Can't play songs on iPod 80Gb Classic.

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Can't play songs on iPod 80Gb Classic.

Newbie to iPod. Former PC/Windows 2nd level support officer. Have brand new iPod bought duty free. Tried to load iTunes, but couldn't. Error message "The installer encountered errors before iTunes could be configured." It goes on to tell me to try later on. Searched on the error message in Google and visited several forums. As suggested, uninstalled Quicktime and purged registry of anything Apple with the exception of directly iPod related stuff. Puerged PC of ALL unnecessary files. Tried to install again with same result. One forum suggested Winamp as an alternative. Purchased and installed Winamp Pro. Getting to know the program, managed to rip and play a few tunes, but playlists weren't working. Purged iPod of all music (not control files!) and have successfulley ripped and synched about 600 songs onto the iPod in MP4/LC-AAC Encoder v1.28 format. Cannot play these songs on the iPod. It shows them as "now playing", but there's no movement on the progress bar or on the time countback. If I hit the play button and hold the iPod to my ear, I can hear the drive spin up, then stop. Can play files on the iPod on my PC. Hard drive must be OK, as I can synch to it.

Any suggestions much appreciated.

PC, Windows XP Pro

Posted on Jan 19, 2008 4:35 PM

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Answer 1

Jan 19, 2008 7:13 PM in response to Grumblebum

Hi Grumblebum.
If you take a look at http://support.apple.com/specs/ipod/iPod_classic.html it will show the following audio formats supported by the ipod:

AAC (16 to 320 Kbps), Protected AAC (from iTunes Store), MP3 (16 to 320 Kbps), MP3 VBR, Audible (formats 2, 3, and 4), Apple Lossless, WAV, and AIFF.

It might be you have ripped the song into the wrong format.

Winamp may play these songs fine,but it looks like itunes will not support this format. I looked at the winamp website and see the format you mention. My suggestion would be to re-rip those cds into a MP3 format. Hope this helps.

Message was edited by: david-iPod80Gb

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Answer 2

Grumblebum Author

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Jan 19, 2008 8:09 PM in response to david-iPod80Gb

Thanks for the response, David. Surely the format I have used is covered by the specs at that site? I had been there and checked it before I started. I'm only using 128kbps output bitrate, so it should be well within tolerances. As an aside, is there any way of re-ripping files already processed, or do they have to be done from CD again? What a pain, if this is the only option I have!

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Answer 3

Grumblebum Author

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Jan 19, 2008 8:32 PM in response to Grumblebum

FWIW, after David's suggestion, I ripped a CD into MP3 format. Same result. The song won't play. Any other suggestions much appreciated.....

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Answer 4

Jan 19, 2008 8:34 PM in response to Grumblebum

In iTunes, if you right click on the song, there is a window that pops up and one of the options is "convert to aac". You can try this. If that does not work, you may have to re-rip the songs. I don't think it is a matter of bit rate and much as it is the mp4 format you mentioned. I rip using 320k mp3. I have lots of hard drive space so I don't worry about size. Also, I think I only have something like 1300 songs or so.

Ignore the above then. Will the song play in iTunes?

Message was edited by: david-iPod80Gb

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Answer 5

Grumblebum Author

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Jan 19, 2008 8:34 PM in response to david-iPod80Gb

I'd be using iTunes, but as I mentioned in my original post, my PC won't load it. Tried everything to get around it, but it just doesn't happen.

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Answer 6

Jan 19, 2008 8:45 PM in response to Grumblebum

I have not used winamp in years, back when it first came out. One last thing I can think of, will the either of the formats play in quicktime?

About iTunes, sorry to hear you are having problems loading it. I loaded it on XP and Vista and as yet have not had any problems. That is about the limit of what I can think of in the way of suggestions. Hopefully someone else can come up with something. Good luck to you though.

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Answer 7

Grumblebum Author

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Jan 19, 2008 8:59 PM in response to david-iPod80Gb

I've just installed the latest version of Quicktime and it will play both formats from both the iPod and Winamp ripped respositories. Got me stuffed! Thanks for the help however. Guess it's just a process of elimination.....

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Answer 8

Jan 19, 2008 9:58 PM in response to Grumblebum

You can try to rip your music with the freeware Audiograbber: http://www.audiograbber.com-us.net/. There are various options that will also allow you rip with Lame and other quality enhancements. Good luck.

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Answer 9

Jan 20, 2008 10:32 AM in response to Grumblebum

hey im having the same problem my ipod will play one or two songs first though then it stops playing them ive also tried all the de-installing and re-installing. the only thing that i can think of that might be different from others is that i didnt install itunes on C but on another removeable memory space that is always connected i dont if that could be it but im running out of ideas please help!!!

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Answer 10

Grumblebum Author

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Jan 20, 2008 3:51 PM in response to SithLordDarth

Ripping isn't the problem -- it's playing the tunes on the iPod!

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Answer 11

Grumblebum Author

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Jan 20, 2008 7:53 PM in response to whatever345678

For further info, I just went in to the local Apple dealer and had my iPod restored on a Vista machine running iTunes, and gave it an identity, which apparently it didn't have before. Came home, Winamp transferred about 722 songs across in under 5 minutes. Left about 15 on my machine. The bloody thing still won't play anything! Just about had a gutful. Might go for a refund and get a Zen or something instead.

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Answer 12

Cate1976

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Jan 21, 2008 7:58 AM in response to Grumblebum

I have Windows XP SP2 on my PC. When I downloaded latest version of itunes, I also got quicktime. I've managed to import CD's into itunes and get them on my ipod without any problems. My guess would be that Win Amp isn't compatible with itunes.

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Answer 13

Jan 21, 2008 11:26 AM in response to Grumblebum

I was having similar issue. Songs would play to a specific point, then immediately skip to next song at same point in song everytime. All the songs I was having this issue with were MPEG Layer 1. I highlighted the songs in my library, converted them to AAC, deleted the MPEG-1 songs off I-Pod Classic, then re-loaded the converted AAC files to IPOD. That solved the problem. I don't notice any difference in sound quality either. I was worried they would be "re-compressed" by doing this, but can't tell any difference if they were. I have not loaded the new firmware, as I've been reading about all kinds of problems with it. The Classic manual on the Apple Support site shows this:

iPod classic doesn’t support WMA, MPEG Layer 1, MPEG Layer 2 audio files, or
audible.com format 1.
If you have a song in iTunes that isn’t supported by iPod classic, you can convert it to a
format iPod classic supports. For more information, see iTunes Help.

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Answer 14

Grumblebum Author

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Jan 30, 2008 3:26 PM in response to Catch22baseball0

As it turns out, I returned my iPod to Apple. They acknowledges that the machine was faulty and I'm waiting for a replacement. A local current affairs program last night said that 1 in 3 Classics fail. Looks like I should have bought Creative or something. All the guff about using nothing but iTunes is guff also. All it's good for is updating firmware and from other threads here, some of the firmware upgrades are dodgy as well. ****.......

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Answer 15

Feb 2, 2008 5:51 PM in response to Grumblebum

Agree wholeheartedly. I upgraded to the 160gb from a 3rd Gen 10gb model. Never had any issue ever w/ the 3rd Gen one. For all it's supposed bells & whistles, this Ipod Classic is turning out to be a bit of a piece of you know what...

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