iTunes cannot read contents of iPod - all music seems to have dissapeared

I've been having the same trouble with my iPod- the drive i full, but it says no songs. I am wondering if it has something to do with iTunes 10. I have never had any problems before this version of iTunes. It really is a pain having to reload my entire library of 150 GBs even though I have it organized into playlists. The first time it happened, I thought it was because my nephew didn't eject the iPod correctly, but the problem has persisted at random times I look and I have no songs, but only 50 mb of free space. The only solution I have found so far is to restore each time. If this is happening with both windows and Mac OS the common factor is iTunes.

Hi, welcome to Apple Discussions.

*Recover media from iPod*
See this post from Zevoneer for options on moving your iPod data back to your computer.
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=11657508#11657508

Some of the tools linked to will only work if the iPod has a valid library which yours hasn't got. Others can scan the drive independently and some may even be able to rebuild a damaged library. The manual method towards the end should be able to recover your media regardless of the state of the library.

tt2

*Check your iPod with Diagnostics Mode*
It's possible that your iPod's hard drive has started to fail. Take your iPod and place your right thumb on the centre SELECT button and your left on the top MENU button. Press down both thumbs for about 6 seconds until your iPod reboots. Immediately move your left thumb around to the rewind button |<< on the left and hold this down together with SELECT for a further 6 seconds. Your iPod should now switch into Diagnostic Boot mode. Press MENU for *Manual Test*, then select *IO > HardDrive > HDSMARTData* to reveal your stats. For comparison here are mine for my 2 year old 6th Generation Classic:

Retracts: 889
Reallocs: 12
Pending Sectors: 0
PowerOn Hours: 2202
Start/Stops: 894
Temp: Current 24c
Temp: Min 10c
Temp: Max 50c

Take a note of your results. When finished press *SELECT & MENU* for 6 seconds to reset the iPod again.

With modern disc drives sectors are no longer marked bad by a disc scan, if the SMART firmware detects a sector it has trouble accessing it will attempt to invisibly reallocate it to a spare area of the disc.

Note that I've only 12 remapped sectors and none pending. To help explain what the numbers mean here is an extract from the Wikipedia S.M.A.R.T. article:

*Reallocated Sectors Count*
Count of reallocated sectors. When the hard drive finds a read/write/verification error, it marks this sector as "reallocated" and transfers data to a special reserved area (spare area). This process is also known as remapping, and "reallocated" sectors are called remaps. This is why, on modern hard disks, "bad blocks" cannot be found while testing the surface – all bad blocks are hidden in reallocated sectors. However, as the number of reallocated sectors increases, the read/write speed tends to decrease. The raw value normally represents a count of the number of bad sectors that have been found and remapped. Thus, the higher the attribute value, the more sectors the drive has had to reallocate.

*Pending sector count*
Number of "unstable" sectors (waiting to be remapped, because of read errors). If an unstable sector is subsequently written or read successfully, this value is decreased and the sector is not remapped. Read errors on a sector will not remap the sector (since it might be readable later); instead, the drive firmware remembers that the sector needs to be remapped, and remaps it the next time it's written.

Large numbers of Reallocs or Pending Sectors would suggest your drive is failing and that you may need to repair or replace your iPod. Check your stats after another attempt to update your iPod. If the numbers increase that again points to hard drive failure. While it won't be good news at least you'll know it isn't some random software problem and you can decide what to do next.

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If your iPod checks out OK try this tip for rebuilding it...

*Break up large transfers*
In iTunes select the menu item *File... New Smart Playlist*. Change the first drop-down box to Playlist, the next to is and the next to Music or whatever playlist holds the bulk of the content you want on your device. Tick against *Limit to*, type in say 10, then change the drop-down to GB, and set the last drop-down to artist. When you click OK you can enter a name for the playlist, e.g. Transfer. Now sync this playlist to your iPod rather than your entire library. When the sync is complete modify the rule ( *File... Edit playlist* ) to increase the size by your chosen amount, then sync and repeat. You can experiment with different size increments, if it doesn't work just choose something a bit smaller until it works each time. Before long you should have all your music on your iPod. Once that's done you can move on to other media such as podcasts, videos, photos, playlists etc.

tt2

Perhaps something is interfering with USB communications. If you don't already have the unit set up for disk mode then turn this on and try to assign a different drive letter. It may help, if possible, to exclude the drive from any on demand anti-virus scanning. You should probably also test it with a different computer.

tt2

I've been having the same problem, and I agree with the others on this page... it has been recently, since iTunes 10 has been out. I've had my iPod classic 160GB for almost a year with no problem until recently. This problem started about a week or two ago. Since then, I've been all over the forums, seeing multiple countless people with the same problem, and trying multiple suggestions trying to fix this. Such troubleshooting tips have been:

* Restarting my computer
* Restoring iPod to factory
* Uninstalling and reinstalling iTunes (even running the install as administrator)
* Changing drive names (which makes the computer not recognize it at all)
* Trying to connect iPod in "Disk Mode"
* Changing iPod cables, ports, and hubs
* Taking my iPod to the apple store at the mall to have them replace it while it's still in warranty (which it has been replaced to a NEW iPod that still does the same thing everytime I plug it in to update it with more music)
* Testing to see if the iPod does it on other computers (which it doesn't)
* Testing to see if other iPods give the same problem on this computer (which they do)
* and many other suggestions, which I can't remember cause there have been so many...

I have tried all of these, as well as mixing and matching different combinations of these and other suggestions, all in which have resulted in the problem remaining the same, or becoming worse. Some suggestions have made it to where iTunes, nor my computer would even recognize the device being plugged in at all. It wouldn't even charge the iPod. Everytime the iPod has been restored, I load my library back on (which is over 100GB, so it's a pain to do this everytime), and it works fine until I plug it back in to update with more music. This is really getting annoying. What else can be suggested that is a PERMANENT fix?

- K.C.

Message was edited by: djanthera

The major problem with computers is that every one is different. For all we know there's some blindingly obvious solution, such as a piece of conflicting software, that applies in your case but because we (fellow users, trying to help out) only hear about the symptoms you experience with iTunes we don't get to put two & two together. Anecdotally, it would seem that iTunes 10 "broke" syncing for a small minority of users but I for one have never seen the problem personally, nor heard of a definitive guaranteed fix.

Other things I can think of to try...
Make sure Windows isn't trying to use the iPod for ReadyBoost
Excluding the iPod from any Anti-Virus scanning
Excluding the iTunes folder from any Anti-Virus scanning
Disk checking the source drive
Check power saving settings don't try to put hard drives to sleep
Breaking up transfers as suggested earlier in this thread
Use an alternative manager such as MediaMonkey.

tt2

Has anyone tried uninstalling itunes 10 and reinstalling a previous version?

You aren't the only one. I just bought my iPod about a week ago, ended up exchanging it because of this, and the second one won't work either. Getting really fed up having to restore the thing almost every day.

Anyone managed to find an older version? I'm getting really frustrated with this myself and I know I can't be the only one. Gonna return this second iPod with this problem and be done with iPods unless I can get it working 😟

Are you running any kind of backup software? I'm running carbonite on my user folder, but again this problem started after I updated iTunes10.

I'm still having troubles with this issue.
Here is a link for older versions of iTunes
http://www.oldapps.com/itunes.php/