Why does my iMac not recognize my iPod nano?

Question

Level 1

4 points

Why does my iMac not recognize my iPod nano?

I recently purchased an iPod nano, with the touch screen, for my wife. Obviously she wanted to immediately connect it to our iMac 27" and transfer her music files. But the iMac does not recognize the iPod, whatever we try. It does not turn up in iTunes, the Finder or System report, and it does not charge. The really strange thing is that the computer has no problems with my HTC Wildfire, running Android. It also has no problems with flashdrives, our portable hard drive or printer. Only the iPod. So much for the "Im a mac and I always work.. diddely."

I have tried the following:

Reset the iPod nano by holding the power button until the grey apple appeares
Restore the iPod nano from a PC running Windows XP (Which had no problems recognizing the device by the way)
Tried to connect with two different cables (Wich again both worked well with on the PC)
Updated iTunes to the newest version
Ugraded from Snow to Lion 😟
Reset PRAM, NVRAM and SMC
Shouting

None of those has made any difference. What should I do next?

My Mac is a iMac 27", produced in 2009, 3,06 GHz Intel core 2 Duo, 4 GB 1067 MHz DDR3 Ram S/N: W80031TH5PE. Running MacOS X 10.7.2

The iPod is a nano, latest generation with the touch screen, Model no: A1366 EMC No: 2385. S/N: DCYFX08WDDW2

iPod nano, Mac OS X (10.7.2)

Posted on Oct 20, 2011 11:48 AM

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Answer 1

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Oct 20, 2011 12:08 PM in response to Sakarias

Some additional info:

Yes, I have tried connecting it from through the 4 USB ports on my Mac
I recently tried to connect my sisters' iPod nano, which is the previous generation (with a wheel). That did not work either. Perhaps my Mac has an iPod allergy.
My wife used to have an iPhone 3G, which got run over about a year ago. The iPhone worked fine with the Mac.

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Answer 2

Oct 20, 2011 2:23 PM in response to Sakarias

Try recovering.

To do this, connect the Nano to your computer with iTunes running. Then press and hold the volume up, volume down and sleep/wake button until iTunes brings up a dialog box, then release the buttons. If you hold them too long after the dialog comes up, you may have to start over.

Once the dialog comes up, follow the instructions to "Recover" your iPod. It will ask permission to download a file - that is normal.

i

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Answer 3

CMCSK

Level 6

11,452 points

Oct 20, 2011 5:31 PM in response to Sakarias

iPod not recognized in iTunes and Mac desktop

Shouting

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Answer 4

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Oct 21, 2011 12:43 AM in response to iPod Whisperer

I did try to recover it – twice. Since the mac does not recognize it, I had to do it from a PC at work, running Windows XP (the effect should be the same though). In fact I have done everything on the official list from Apple: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1410

I called Apple support shortly after purchasing the device, and they adviced me to take it back to the store and get a replacement. The store however refused since they could access it from their own iMac. So I'm stuck with it - and I want to find a way to make it work.

It all points to something being wrong with my iMac, but why does it recognize all other USB devices? Why is it only the iPod that is causing trouble?

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Answer 5

Oct 21, 2011 2:48 PM in response to Sakarias

That is strange, but your experience does make it sound like your computer is where the issue is.

First, if you are still under warranty, you can call the apple helpline and they can work with you on a solution.

The first thing to try would be the basic stuff. Run Disk Utilitites and repair the permissions on your HD. Once that is done, restart the computer and try again.

i

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Answer 6

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Oct 22, 2011 6:38 PM in response to iPod Whisperer

Thanks. Tried to repair permissions, but no such luck (It produced quite a log though). Since the HD is a topic for this problem, I partitioned my disk a while back. I cant believe that this would cause problems with the iPod, but I´d still best mention it.

I guess its about time to call support again. I think they will probably treat me like an idiot for not figuring this out, so I want to make sure that I have tried everything else first. Luckily I live in Norway where a two years warranty on all electrical devices is required by law. Therefore both the computer and the iPod are still warranted 🙂

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Answer 7

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 2, 2011 6:02 AM in response to Sakarias

So I ended up calling Apple support. After doing everything they suggested (Amongst other things create a new admin account, and try form there), support said that I had to bring my mac to service. So I took my iMac with me on the train and went to the city. The service provider told me that if this proved to be the fault of a software bug I would have to pay for the service even though it might be Apples fault, and even though the computer is still warranted. So the service provider urged me to bring my Mac back home and do a clean install. I purchased a big portable hard disk for a time machine backup, and then did the reinstall. I restored the user accounts from time machine, but nothing else.

