Thanks for that information! It worked with my Samsung well. Now I've got a really usable MP3-Player!

THANKS a lot!!!!
No more to say - it worked superb!!!

Amarok (and others) now support MTP with libmtp.
If you need mounting as a filesystem, use mtpfs (a fuse filesystem)
So you still have rds functions :)

1a. I have been told about Amarok.
I don't use Amarok.
I don't need Amarok.
I don't want to use Amarok.
Amarok is a bloated application, too complex to be "Zen".
Besides, Amarok is NOT available for RHEL5. Not even in a 3rd party repo. And I don't want to build it myself, as long as I don't like bloatware anyway!

1b. What "others"?

2. MTPFS: yes, it could be a solution. But why bothering to wrap around a shitty crap (MTP), when the "zen" way is to have it seen as a regular filesystem?

Samsung sucks, Microsoft sucks, Apple sucks, all of them for their love of MTP.

Brilliant. I bought the YP-U3 for my wife for Christmas because I thought it could be simply connected as another drive like my iRiver. MTP is awful - thank you for this solution.

I've been using the mtp-tools (a set of simple command-line utilities included with libmtp) to manage files on my U3. They're adequate but leave a bit to be desired.

Be that as it may, MTP isn't such a bad thing. While it's true that

- Linux (along with every other OS except Windows Vista) doesn't support MTP as a normal filesystem;
- There are relatively few programs that do allow you to communicate with MTP devices, and most of them suck;
- the libmtp itself is still fairly immature;

none of the above are the fault of the MTP protocol -- merely unfortunate consequences of the fact that it's a relatively new protocol used by a relatively small number of devices.

Indeed, although MTP isn't perfect, I would argue that it's a much better way of communicating with the player, than simply exposing the underlying storage as a mass storage device. Essentially, MTP is a *remote filesystem* protocol, whereas mass-storage is a remote *block device* protocol. Why is the former better? Several reasons:

- The mass storage protocol is unnecessarily low-level. The player itself contains an OS which is perfectly capable of managing its own filesystem; it doesn't need the PC to tell it where on the disk to place files, directory entries, and so forth. By doing away with that, MTP eliminates substantial protocol overhead, and makes life simpler for the PC as well.

- As a mass storage device we're limited to the least common denominator -- a filesystem that every computer knows how to read and write. Which is to say, either FAT16/VFAT, or FAT32. An MTP device can use whatever filesystem you like internally, which means it can be faster as well as making more efficient use of the storage device.

- A corollary to the above, an MTP device can easily collect whatever information it needs about the files it contains. If it needs a database of playable files and their metadata, it can update the database as files are added and removed. For a mass storage device to do the same requires that either it monitor all operations the PC performs (difficult if not impossible, especially when the PC need not always leave the FS in a consistent state), reread the entire FS every time it's modified (slow), or (iPod-style) require the PC to do additional kludgy database maintenance.

- It also isn't necessary for an MTP device to parse files for ID3 tags and such -- because MTP provides the ability to associate metadata with each file. This also makes modifying that metadata much easier. It lacks a bit of the Unix nature, sadly, but it is mighty convenient.

- Finally, because MTP transfers are file-oriented rather than block-oriented, there's no way for a faulty connection, power failure, bug in the PC's OS, or a user accidentally disconnecting the device without unmounting, to result in a corrupted filesystem.

Just my opinion, make of it what you will.

I respect your opinion, HOWEVER I strongly disagree with the following: "The mass storage protocol is unnecessarily low-level. The player itself contains an OS which is perfectly capable of managing its own filesystem; it doesn't need the PC to tell it where on the disk to place files, directory entries, and so forth. By doing away with that, MTP eliminates substantial protocol overhead, and makes life simpler for the PC as well."

It's not "unnecessarily low-level", it's just fine to be "low-level"! And I DON'T NEED AN OS IN A PLAYER, I WANT THE PLAYER AS SIMPLE AS POSSIBLE! I hate when the OS within stuff like a mobile phone is showing its bugs!

Your plea pro-MTP is very elaborate, and it worths a second reading, however I want a device to be simple-reliable-portable-compatible. And I prefer it to be seen as a disk -- this way, I could really use it just like a regular USB stick, maybe storing documents on it when a plain stick is not available!

I'm sorry if I offended. And I guess I did rant a bit more than I intended to :)

You're absolutely right about mass-storage being more portable. Although I imagine sooner or later most OSes will have MTP support of some kind out of the box. And the MTP protocol itself does have some definite advantages -- there is a reason they decided it was worth breaking compatibility, after all. That's all I was trying to say.

You're not offending me, on the contrary!

It also works out of the box (Mine has firmware 1.11) with Rhythmbox and the included MTP plugin (Just enable the plugin in Edit/Plugins...) It is not the best player but included on Ubuntu and has basic functionalities...

