. If you don't care about photo viewers or text readers stick with 1.0.1.

 

[Rayek]

Firmware 1.0.1:

From what DaveC says, it's not bright. There are no bonus features in anything, and battery life is lower. Movieplayer works perfectly, Image viewer is fudgy, and text reader is mostly the same as 1.4.0, minus a few bonus things.

Firmware 1.2.0/1

The screen became brighter in this version. Movieplayer sync is ruined on lots of movies. SD cards are not working and you might have to check both .0 and .1 to see which ones work with your SD card. Image viewer became very nice in this version as well.

1.4.0

Battery life improved, and battery light indicator now works. Movieplayer sync fixed, and resume function added to movieplayer. Text viewer now has choosable colors and the ability to use your own .ttf font. There is now an LCD tweaker in the settings as well, although it does not compare to the original LCD tweaker. LCD tweaking/overclocking cannot be directly done, it requires a script to be run. There are guides on how to do this. Explorer now has delete/move/copy functions, and the LCD can be turned off in the MP3 player (is this new in 1.4.0 or has it been always there?)

Hope it helps..

​

FW 1.01 screen is not bright, as in too bright. It is perfect in 1.0.1 giving dark blacks and deep color. All other firmwares are TOO bright giving washed out black and faded colors. I think the screen looks AWFUL in the new firmware as it is way too bright giving poor color depth. It is part of the ignorant philosophy that "more is better" but it rs not better it is worse. They ruined the screen contrast which is why I won't upgrade. If you don't care about photo viewers or text readers stick with 1.0.1.

​

I was wondering, once I got my GP2X and fired up DrMDx, that Rocket Knight Adventures was so washed out. It was like someone took the game, sprite by sprite, and took a 'sponge tool' to it. Really disappointing. So this is due to the new(er) firmware? Their fixes of the lines and stuff seemed to work, but how in the process did that end up desaturating the colors? I hope there's a fix soon, I thought RK's suit was blue

 

[Kag]

Other 1.4.0 Stuff
-Able to select different speeds in movie player(Save, Normal, Full[by pressing Y]) <-- not sure if it used to be there
-Has some audio bugs in both movie player and audio player(Suddenly goes max volume or stereo suddenly becomes reversed)

 

[hercule18]

Hi,

Does the battery life is better, same or worse from the firmware 1.0.1 to the 1.4.0?

bye

Herc. h34r:

 

[G Morgan]

Has nobody else had problems getting sound in squidgesnes. Since 1.4.0 i haven't been able to get any audio out however I alter the settings. At least it runs at reasonable speeds now though.

 

[DaveC]

I was wondering, once I got my GP2X and fired up DrMDx, that Rocket Knight Adventures was so washed out. It was like someone took the game, sprite by sprite, and took a 'sponge tool' to it. Really disappointing. So this is due to the new(er) firmware? Their fixes of the lines and stuff seemed to work, but how in the process did that end up desaturating the colors? I hope there's a fix soon, I thought RK's suit was blue

​

Yeah and Sonic is powder blue instead of dark blue. It really sucks I am suprised no one is bitching about it. Couldn't they add a brightness control into the settings?

 

[parag0n]

They have... the LCD gets darker and brighter depending on the settings in the built in lcd tweaker.

Seems you're the only bitch here DaveC

 

[reallynotnick]

They have... the LCD gets darker and brighter depending on the settings in the built in lcd tweaker.

Seems you're the only bitch here DaveC

​

*pulls out gat to back his homeboy DaveC*

That is not a brightness control, that is an LCD timing control, it just happens that the screen changes brightness at the two extremes. But when you are at those extremes you will see loads of weird stuff like wavy lines or super nasty scanlines or just weirded out colors.

The only thing the LCD timing thing is TRULY good for is getting rid of the wavy lines, nothing more nothing less.

What we also need is Contrast and brightness to make our screens look the best, not to mention getting rid of those nasty scanlines :angry:

 

[davidmt]

Yeah and Sonic is powder blue instead of dark blue. It really sucks I am suprised no one is bitching about it. Couldn't they add a brightness control into the settings?

​

You've also moved the brightness setting in DrMDx down to zero, correct? Once I did that I was happy.

 

[Khatoblepas]

I think (by quickly scanning over the technical docs), that there is in fact hardware brightness/contrast/gamma in the video post-processor. It just hasn't been used much =P.

Also, after using the built in LCD tweaker on setting 4 (Thanks, DaveC ^^), my screen is now almost perfect. No scanlines, rippling, or flickering. It's just a little too washed out. GPh needs to implement brightness/contrast/gamma next =P.

1.4.0's video is fine, no sync issues or whatever. Music is fine, though it NEEDS to be underclocked to about 66Mhz to give the recommended battery life. Photo viewer is fine. I wonder if they're using hardware scaling for that?

 

[DaveC]

I think (by quickly scanning over the technical docs), that there is in fact hardware brightness/contrast/gamma in the video post-processor. It just hasn't been used much =P.

Also, after using the built in LCD tweaker on setting 4 (Thanks, DaveC ^^), my screen is now almost perfect. No scanlines, rippling, or flickering. It's just a little too washed out. GPh needs to implement brightness/contrast/gamma next =P.

1.4.0's video is fine, no sync issues or whatever. Music is fine, though it NEEDS to be underclocked to about 66Mhz to give the recommended battery life. Photo viewer is fine. I wonder if they're using hardware scaling for that?

​

Well the source IS available for the kernal. I am not sure if that is where the brightness is stored or not. I know for a fact that brightness CAN be adjusted as screen brightness changes with different FW releases. Someone could hack in a brightness adjuster that even uses the same screen as the LCD tweaker.