Skinning/ Themeing FAQ

[bowzil]

Hi, I am newbie here, this is my first time posting in this forum. I have question regarding themeing. Whenever I tried to put my own images for the screen bookmarks, I got a message like this:

"The bitmap is part of a group that shares the same palette, but it has midified entries. Other members of the group will probably have wrong colours now. Check these bookmarks: Background Navi Left, Background Navi Right, Background Navi Middle."

I edited my images with photoshop CS2 and I am using H3Mod 2.4.2244 version.

What is wrong with that? What am I supposed to do in order to get things right? I look at the help, but it did not help much. Does anyone know step by step to do it? I really appreciate your help.

Thanks

[DD]

You aren't doing anything wrong- it's just a limitation in the firmware. Most of
the images in the iriver firmware use a 256 colour palette, and some of those pallettes are shared among several images like the error message mentions.

So say for example you have the edited image, when you save it photoshop most likely changes the palette so only the necessary colours are included. But then that throws off the other images in the firmware which usually share that palette.

An example 256 colour palette...


But if your image is made up of pinks, oranges and greens, the program might save it with a palette like this...


The only real way of sorting it out is to make sure all the mentioned images share identical palettes.
Hope that helps.

[Lord Julius]

Drippydonut, that's an excellent explanation. if I ever get round writing
an improved helpfile, I'll copy it, OK? And a tip to bowzil:
Copy all images that share a palette (the list is in the helpfile) into one
image in photoshop before editing. E.g.
- Create a new image 100x176 pixel, true colour, not palette based.
- Copy the images of a shared group into it, e.g. the Background Navi
Left, Middle and Right.
- Modify them at will, or draw completely new designs of the same size.
- Now reduce the colour depth to 8 bit, palette based.
- then cut the three images from the big one, they now all use the same
palette.
- save as gif files, to make sure that they remain 8 bit.
I don't have photoshop, so I can't give you details on how to do it, but
it should be easy enough, it is in paint shop pro.

[bowzil]

Originally Posted by drippydonut

You aren't doing anything wrong- it's just a limitation in the firmware. Most of
the images in the iriver firmware use a 256 colour palette, and some of those pallettes are shared among several images like the error message mentions.

So say for example you have the edited image, when you save it photoshop most likely changes the palette so only the necessary colours are included. But then that throws off the other images in the firmware which usually share that palette.

An example 256 colour palette...


But if your image is made up of pinks, oranges and greens, the program might save it with a palette like this...


The only real way of sorting it out is to make sure all the mentioned images share identical palettes.
Hope that helps.

Thanks drippydonut, That really helps me a lot. Now I can make my own theme.

Originally Posted by Lord Julius

Drippydonut, that's an excellent explanation. if I ever get round writing
an improved helpfile, I'll copy it, OK? And a tip to bowzil:
Copy all images that share a palette (the list is in the helpfile) into one
image in photoshop before editing. E.g.
- Create a new image 100x176 pixel, true colour, not palette based.
- Copy the images of a shared group into it, e.g. the Background Navi
Left, Middle and Right.
- Modify them at will, or draw completely new designs of the same size.
- Now reduce the colour depth to 8 bit, palette based.
- then cut the three images from the big one, they now all use the same
palette.
- save as gif files, to make sure that they remain 8 bit.
I don't have photoshop, so I can't give you details on how to do it, but
it should be easy enough, it is in paint shop pro.

Lord Julius Thanks for the tip. That was what I did at first. But my problem was finding the color table in photoshop CS2. Finally I found it in Image --> Mode ---> (choose indexed color) ---> color table . Now I understand that all images should have the same color palette.
I am really happy that both of you help me with this issue.

Thanks again.

[jclement30]

Originally Posted by alienshards

Because of this, however, H3mod doesn't work on Macs.

So, does anyone have any recommendations for mac / linux users?

[DD]

Mmmmmmmm... *ponders*... erm... *scratches head*... *scratches head some more*...

Rockbox? With the customisable WPSs? But then again if you want to install Rockbox the easy way, you use the firmware patcher which is a Windows app (although I have sent some mac users patched firmware files before).

[amp]

Hi everyone.
Ive only just joined Misticriver, this is my first post so please be gentle on me.
Ive been using a H340 for about 4-5 months now and im interested in trying to personalise it. Ive started to look at how to change the theme and Im starting to get a little confused. Can anyone help me out with a very simple explanation on how this can be done. Im sorry if im being a bit thick about this, but like I said, I tried to read up about it and started to get very confused. Thanks in advance for any help.

[DD]

You can either skin the original H300 firmware with a program called H3mod, or I would suggest at looking into putting Rockbox on you player which offers a much more customisable WPS (while playing screen) and has features like album art.

