Lifehacker alerted us this week to the release of Rockbox 3.0. Rockbox is a product we already use on our MP3 player. It is an alternative open-source firmware which includes not only expanded music support, but album art, games, video playback, and more.

For those of you wishing to try it, but not willing to give up the manufacturer’s firmware, it installs a dual-boot firmware loader, allowing you to press a hotkey to boot into the old firmware.

We have switched from MP3 to playing files encoded using open-source format OGG and this software allows us to do so. It runs on a variety of players produced by Apple, Archos, Cowon, iriver, Olympus, SanDisk, and Toshiba. More will come, as people work to port it.

So, check Rockbox out. If you don’t like it, you can uninstall it.

Related Articles

• Rockbox Web Site(Rockbox.Org)
• Rockbox Replacement MP3 Player Firmware Gets Updated [Mp3 Players]
• Rockbox 3.0 Supercharges Your MP3 Player [Featured Download]
• Rockbox open-source MP3 player firmware hits 3.0
• Rockbox 3.0 Released. Quietly.
• Rockbox 3.0: turn your old iPod into new h4wtness with free/open software
• Rockbox 3.0 firmware breathes the life back into your MP3 player
• The case for FLAC, the case for Rockbox