I love you!

Hello
The forum os offline can anyone post the correct instruction??

Please!!!
I need this!!!
I'm running ubuntu feisty and it have the old libmtp5 that not support this device!!!!

You can try contact this guy who said he has archived everything, so I suppose he has the instructions too:
http://www.hoerburger.net/

Note that the UMS firmware (the same 1.10 version) is available on the Global Download Center (see the link in the article).

Using Amarok with it:
"Samsung YP-U3 sous GNU/Linux Debian Lenny"
http://fonctionerd.free.fr/index.php?2007/12/02/12-samsung-yp-u3-sous-gnu-linux-debian-lenny

Hey guys!
I uploaded the UMS files on Rapidshare!

Here's the link: http://rapidshare.com/files/84786997/DFU.ZIP.html

Cheers

Great thread! After some five hours of googling it seems the solution to my problems is near. Still, I can't

1) get Amarok to recognize the YP-U3
2) neither can Rhythmbox nor Gnomad
3) I can't get MPTFS to install properly from sources (fuse and id3tag dependencies seem to be missing)
4) I can't install the solution that everyone else is relying on -- the firmware work-around -- since I only have Linux computers and no Windows machine.

Any suggestions? I stupidly bought two YP-U3s for my daughters for Christmas and now I can't use them for anything!!!

Oh my.

With a proper libmtp, Amarok and Gnomad should see them!

What distro? What version of libmtp?

Notice that in Ubuntu, libmtp has names like libmtp2 (Edgy), libmtp5 (Feisty), libmtp6 (Gutsy), libmtp7 (Hardy).

Before the "transformation", I made the YP-U3 work with a Gnomad compiled from sources, see:
http://beranger.org/index.php?page=diary&2007/11/21/08/41/30-gnomad2-a-good-project-with-a-cr

I am a total Linux noob, been using Windows since 97', grew up with it. Had it installed for a month now, and I couldn't make any sense out of it, nor could I get it to work with my wireless network card and video card. With a lot of help, I got them working. But that still left my Samsung YP-U3.

I never used Linux before and didn't know that Gnomad even existed. But it did. Thank God. I'm on OpenSUSE 10.3 and Gnomad has all the dependencies it needs, so it seems. I can see and acces all the files with all rights on my mp3 player.

Thanks a bunch people!

Guys, the upgrade process from f*cked 1.11 to correct 1.10 worked for me, great, thanks! I was so excited that I immediately upgraded to 1.12 UMS that appeared only a few days ago. Unfortunately it didn't fix the RDS. I have no idea what are the differences between 1.10 and 1.12 and since I haven't used 1.10 I can't compare it. Anyway, thanks for publishing this HOWTO!

Thanks for the info - bought a U3 on Monday without it crossing my mind that it wouldn't be USB Mass Storage. The 1.10 upgrade, though difficult, worked first time.

Samsung meanwhile seems to be giving the royal two fingers to everyone who contacts them. I've also sent an email to their UK support address, but not holding out for anything enlightening - this reply from the forum you linked to seems typical:


Thank you for contacting Samsung Electronics.

Like most new MP3 players ours is an MTP device and there will be no changing of this in the near future. I am sorry for whatever inconvenience this has caused you however it is a design decision by Samsung and I can't see it being changed.

I hope this has been of some assistance to you. If you do have any further queries, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Kind Regards
Con Lafferty
Samsung Electronics UK

Thought this would be interesting - my email:
---------------
Dear Sir/Madam,

We recently bought the U3 player for my wife, as it has the FM radio and .ogg support, both of which are unusual and useful features in a player in this price range.

We were disappointed to find it was not compatible with Linux or, apparently, any non Microsoft operating system, as it uses the Microsoft only Media Transfer Protocol (MTP) instead of the more common and universally adopted and supported USB Mass Storage (UMS) protocol.

Searching the internet showed that this is a common problem, and that firmware version 1.10 is UMS, so we have successfully restored this version. However this wasn't easy, and version 1.10 is missing some minor features such as RDS and artist/album details.

What is the justification for using this non standard driver system? Even if MTP is deemed a good thing, why could the user not be provided with an option in the system configuration to switch to UMS support?

Many thanks,
Andrew Simpson


---------------
The response:
---------------
Dear Andrew Simpson

Thank you for contacting Samsung Electronics.

[Solution]
With regard to your email concerning the MTP version of firmware on our
units, please note that all the MP3 players we have are in this format.
Please note that there is no reason for this its just the way Samsung
have decided to design the unit.

I hope this has been of some assistance to you. If you do have any
further queries, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Kind Regards
Siobhan Mack

Samsung Electronics UK
Customer Communication Centre
Tel.: 0845 726 7864 (All calls charged at Local Rate)