You can download h3mod here...
http://www.cerebus.de/iriver/

...and ready made skins to import into H3mod here...
Completed Themes/Skins


You can find out about Rockbox on the Rockbox site...
http://www.rockbox.org/

[amp]

Cheers for the quick response - where can I get rockbox from & are the help files for installing & personalising very easy to follow?

[DD]

Info about Rockbox and all the documentation are on the Rockbox site...
http://www.rockbox.org/

The Rockbox installation instructions are here...
http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/vie...RockboxInstall

I suggest getting the H300 "Experimental" build. Don't be put off by the name, its just called that might crash more often because it makes use of the very latest patches which haven't necessarially been tested for bugs as much- nearly everyone uses it !
You can get the H300 "Experimental" build from here...
Experimental build by KOSH, Announce only! (NO DISCUSSION)

You can download ready-made WPSs here...
H3xx Rockbox 24bit Color WPS here. No Discussion (56K Warning)

...or if you feel daring you edit them/make your own from the info on this page...
http://www.rockbox.org/twiki/bin/view/Main/CustomWPS

[amp]

Sorry, ive just seen the link for the rockbox website. Please excuse my stupidity.

[DD]

Beware that if you have a US player, putting Rockbox on it will remove DRM support permenantly. It will also void the warranty.

Rockbox also give a lot more features that the iriver firmware, like on-the-fly playlists, gapless playback, and even things like games (and DOOM !). It doesn't currently support WMA playback, but it may do in the future (but DRM will not happen).

Another thing to note is Rockbox doesn't play videos, but you can boot back into the iriver firmware at any time by holding down record when you turn on your player.


Pssst, now time for me to advertise my themes ...
H3xx Rockbox 24bit Color WPS here. No Discussion (56K Warning)
H3xx Rockbox 24bit Color WPS here. No Discussion (56K Warning)
H3xx Rockbox 24bit Color WPS here. No Discussion (56K Warning)

[amp]

Im living in the uk & bought my H340 from a UK supplier. Im pretty damn sure its a european version. Is there an obvious way to tell if its a european version before I start to install Rockbox.

[DD]

Oh, you're fine then. You can run Rockbox on a US player anyway, it just means you loose DRM support (like support for subscription services).

[amp]

Firmware version is 1.30 E. Will rockbox run fine with this version of the firmare?
Its just that I notice in the installation instructions it says version 1.29 EU.
Hope Im not being a little stupid about this, its just that I dont want to fry the machine.

[DD]

1.30 is the mystery firmware which seems to be a mistake/joke/supernatural love-child (ignore me ) of iriver and seems to be more of a downgrade than an upgrade, lacking, features like video. Seeing as the link for 1.29 on the iriver site points to 1.30, the best option is to get 1.29k (Korean) then change the language to English by doing this...

Originally Posted by andrewmel

Turn player on.
Hold (not press) the Navi button.
From the menu select the first option by just pressing (not holding) the Navi button.

Go to the second menu option by pressing the (-).
Then select that by pressing Navi.

Use the (+) to go up the options, until you see English.
Select that.

Restart your player.

The Korean firmware is identical to the European firmware, just it doesn't have the volume cap that the European firmware has to have because of French law.

[amp]

1.29k isnt Korean only firmware is it? I guess you you wouldnt tell me to install it if it was.
I hope your not spending all your time aswering my posts - thanks for all your help here.

[DD]

Its the Korean firmware, but you can easily change the language to English using those insructions I posted. Anyway, you never know, you might like Rockbox and forget all about the iriver firmware (I haven't used the iriver firmware for a good few months) ! On-the-fly playlists really are very useful .

[amp]

Drippydonut.
Cheers for all your help - Rockbox is now installed & im customizing to me hearts content. Any recommendations for a good them that shows album art?

[DD]

A few of my favourites have to be...

My own of course, DigiCurve - Alpha... Link
iCatcher Colour Touch 2... Link
iCatcher Colour Touch... Link
Original iCatcher... Link
Greyt... Link
HiPod (yes it looks like an iPod, but its very sleek )... Link

Its best just to go through the 24bit WPS thread and find one you like (album art ones start at about the end of page 6)...
H3xx Rockbox 24bit Color WPS here. No Discussion (56K Warning)

If you haven't yet read about where to put the album art, there is a guide here...
[HOW TO] Album Art Made Easy

[Slick Rick]

Im having trouble making gif images for H3mod. Everytime I put the image on my Iriver and switch it on the picture turns out to be way too bright, Even when I make it really dark on the PC when I put it on the Iriver its light again. Im using photoshop 7