Sony WALKMAN NWZ-A Series (NWZ-A828) - USB and MTP problems and solutions

[jankushka]

i just bought a sony walkman nwz-a828.
an amazing player in terms of audio and video quality.
it really is.
ipods are crap in comparison.

anyway...
this post is because i managed to get it working both via usb and mtp.
usb is for drag&drop with any file manager.
mtp is for use with amarok (or similar multimedia app).

problems
in normal circumnstances, you'll have huge problems in 8.04 hardy:
a) device not detected as a usb device (so you can't drag&drop your music)
b) mtp doesn't see it (so you can't use it with amarok)

solutions
you need to enable the source repositories in your package manager.
for mtp...this is really a short term hack, 'cause libmtp-0.3.0 (libmtp8) already includes this and other devices
but it's not packed for *ubuntu, yet.

so..

Code:

sudo -i
cd /tmp

become root and go to, for example, /tmp.

usb issue:
hal needs to be fixed/recompiled/reinstalled.

Code:

apt-get build-dep hal

download all the packages that hal needs in order to be rebuilt

Code:

apt-get source hal

download and unpack the hal source

Code:

nano hal-0.5.11~rc2/hald/util.c

edit util.c
at line 201, replace strtol by strtoul

Code:

apt-get source --build hal

rebuild hal (will automatically compile and build a few deb packages)

Code:

dpkg -i libhal1_0.5.11~rc2-1ubuntu8.2_i386.deb
dpkg -i hal_0.5.11~rc2-1ubuntu8.2_i386.deb
dpkg -i libhal-storage1_0.5.11~rc2-1ubuntu8.2_i386.deb

install the newly created stuff

***

mtp issue:
libmtp needs to be fixed/recompiled/reinstalled.
/etc/udev/rules/45-libmtp7.rules needs to be updated.

Code:

apt-get build-dep libmtp7

download all the packages that libmtp needs in order to be rebuilt

Code:

apt-get source libmtp7

download and unpack the libmtp source

Code:

nano libmtp-0.2.6.1/src/music-players.h

edit music-players.h
add the following (braces, commas and all) to the list of sony mp3 players

{ "Sony", 0x054c, "Walkman NWZ-A828", 0x035b, DEVICE_FLAG_UNLOAD_DRIVER },

Code:

apt-get --build  source libmtp7

rebuild libmtp (will automatically compile and build a few deb packages)

Code:

dpkg -i libmtp7_0.2.6.1-2ubuntu1_i386.deb
dpkg -i mtp-tools_0.2.6.1-2ubuntu1_i386.deb

install the newly created stuff

Code:

nano /etc/udev/rules.d/45-libmtp7.rules

add the following to the list of sony players

# Sony Walkman NWZ-A828
ATTR{idVendor}=="054c", ATTR{idProduct}=="035b", SYMLINK+="libmtp-%k", MODE="660", GROUP="audio"

reboot and you should be done.

hth

[Teunis]

My compliments for your solutions and posting!

[psychok7]

hey there im using ubuntu.. i did ur steps and the mp3 finally mounts but for some reason it doesnt let me change the songs i have in it.. it gives me "Error removing file: Read-only file system"
i tried sudo nautilus /media,,, and it still doesnt work..
any ideias wht i should change?

[jankushka]

hi.
the above hacks were carried out on kubuntu 8.04.
not sure if they work the same for ubuntu (gnome).
i don't use ubuntu.
anyway...
i won't have access to my player till i get back home tonight.
so i can't try and replicate your problem now.
but i'll try.
in the meantime, we can investigate your issue a little bit...
could you please hook up your player, start a terminal emulator and post the result of:

Code:

id

to see what groups your user account belongs to.
there's a few groups you need to be member of, in order for the plug dev things to work.

Code:

cat /etc/fstab

to see if there's anything funny in your file systems' table

Code:

ls -l /media

to see if you have any funny mount point in your media directory

Code:

ls -laR /media/path_to_your_player

to see what the directory tree of your player looks like.
in particular, who do the files and directories belong to.

cheers

[psychok7]

well yesterday it worked.. today when i plug in the mp3 it doesnt even mount..im using a sony NWZ-S616F
i havent changed anything only rebooted my computer.. anyways heres the output
psychok7@psychok7:~$ id
uid=1000(psychok7) gid=1000(psychok7) groups=4(adm),20(dialout),24(cdrom),25(floppy),29(audio),30(dip),44(video),46(plugdev),107(fuse),109(lpadmin),115(admin),125(sambashare),1000(psychok7)
psychok7@psychok7:~$ cat /etc/fstab
# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
proc            /proc           proc    defaults        0       0
# /dev/sda6
UUID=1c2d92cd-dae3-4d06-a2c4-01476d82fb71 /               ext3    relatime,errors=remount-ro 0       1
# /dev/sda7
UUID=35d7964e-820c-4e42-b0ed-5dc8a98915bc none            swap    sw              0       0
/dev/scd0       /media/cdrom0   udf,iso9660 user,noauto,exec,utf8 0       0
psychok7@psychok7:~$ ls -l /media
total 24
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 8192 2008-09-08 19:10 BACKUP
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root    6 2008-07-30 18:48 cdrom -> cdrom0
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 2008-07-30 18:48 cdrom0
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4096 2008-09-07 17:42 disk
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root 8192 2008-09-07 13:31 EXTERNAL HDD
psychok7@psychok7:~$

but the last line i didnt do because the mp3 is not mounting anymore

[jankushka]

well, the NWZ-S616F is not the NWZ-A828.
they're two different players.
they're even two different generations.