Again, no luck.

I am thinking, maybe I should install Windows XP and see where that brings me. If it does not work with windows it is bound to be a hardware problem, isnt it?

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Answer 8

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 3, 2011 5:41 AM in response to Sakarias

It turns out that installing windows on a mac is not as easy as I thought. Since I had partitioned my disk with disk utilities, Boot Camp Assistent told me it woudnt even touch it with a ten foot pole. ooooohhh.... :-( Why cant they just get along? Well, since that didnt work, I downloaded a SUSE studio liveCD and tried it that way. Of course it is still the same.

Now I cant but suspect that my hard drive has something to do with this, given the feedback from iPod Whisperer, as well as the attitude from BCA. I decided to try fix it from the Lion install utility, but that could not be done. So I had to find my Snow leopard disks. I was able to reformat the disk, but I am still waiting for the setup.

I am starting to feel that connecting an iPod to an iMac is more complicated that what I would consider as normal. In any case it is nothing like this: http://youtu.be/MwZkZfOVUHM

By the way, I am logging my experience here in order to show it to Apple support – and hopefully I will have some cheerful news by the end of this process. If so, my experience might be the light in the end of the tunnel for those in the same situation.

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Answer 9

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 3, 2011 6:22 PM in response to Sakarias

I guess I can finally conclude that this has to be a hardware problem.

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Answer 10

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 6, 2011 11:29 AM in response to Sakarias

New development: I had some visitors this weekend. They had with them an iPhone and and iPod shuffle. Both of those could be connected to my Mac. It would certainly make sense that it has to be the iPod, but then again it works on every other computer I have tested it with. Boy, this is confusing! 😕

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Answer 11

Nov 7, 2011 2:46 PM in response to Sakarias

Not sure why it would work on PC and not MAC. However, did you look at the pins on the plug on the nano itself to make sure they are not bent? You will likely need a magnifying glass to know for sure.

i

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Answer 12

who1970

Level 1

0 points

Dec 10, 2011 5:35 AM in response to Sakarias

Not too sure if this will work or not for you.

But I bought a Mac for the first time a couple of weeks ago and I had similar issue. I had two iPods and one of them showed ok in itunes and the other didn´t. Plus the one that didn´t show up in the iMac showed in itunes in my PC without problems, like always. Really bizarre. I´ve been going crazy searching apple support pages and forums for days and could not find anything that solved the problem. I came across this mail thread but noticed that no solution is given. Only difference in my case seems to be that the ipod appeared in Finder.

I went today to the Apple shop where I bought the iMac and, funny enough, they had the same problem. My iPod didn´t appear in any of their computers iTunes. What they did was reformatting completely the ipod via the disk utility under Utilities. I lost the data (no big deal since I can resync) and the iPod was inmediately recognized by itunes and showed up like it should.

I noticed that you don´t even see the ipod in finder, but I seem to understand that your ipod appears in other computers, so you might want to try reformatting it. For your information, in my case it is a 3rd gen iPod and it is formatted to MS-DOS FAT 16.

Hope it helps.

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Answer 13

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Dec 13, 2011 9:14 AM in response to who1970

Wont reformatting mess up the software on the device? How do you handle that?

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Answer 14

Dec 13, 2011 9:34 AM in response to Sakarias

Reformatting will wipe out everything you synced to it. Check out theiPod nano (6th generation) - User Guide for reformatting instructions and other troubleshooting suggestions if you have not already done so.

Suggest that you do a search through Knowledge Base

Read the postings listed in the "More Like This" column over here: ---------------->

If you are still having problems after doing the above and in view of Apple Stores not replacing and/or charging you for repairs, strongly suggest that you call Apple Customer Relations @ 1-800-767-2775. Explain to them exactly what you stated in your postings.

Good luck!

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Answer 15

Sakarias Author

Level 1

4 points

Mar 4, 2012 12:21 PM in response to Sakarias

As it turns out, my problem was in the hardware. I sent my computer to Apple service, where after a series of tests, the motherboard was replaced.

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