[KLUG Members] iPod & Linux.

[Mike Williams]

>
> From:
> Greg Mason <gmason at fast-mail.org>
>
>
>>
>> I don't know anything about iPods.  Do they only play MP3s?  I've 
>> encoded most
>> of my stuff in ogg so I don't have to putter around trying to get 
>> MP3s to play (I don't buy MP3s I just rip what I buy on media).   And
>> I've been too lazy to
>> get around to buying a player yet.
>
>
> They will play OGG if you've got iPod Linux installed. iPod Linux 
> will play MP3s, OGGs and somewhat AAC. Since they had to reverse 
> engineer everything, they don't really use the audio decoding chips 
> in the iPod, just software. And the iPod doesn't have that great of a 
> CPU (cuz it doesn't need it). It was quite the feat for the iPod 
> Linux guys to get MP3s and/or OGGs to play in real-time.
>
> -Greg


Have they gotten it to fully realtime yet?  Last I heard it was 80% or
so of real time, meaning it would have to stop and think occasionally. 
Impressive feat in either case.

Now if somebody can convince them to do the same thing to the Rio
Karma.  Great device, plays ogg & FLAC as well as MP3, and it has an
Ethernet port and RCA jacks in the docking station!