HowTo use the Teac mp-233 MP4-player

[MU]

product:
http://dspd.teac.de/index.php?id=3038

Do NOT get a player that uses "MTV" videos, just "AVI"!
It seems, that MTV is a seldom closed source codec, so you might not be able to use it in Linux.

The mp-233 is a portable mp3/mp4 player, with a 1.5 inch display.
It was sold in MediaMarkt (a local technical supermarket) for 25 Euro with 2 Gigabyte internal ram.

Charge battery
First, you should plug it in a USB-port, and wait around 30 minutes, to charge the battery.
It shall need 3 hours for a full charge, but for first tests, 30 min. should be ok.

Problem: USB
I have many USB-ports.
When I attached it on them, after some seconds, the display began to flicker or disappeared.

When I typed in a consolewindow:
dmesg

then I saw several errors like "device disconnected".
Googling showed, that such errors can appear on some ports, but they appeared on all 3 USB adapters I have.
It took me hours to understand, that it was not a driver problem, and at the end, I just tried every stupid thing I could imagine.
The solution finaly was, to use a cheap USB-hub (these cost 7 to 10 Euro).
With a more expensive HUB (with own powersupply), I had the errors, too.

So it is REALLY good luck, if it works.
Try every combination that is possible.

With the cheap hub, I very seldom have problems now.
I just got errors twice, when no number could be assigned. Plugging it out and in again solved this.

mount player

Now the hardware works, but how do we access it?
dmesg shows such lines:

usb 4-2.1.3: USB disconnect, address 26
usb 4-2.1.3: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 27
usb 4-2.1.3: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
scsi19 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
usb-storage: device found at 27
usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning
scsi 19:0:0:0: Direct-Access EM783RB MP4 Player 1.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] 4024320 512-byte hardware sectors (2060 MB)
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] Write Protect is off
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] Assuming drive cache: write through
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] 4024320 512-byte hardware sectors (2060 MB)
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] Write Protect is off
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] Mode Sense: 03 00 00 00
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] Assuming drive cache: write through
sdc:
sd 19:0:0:0: [sdc] Attached SCSI removable disk
usb-storage: device scan complete

So the device is sdc.
In the drivemounters I see sdc1 to sdc4, but they cannot be mounted.
Instead, do it by hand:

mkdir /mnt/sdc
mount /dev/sdc /mnt/sdc

IMPORTANT:
before you unplug the player, you MUST type:
umount /mnt/sdc


use player
Now you could copy some mp3 files to the player.

I wanted to use video movies, and tried just these.
First I used avidemux from the forum, but it does not support the XVID codec.
Then I downloaded the current from Slackware 12.1 with gslapt.
That runs fine (over 11 MB though, as it downloads several dependencies).
BUT: I was not able to create valid files for the player.
So we cannot use the fine grafical avidemux

Google then showed, that the Windows-Software to create matching videos, has a .ini:
/root/.wine/drive_c/Programme/AVIConverter/Converter.ini

Here I found options for "mencoder", that is included as windows-version.

So I installed mencoder from:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=26511


I ran it with the options from the windowsversion (from the .ini):

mencoder -ofps 15 -vf-add scale=128:128 -vf-add expand=128:128-1:1 -srate 44100 -ovc xvid -xvidencopts bitrate=400:max_bframes=0:quant_type=h263:me_quality=0 -oac lavc -lavcopts acodec=mp2:abitrate=96 test.avi -o output.avi

That is ONE long line!

If you have a different player, use one of the other options there, that match your display-resolution.
It is a generic tool from Teac, that can be installed in wine to get the options, but the program itself does not work.
So I attach the .ini, in case you need options from it.
Like this there is no need for you, to install the Windows program.


So you might use such a script:

video2teac

Code: Select all

#!/bin/bash
mencoder -ofps 15 -vf-add scale=128:128 -vf-add expand=128:128:-1:-1:1 -srate 44100 -ovc xvid -xvidencopts bitrate=400:max_bframes=0:quant_type=h263:me_quality=0 -oac lavc -lavcopts acodec=mp2:abitrate=96 "$1" -o "$2"

So you could convert a video like this:
video2teac test.avi output.avi

Then copy output.avi to the player, unmount it, and enjoy your video!

Mark