u/7or3h

Trying to turn an old RK2818 ebook into a Tamagotchi. Stuck at the monolithic firmware stage, need guidance

This summer I started a personal project: turning my old 2009-ish ebook reader (Rockchip RK2818X) into a Tamagotchi-like virtual pet.
Not because it’s useful, but because I want to learn how to reshape closed systems.

So far I’ve:

  • Identified the SoC (RK2818X).
  • Dumped the original firmware.
  • Unpacked everything with the few tools that still work for this platform.
  • Loaded the main binary into Ghidra.

And now I’m stuck.

The firmware isn’t Linux-based, it’s a single monolithic blob full of trampolines, DSP-style pipelines, mixed code/data regions, weird control flow, and functions that look autogenerated.

I can analyze pieces, but I don’t know the right strategy to move forward.

If anyone has experience with Rockchip devices, monolithic DSP firmware, or general blob reverse engineering…

I’d really appreciate any pointers, workflows, or documentation.
Just need direction, not someone to do the work for me.

Thanks!

reddit.com
u/7or3h — 6 days ago