iPod Classic (A1238) Not Syncing All Songs

Question

iPod Classic (A1238) Not Syncing All Songs

I've got an iPod Classic 120GB (Model: A1238) that is not syncing all songs. Using iTunes v12.2.2.25 (64-bit). I've done a reset via iTunes. Sometimes when it connects to my PC (Windows 7) it says that the drive needs to be scanned. I've done a scan and it comes back okay. I've done a format through Disk Management, un-checking Fast Format, in hopes that it would separate those bad sectors and ignore them. That seemed to work, when I plugged it back into iTunes I chose to sync manually a few artists at a time. This worked for a bit, then it hung again and stopped working. I ran diagnostics on the iPod, below are the results.

SMART DATA

Retracts: 79

Reallocs: 2180

Pending Sectors: 5

Power On Hours: 51

Start/Stops: 54

Temp: Current 26c

Temp: Min 11c

Temp: Max 60c

I'm assuming the data I highlighted in bold above shows that the hard drive is dying. Is there anything else I can do to resolve my issue before thinking about buying a replacement hard drive and prying it apart to replace the drive?

Thanks in advance!

iPod classic, Windows 7

Posted on Sep 19, 2015 11:12 AM

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Answer 1

Sep 22, 2015 2:00 PM in response to GatorBait1996

Can anybody help? Has this never happened to anyone else?

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Answer 2

turingtest2

Level 10

274,352 points

Sep 23, 2015 2:17 PM in response to GatorBait1996

See Corrupt iPod classic. Try a DFU restore. Hopefully that will clear the pendings.

tt2

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Answer 3

Sep 23, 2015 2:17 PM in response to turingtest2

Thank you, I saw and read your post before, I thought it was a well informed article. I believe I tried all of your suggestions and got the iPod working again, for a little bit. I thought for sure after the reformat it was uploading (syncing) all songs without an issue, especially if I did them in smaller transfers. But no, it hung on a song again then error'd out and said it was corrupt when I connected it to my PC again. I plan on going through you post again and trying everything out one more time, with high hopes. But, I think the drive may be past saving. *****, because I've never dropped it and have always taken good care of it.

Let me ask you this, I decided to redo my music collection by first importing all my CD's using Apple Lossless Encoder instead of what I was using, MP3. Would that be an issue? I assume the iPad classic should be able to play Apple Lossless (.m4a) without any issues. Just a thought, since that seems to be when my problems started.

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Answer 4

turingtest2

Level 10

274,352 points

Sep 23, 2015 4:48 PM in response to GatorBait1996

I suspect you're giving the iPod's drive more work to do reading Apple Lossless, and certainly using more of the drive's surface. If there are still sectors that won't read reliably it make take a few rounds of restoring and reloading the device to map them all out. You want to look for 0 pendings after a restore/DFU/reformat and then hope that stat stays at zero after reloading your media.

tt2

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