atanu2013
Level 1
(0 points)
Q: After installation of Itune 11.0.5 on Win Vista, the Ipod stopped syncing and showed errors. Itune now freezes/does not show the Ipod after repeated Restore etc.
I use a 160 GB IPod Classic with ITunes on Win Vista. My Itunes library contains about 100 GB of music.
Recently, after installation of Itune 11.0.5 on Win Vista, the Ipod stopped syncing and began to show errors and hang up. I have tried 5 R, Format (Windows), Scan (Windows), Reset, and Restore again and again. After Restore, the Itunes and Windows Explorer hang or Itunes does not show the IPod at all. Sometimes, ITunes finds IPod corrupt repeatedly and prompts for restore. I have followed instructions in http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1372, without success.
Chkdsk initially did not find errors. But the disk check with the IPOD utility (Reset followed by Menu+Rewind), however shows very poor health of the disk. But why did the problem appear suddenly after Itunes update? Chance? Or is there any poosiblity that the update might have some flaw. Or can there be any other reason and hope for getting back the IPod?
Any help welcome.
iPod classic 160GB (Late 2009), Windows Vista, Other machines: IPad and IPhone
atanu2013
Level 1
(0 points)
Hi TT2 and others who may read this
It has been almost 2 months when I have spent most time on the iPod. It has been a difficult and restless time.
Finally, I have found that the full formatting and the DFU/Restore will not solve the problem of bad sectors/blocks in the HDD. One will only waste time doing that repeatedly. If there are bad sectors/blocks in the HDD, there will be freezes, or no show of music in iPod after an apparent succesful sync or no show of iPod on iTunes etc. It is very frustrating.
To cut the story short and so that others who face the same problem may be helped, I have noted the steps that brought back my iPod fully.
1. I ran a surface scan of the full HDD (It may be easier to first fast format (FAT32) the HDD and create several partitions and check each partition through suface scan). Usually, as it happened in my case, the faults may be located in a part of the HDD. In my case, errors were found in the first 7% of the HDD only. At 7% any work would freeze. Rest of the HDD was found perfect with 0 errors shown during the suface scan.
2. I put the HDD into disk mode and formatted it with FAT32 and then restored the iPod through iTunes.
3. After restoing the iPod firmware on the full 148GB FAT 32 formatted HDD, I performed a resize/ move operation and shifted the active part with iPod firmware on it to the later 85 % of the HDD, leaving the first 15% of the HDD unassigned (The HDD has error on the first 7%).
4. I put the iPod in disk mode and ran a chkdsk with /r parameter. Found no error in the active 129 HDD.
5. I attached the iPod to iTunes. At this stage it shows 129GB available. I just synced my full library of 100 GB. When sync complete message came up, I clicked the 'sync' button at the right lower bottom side of each page to ensure that nothing was pending.
6. I ejected the iPod from iTunes.
And the iPod is working perfect.
Note:
1. I used EaseUS partition Master free SW for formating and resize/move operation. During operations related to the HDD involving windows OS (such as formatting, checking disk, surface scanning, partitioning, resizing etc), I disabled Apple Mobile and iPod services in Computer Management panel and kept the iPod in disk mode.
2. After resize/move opeartion, a Restore or DFU should not be done, as this restores the iPod for full 148GB, including all the error sectors.
Hope this hepls others who are facing the same problem. I note that although, I have tried to note the precise sequence which brought back at leact 129 GB of the HDD, the actual events were not so systematic. The effort left me drained.
Best Wishes.
