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I’ve been on a kick lately buying bulk lots of MP3 players and reviving/updating/upgrading them. Keeps me busy, keeps them out of landfills, and is fun for me. Recently I got a bulk lot that had numerous Creative Zens: two Micro, one Touch, and one Vision:M. It was a major PITA to get these working so I wanted to document this for myself and others. I archived all the files on github – see brianpipa/CreativeZen.

First, big thanks to Reddit user jenrenefefe whose complete Creative Zen update guide was instrumental in helping me do this. I also archived it on github as a PDF, just to be safe.

OVERALL

You will need Windows 98. I followed the instructions in the guide to download a Windows 98 ISO. My only laptop is Linux Mint and I didn’t want to try dual booting it and I tried VirtualBox on it but I couldn’t get it to work. So, I bit the bullet and spent $23 on an old laptop to put Windows on. This is now my “old tech” laptop. I installed Windows 10 Home and VirtualBox, and setup VirtualBox with Windows 98. Follow the info in the guide. This was not easy. The laptop came with no OS on it, and I had to jump through all kinds of hoops to install Windows on it… but I eventually got it done.

I’m not going to go through the software/firmware/drivers – the guide goes through that – I’m just going to go over the hardware I used to upgrade the drives.

Continue reading →

I picked these two up from ebay and both were in Japanese and have no option to change languages. Did some research and figured out how to switch them to English. Despite them not being listed on https://www.rockbox.org/wiki/SonyNWDestTool the tool does work. Watch this youtube video (different model, but the concept is the same) and follow the instructions on the SonyNWDestTool page. Once you run the command and safely eject, reset the settings.
To reset the settings on either one the steps/menus are the same:

1. From the Main screen – choose toolbox in the bottom left
2. push up once to get to the bottom of the list and choose that (Common Settings)
3. push up twice then choose that (Reset/Format)
4. Choose what is selected (Reset All Settings)
5. Press left once to select Yes

and now the interface should be in English!

I recently got a Cayin N3 in a grab bag of MP3 players from Goodwill. The firmware upgrade is available from their google drive, but it’s a pain to actually get so here it is for anyone else looking for it. Cayin N3 Firmware v3.1 Just unzip it into the root of your micro SD card then go to Settings->System Upgrade

Official download page: https://en.cayin.cn/drive/9/18/567.html