the mtp tweak won't work for your player.
the S616F's got a different product id.
plus, hardy should already include mtp support for it.
it lists the S615F and the S618F, so yours should work too.
and if it doesn't, then we need to find out its actual product id.

i'd suggest you put things back as they were.
remove the modified libmtp packages.
and re-install the standard ones from the repos.

as for UMS (USB Mass Storage) mode, i'm not sure.
does your player support UMS?
if it does, is it at least seen as a new device when you plug it in?
i'd suggest to remove the tweaked hal packages.
and put back the original ones from the repos.

then reboot, plug in your player and issue:

Code:

sudo lsusb

sudo is possibly superfluous

[psychok7]

mine suports ums and mtp.. it did work on ubuntu 7.10, so how about me checking all those details in from the ubuntu 7.10 live cd, the id and product details ? does it help?
if not ill just do wht u suggested

[psychok7]

psychok7@psychok7:~$ sudo lsusb
Bus 005 Device 009: ID 054c:0327 Sony Corp.
Bus 005 Device 007: ID 09da:0006 A4 Tech Co., Ltd Optical Mouse WOP-35 / Trust 450L Optical Mouse
Bus 005 Device 004: ID 043d:00bb Lexmark International, Inc.
Bus 005 Device 003: ID 059f:0c41 LaCie, Ltd
Bus 005 Device 002: ID 05e3:0606 Genesys Logic, Inc. D-Link DUB-H4 USB 2.0 Hub
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 0000:0000 
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 0000:0000 
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 0000:0000 
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 0000:0000 
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000

this is the output i got..i havent unistalled those libraries yet thou...oh and i must tell u.. i did follow ur inital instructions but when the time came to modify those documents.. i didnt because i was hoping the models that were listed were enough the S615f/S618f i think its this models.. i didnt put in ur model

[jankushka]

alright.
i see.
the device is detected alright...

Bus 005 Device 009: ID 054c:0327 Sony Corp.

vendor id is: 054c (i.e. Sony)
product id is: 0327 (which is actually the same as the S615F and S618F models)
so i think the problem is in hal somewhere.
possibly in some file here:

/usr/share/hal/fdi/information/...

could be

/usr/share/hal/fdi/information/10freedesktop/10-usb-music-players.fdi

don't really know, though...

you could do what i did: go back to 7.10 (cfr this).
for me, kubuntu 7.10 was rock solid.
kubuntu 8.04 is a mess.

[ceoxtc]

Jankushka, you are a lifesaver!!  I bought this unit last Friday and was five minutes away from returning it because Xubuntu 8.04 wouldn't see it, even if I mounted it using pmount.

I followed your instructions to the letter (well, almost - I used vim rather than nano!) and I'm transferring music to my player as we speak.

Note, I didn't have to do the very last step b/c after following the prior ones, the applicable lines were already in 45-libmtp7.rules

Stellar!  Thanks.  Yet another reason why I love the Ubuntu (Linux) community - others helping others.

[jankushka]

good.
glad it was useful.
2 things.
- no way i'd return the walkman: it's too good!
- intrepid (8.10) ships with libmtp 0.3.0, which includes support for our dev

take care... 

[ceoxtc]

Indeed!  Very intuitive user interface and superior audio from the headset.  I noticed the GNU general and less public licenses reprinted on the copyright sheet so I went looking at Sony's site to see which open source products they used for the unit.  I found the following:

# busybox-1.1.0.tar.gz
# dosfstools-2.11.local.tgz
# e2fsprogs-1.35-2.0.0.0501450.src.rpm
# gcc-3.4.3-25.0.43.0501450.src.rpm
# glibc-2.3.3-40.0.35.0501450.src.rpm
# linux-kernel-2.6.10.local.tgz
# lrzsz-0.12.20.tar.gz
# mtd-utils-2.6.9_1.1-6.0.0.0501450.src.rpm
# ncurses-5.4-1.0.0.0501450.src.rpm
# procps-3.2.6.tar.gz
# sysvinit-2.85.tar.gz
# u-boot-1.1.1.local.tgz

Interesting for Sony.  I'm very pleased with the purchase.  The only wish list items I would want are dynamic playlists and Ogg support but maybe those will be forthcoming via a firmware update.