An Ipod has been detected, but it could not be identified properly.

doing the same thing on my macbook pro with leopard/itunes 7.6.2 - what a pain in the f*cking arse.... who else gets the impression apple don't even bother looking at these forums?

I found the solution! The problem is that windows tries to keep drive letters reserved for certain drives. Eg, Windows is keeping the E: drive reserved for my USB thumb drive. The ipod really only works when it's on E:.

Step by step, here's how to fix in Windows XP:
1. Unplug your iPod, shut down iTunes
2. Plug in a thumb drive, verify it mounts to drive E:
3. Go to Control Panel -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management
4. Click on Storage\Disk Management
5. In the upper pane, right click on the thumb drive (E:)
6. Select "Change Drive Letter and Paths..."
7. Select your drive, click on "Change..."
8. Select another letter, like "G:"
9. Click OK, OK.
10. Close Computer Management, Close Administrative Tools
11. Start up iTunes
12. Plug in your iPod
13. iTunes will ask to update your iPod
14. Follow the prompts, iPod will be updated and reboot
15. After update completes, undock and redock your iPod
16. iTunes will now see your iPod
17. Victory

great work - now does anyone have the faintest idea how to make it work on a Mac?!!!!

I can't find where it says E: thumb drive?

I am having the same problem with both my iphone and my fifth gen ipod. the iphone won't recognize at all sometimes, and the ipod gives the message talked about in this forum. The only thing that works is first deleting itunes, then reinstalling it. Then it will work for a little while, then stop working again. Im getting tired of going through this dance. Anyone figure out whats going on???

On a friend's Vista computer, I had the same warning, but Vista wanted to "Do you want to scan and fix ..." the drive at the same time. I had completed the first two steps of this check list: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1363 which included re-installing iTunes, when I came across bumbobway's solution about the drive letter. Unfortunately, changing the drive letter from G: to E: didn't help, so I moved it back to G:. Reformatting the drive seems to have done the trick.

Not sure if someone already posted this, but I know how frusturated I was so I thought I would post my fix.

I had the same problem and thought I had destroyed my iphone, but the problem is that on most computers the front USB porst dont give enough power, sure enough my iphone and Ipod restored properly when plugged in to the back not the front.

God Bless You, wriley123.

I was going nuts. Resetting, reinstalling, blah blah blah.... and all I had to do to get my iTouch recognized by iTunes was to use the USB plug on the back of the computer instead of on the keyboard.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!