mp3 device issues

lekremyelsew · 12-25-2008, 10:07 PM

Hello,
I got a Samsung P2 MP3 player today and I cant seem to get it to work with linux.
It came with a CD with software on it but it is exclusively for Windows.
The actual device is working fine, I just don't know of any software that can read it.
I red in my system help file to try and use Banshee for it, but as soon as I plug in my MP3 player to my computer, Banshee crashes.
I have tried running the software through WINE but it doesn't work. I have also tried running VMware, but I have no clue how that works.
Does anyone know of any other ideas?
The only thing I can think of is to resize my partition of my hard drive and install a copy of Windows. But does resizing a partition make it lose data?

r1d3r · 12-25-2008, 10:19 PM

It seems your mp3player is a MTP device which means you dont have access to the filesystem,
you can add media to your player with rhythmbox, but first you need to enable the MTP Device Support plugin.

lekremyelsew · 12-25-2008, 10:22 PM

thanx
do you know of a way i could transfer video and pictures to the device?

r1d3r · 12-26-2008, 01:44 AM

Actually i didnt find any thing for video and pics, but you can send them from command line with "mtp-tools".

jschiwal · 12-26-2008, 02:26 AM

I use amarok with my P2. I have libmtp8 installed. It contains the hal information about the P2 player.
You can also use the "mtpfs" program to mount the P2 player somewhere and copy the MP3's, pictures & videos in the respective folders. You can copy & delete files, but you can't move files from a directory in the P2. To use mtpfs, you need to make sure the fuse module is loaded in the kernel. Using the program itself couldn't be simpler. "mtpfs <directory>". That's it. Now you access the P2 as if it were a directory.

You may have a problem with videos however. The P2 seems even touchier about the videos it plays than the Sansa View. While the packaging claimed to support a variety of formats without mentioning the converter program, it seems to only support wmv video. I have only recently purchased the P2 and haven't taken the time to study the xml output from the "mtp-connect" program (mtptools).

Segment of /usr/share/hal/fdi/information/20thirdparty/10-usb-music-players-libmtp.fdi for the P2.

Code:

      <!-- Samsung YP-P2 -->
      <match key="usb.vendor_id" int="0x04e8">
        <match key="usb.product_id" int="0x5083">
          <match key="info.capabilities" contains_not="portable_audio_player">
            <append key="info.capabilities" type="strlist">portable_audio_player</append>
          </match>
          <merge key="info.vendor" type="string">Samsung</merge>
          <merge key="info.product" type="string">YP-P2</merge>
          <merge key="info.category" type="string">portable_audio_player</merge>
          <merge key="portable_audio_player.access_method" type="string">user</merge>
          <match key="portable_audio_player.access_method.protocols" contains_not="mtp">
            <append key="portable_audio_player.access_method.protocols" type="strlist">mtp</append>
          </match>
          <append key="portable_audio_player.access_method.drivers" type="strlist">libmtp</append>
          <match key="portable_audio_player.output_formats" contains_not="audio/mpeg">
            <append key="portable_audio_player.output_formats" type="strlist">audio/mpeg</append>
          </match>
          <match key="portable_audio_player.output_formats" contains_not="audio/x-ms-wma">
            <append key="portable_audio_player.output_formats" type="strlist">audio/x-ms-wma</append>
          </match>
          <merge key="portable_audio_player.libmtp.protocol" type="string">mtp</merge>
        </match>
      </match>

Note: the mtp HAL fdi file is also supplied by a libmtp-hal package.