Q: Can the iPod 6th Gen. be completely turned off ?

The Classic does not have an off switch either, you hold down the play/pause button and it puts it to sleep. If you don't turn the hold switch on (orange showing) then if you touch any button it will come back on. Even in deep sleep it is still using power.

Did you leave your headphones plugged in when you hit the pause button? Or was the Nano in a speaker dock? Because the 6th Generation Nano doesn't have a speaker so those are the only situations where you could hear music from it. After you pressed the pause button did you push the sleep button on top? That is the equivalent to holding down the play/pause button on the Classic.

If it is coming on and you have the headphones plugged in, unplug them (which I would recommend anyway). If it is in a dock does it have an alarm. Or could someone/something be pushing the buttons? If neither is true your Nano is defective and you need to exchange it. Mine was sitting in an Apple dock connected to my headphone amp for the past 3 days. I took it out, touched the sleep button, the Apple logo appeared (it had gone into deep sleep) and then it lit up. I had about 95% of the battery left, as I had listened to it for an hour or so connected to the headphone dock.

wow, i'm amazed. went on a 5 hour flight cross country only to find out that my new little nano had a dead battery. oops! didn't know what happened until i started searching the forums!
this is unfortunate, if i had known this sooner i would have returned this thing. it's too small anyway...and thank goodness i didn't sell the older one with the video camera. I may even get applecare on the older one...yikes!
who would buy this thing knowing that every time you use it, and think you are turning it off, the next time you turn it on the battery will be dead!!!!

So you are saying that on the airplane you had a full charge, you pushed the pause button (or stopped the radio), unplugged the headphones, pressed the sleep button and 5 hours later when you turned it on your battery was dead?

If yes then your Nano is defective. Get it serviced.

Pushing and holding play/pause on your 5th Generation Nano is the same thing as pushing pause and then the sleep button on the 6th Generation Nano (since there is no sleep button on the 5th Generation. At first they are in a "light" sleep, leave it long enough it will go into a "deep" sleep, I.e. Whe you turn it back on you will see the Apple logo and it will boot. In neither scenario is it completely off as it has to provide power to the clock.

Message was edited by: deggie

Thanks for your help and post.
I had charged it completely the day before, plugged into the wall using the Apple wall charger (obviously with the provided USB cable!).
Then, when i got on the plane at 12:30pm the very next day....the battery was dead.
I'm pretty sure it was off, i had pressed the one button on the top right of the thing. I don't believe any music was 'on' nor was the radio 'on'. I will try to replicate this, and if it happens again, I'll take it into the Apple store.

The button on top will not stop the iPod from playing, it will just put the screen to sleep. Be sure you have pushed pause first.

No. How can Apple be so psychorigid as to prevent it is beyond me. Should be easy to fix though. Hoping it will be uncluded in the next OS upgrade. Too bad Bluetooth and Nike + were not included also.

ok, thanks for that tip!!!

Might help if you read through the thread before replying to the first post. No current iPod can be completely turned off, there is no fix necessary, it will not be in the next OS upgrade and they are unlikely to ever add BT to the Nano.

I have received a Nano 6th generation with my Bose CQ15 headset. I can see why I got it for nothing. It is difficult to navigate and impossible to turn off and there were no instructions with the product. Fortunately I have a Nano 3rd generation which I use with the headset (incredible sound) and use the 6th in my receiver. These touch screens must have been created by those with dainty fingers.

I wouldn't recommend the 6th generation to anyone. The people who beta it must be brain dead or antisocial and live in darken rooms. Whomever dreamt up the boxing of the Nano 6th needs to take a course in merchandising. I can only guess it is some electronics nerd who enjoys Rubric's Cube.

You do realize you can't turn off the 3rd Generation Nano either, don't you? Just like the 6th Generation.

And I have no problem with the controls or the packaging.

You do realise that there is obviously an issue here for many due to the volume of people raising their concerns?

I'm glad that you are happy with your purchase, but many, many people are having significant issues with the battery life, and due to this Apple will HAVE to do something to rectify the issues.

The "fix" should be relatively straightforward - update the firmware so that a long press on the sleep button pauses any music playing, turns off the radio, and puts the device into sleep mode. A short press can have the exact same behaviour as it currently has

Implementing the above should ensure that people like yourself who are happy with how the device currently works will be unaffected, but people having issues can use the long press to ensure that battery life is maximised.

I posted the following on a separate thread "6th Gen Nano Battery Life". At least from my experience on two separate 6gen nano units, there may be a battery issue separate from the firmware functionality.


(from "6th Gen Nano Battery Life" thread)
I returned the 1st 6gen nano that I purchased in October due to out of spec battery life (16hrs). I read somewhere that there are defective batteries being used on some batches, so I gave it a go on a second 6gen nano. This unit has given me 26 hrs of play back and it is still going. Bar graph shows about 10% remaining after 26 hrs.

Before I began run time test I;
(1) unpacked (new)
(2) drained the battery through Snowfox diagnostic menu
(3) Registered, sync'ed, and charged on a PC for 3 hrs 15 min.
(4) plugged in a head phone and started playback
(5) still playing after 26 hrs.....

I'm not certain if it was the "defective battery" on the 1st unit or the fact I conditioned the battery before any use on the second unit. I did not condition the battery on the 1st unit. But hey, I'm happy with the 2nd unit so far.

I'll let it play until it shuts down, then fully charge the unit and let the unit sit for 34 hrs to see the battery drain (before 36 hr shut down)


(2 days later on a follow up post)

Finished the "run time" test.

At 50% volume the 2nd unit;

*warned (spoke) "low battery" at 29 hrs and a change
*then shut itself off at 31 hrs and a change.

I then recharged the unit for 3 hrs and let it sit 28 hrs => no noticeable change in battery bar graph.

If you have not already done so you can send this as feedback. Since none of the iOS devices work this way I doubt they are going to do that, nor am I sure the switch has the capability to discriminate between a long and short push.

Just because a small amount of people here (people come here to post problems) have stated they have a problem with touching pause then the sleep button is not an indicator of a major problem.

I tried this and got some weird screen that was either not English or backwards-it was so small I couldn't tell. What was that??

As I see, many people dislike this lack of feature. Most people right away think it's a waste of money and go return it. On my part, I got my Ipod Nano 6th gen RED as a Christmas present, and I do not want to be rude and return it just because i wont fully turn off. I have done tests of battery life with different amounts of music playing.

Most people probably get the idea of just pausing the music, clicking the wake/ sleep button and just letting it sit over night, or in your gym bag, or in your car, etc. the ipod is still using energy because it has to remember the song that is playing, keep the song ready for play, and know where the song was paused. I left my Ipod on a song paused through the night and had barely a 1/4th of battery left. I then noticed when I play a radio station, then stop the radio, go to the main i shows in the top right corner it shows that nothing is playing or is being paused. When you pause a song, not radio, it shows it in the top right corner next to the battery sign. I then left my ipod on after i stopped the radio And unplugged my head phones with a full battery. I had full battery when i woke up. Maybe some people should try that and it does help. Hopefully all this typing is worth while....