Hi there -- I don't have an answer to your question, unfortunately, but I did want to let you know you're not alone with this problem. I just had the CDA-9884 installed, and it works fine with my new nano, but when I hook up my 5th generation 30GB video, I get the "no song" error -- very frustrating, since I listen mostly to my iPod and wanted to use the bigger one that has more songs on it. I found this message board:
http://community.crutchfield.com/forums/thread/17103.aspx that also talks about the problem.
I called the stereo place today, and they're going to talk to the Alpine folks on Monday. I'll post what I find out.