Hacking around with the Leapfrog Didj

In October of last year Leapfrog released a little gaming handheld called the Leapfrog Digi.

On the surface this device is totally unremarkable (apart from the fact that Leapfrog have spent some serious money for software licenses including Pixar stuff and Star Wars) but once you start doing a little more research it becomes an all together more interesting little device.

Some of the 1st things I discovered were that its ARM based (an ARM926) and that is it Linux based (with the board bring up done by Cozybit) with Leapfrogs bespoke ‘Brio’ software layer sitting on top. That was enough to get my attention and after a discussion with a fellow Didj hacker Claude Schwarz I decided that it was probably worth committing my findings so far to this blog so they don’t get lost.

It is also fair to say that this device may be of interest to anyone hacking on the GP2X Wiz (more on that later) and with it’s very low cost (has been seen for $40) it may well appeal to a lot of the resourceful hardware hacking types I am so fond of .

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GP2X: Linux – 1st Source Release

I guess it had to happen sometime.

I am very pleased to relay the fact that DignSys (GamePark Holdings Linux Sub-Contractor) have released the source code to the U-Boot boot loader and Linux kernel used on the GP2X on there web site.

This is the 1st code release and efforts are on-going to resolve any outstanding aspects surrounding code used on the GP2X. I will be checking of the status of this code and fitness to compile, completeness against releases etc. over the next few days, any feedback in that area is greatly appreciated.

DignSys have stated that they will update this code periodically to ensure it is kept inline with the release of binaries on the console.

The source code can be found on DignSys English website under

Embedded Linux Solution > MagicEyes MMSP2.

A direct link is available here.

Please only download this code if you need it, it would seem slightly unfair to kill the DignSys website with unnecessary downloads and I understand there website is not on the fastest of links.

This code is mirrored via SourceForge/Open2x’s CVS.

If you wish to view bits of the code using a browser click here.

To get the code from CVS check out the “gph” (all) or “linux-gp2x” (kernel), “u-boot-gp2x” (boot loader) modules.

The Open2x project will endevour to keep the modules in step with the DignSys/GPH kernel releases.

On a personal note thank you to everybody who has helped in the process of beginning to resolve this matter (GP32x.de, GBAX.Com, #GP32Dev and Mr Pearlmutter especially) and thank you to GamePark Holdings and DignSys for making efforts to ensure compliance in this area.

I only hope this co-operation will continue and shortly extend to any GPL code used in user-space applications and updates to this base code.

John Willis