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Neal Jackson Author

Level 1

82 points

This procedure will fix Error -48

I'm confident the following will cure everyone's -48 error.

First: Select your iTunes Playlists that you use to synchronise to your iPod.

Select View > "Find duplicates"

Now remove all duplicate tracks (files) from the iTunes Playlist(s) you have chosen to sync with your iPod. The playlist(s) must contain no duplicate tracks. (Don't delete files with the same name but by a different artist or on a different CD...these are not duplicate files, just different versions of the same song, etc.)

When you are confident that no two tracks are the same click on the iPod icon in iTunes and select the "Summary" tab and press "Restore". This will wipe the iPod, update the software to 1.2.1 (if it's needed) and copy your new Playlist(s) with no duplicate tracks over to the iPod.

THE TRICK IS TO MAKE CERTAIN YOUR iTUNES PLAYLIST HAS NO TRUE DUPLICATE TRACKS BEFORE COPYING TO THE iPOD.

For some reason when you drag tracks to add to your Playlist in iTunes they sometimes get duplicated...I don't know why this happens but it is what causes the directory errors on your iPod. Checking you have no duplicate files in your iTunes playlists before syncing to your iPod will prevent this error from occurring.

Many different Macs since 1984, Mac OS X (10.4.7), I have one XP PC for playing games...but the OS is rubbish & the games too buggy

Posted on Dec 13, 2006 6:53 AM

90 replies

Dec 24, 2006 6:26 AM in response to P Diddy

The US/UK idea certainly seems to be supported by your evidence. I don't want to complicate matters, but I HAVEN'T done any of the above changes to Country settings on my Mac, and my type -48 errors have (at least for the moment) disappeared anyway. I recall finding an error chart which listed these errors as signifying duplicate files. Well, eventually I DID find just one song on iTunes which was a duplicate. Whether it was erasing that or something else, I'm sync'ing ALMOST normally now. My iPod is set to 'disk use', set not to open iTunes automatically, and I DID use the disk utility ONCE (but found nothing to be wrong with the iPod). The only annoyance I'm left with now is that the iPod flashes the "do not disconnect" sign indefinitely even after iTunes tells me that the update is complete. I simply have to eject the iPod and after 2 minutes or so it reverts to the normal screen. That's TWO updates I've done without having to completely wipe and restore my iPod - WOO HOO!

mikelouw

Level 1

0 points

Dec 27, 2006 3:06 PM in response to Greg White1

I'm another non-US -48 victim. The duplicates thing didn't work for me, and I'm no techie, so I think I'll wait for the firmware update rather than relocate myself, even if only virtually, to the US.

mikelouw

Level 1

0 points

Dec 27, 2006 6:15 PM in response to Roy B

Bad news, I'm afraid. Neither removing duplicates nor changing international settings to US solved the error -48 issues for me (Power mac dual G5, OSX 10.4.8, iTunes 7.0.2, iPod software 1.2.1, 30GB 5th Gen iPod).

The only approach which prevents these errors, at least for me, is to enable disc use, uncheck "open iTunes when iPod is connected", and do a disc repair of the iPod with Disk Utility EVERY TIME I want to sync the iPod. If I forget to repair the iPod disk even once, the -48 error occurs. Btw, errors are found on the iPod each time I run repair disk (header and file number discrepancies).

It's odd that this seems to be affecting only non-US users, but I'm afraid the "fix" didn't work for me 😟

This is becoming a major issue, and is preventing me from enjoying my (expensive) iPod.

Personally, although I'm by no means an expert in these matters, I think it's something to do with iTunes 7.0.2 or the iPod software 1.2.1. I never got these errors before "updating" to these newest versions.

Dec 28, 2006 12:08 AM in response to mikelouw

Morning Mike,
Just switching to US english wont help. You need a new user account this forces itunes to rebuild the xml & library file in U.S english. Did you follow all of the steps detailed in my post?

Dec 28, 2006 12:19 AM in response to Greg White1

Hello greg,
Yup, thats right in OS9 -48 error was listed as a duplicate file issue. There were multiple fixes posted for itunes -48 problem..EG: Removing XML control charachters from song titles, removing/renaming duplicate song files. I've done them all. So it could be that it's worth while completing all the fixes folk have listed. My issue was finally resolved after doing the previous two and switching to a new user account with U.S english. It's effort moving your data to the shared folder and .mac syncing your bookmarks,address book data etc but for me it was worth it just to have my pods working again!

P Diddy

Level 1

18 points

Dec 28, 2006 1:31 AM in response to Made of rain

Morning all, hope you had a good Christmas.

Bad news for me, I'm afraid. After initially finding that switching my iBook to US settings made the nasty -48 error go away, it has now returned. I'm not sure why. So, for me anyway, it is back to running Disk Utility Repair Disk before and after loading iTunes.

The one constant here is inconsistency. There are three possible solutions that I know of (US settings, remove duplicates, Repair Disk). If you find one that works, stick with it!

Alternatively, Apple might consider fixing their buggy software, but that might be asking to much.

Regards

PD

mikelouw

Level 1

0 points

Dec 28, 2006 2:40 AM in response to Made of rain

Hi M of R. Yes, I did everything you suggested, step by step.
Stll get the dreaded - 48's :-((

mikelouw

Level 1

0 points

Dec 28, 2006 11:41 AM in response to mikelouw

Update: finally it works!
I "relocated" my Mac to the US, then in addition, I uninstalled iTunes, deleted the iTunes library amd .xml files, re-downloaded and re-installed iTunes, re-imported the library, and restored and synced my iPod. No more -48's!

Of course, I'm now not sure whether it was the relocation to the US or the re-installing of iTunes which did the trick, but I'm not about to find out any time soon. My Mac will remain in the US for the forseeable future. 🙂 I can live with the quaint old AM/PM times and the more convoluted keystrokes required to get the Euro symbol!

Dec 28, 2006 12:06 PM in response to mikelouw

Not sure how well this will be taken, but you can save yourself a little time and hassle if you use the disk repair workaround by doing the following:

Instead of opting not to open itunes on connection and running disk repair every time before you launch itunes, you can use your ipod as normal (select open itunes on connection) each time until you get the dreaded error 48 message.

When you get the error message you can simply quit itunes (without ejecting the ipod) run disk repair, reopen itunes which will then sync without error and without resetting your sync options.

Not a solution I know, but it does save a bit of time using the workaround.

Dec 30, 2006 6:44 AM in response to toonz

toonz and others,

I thought you'd like to know that Apple recently told someone (a UK user, as usual) about a fix for error -48 having to do with changing timezones, and it worked.

The thread is:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=792697&tstart=0

I'm wondering if that method will help anyone else with -48 in the UK area.

-Kylene

Dec 30, 2006 7:12 AM in response to iPod_nano_1_GB

I switched every UK based setting to U.S about 2 weeks ago which resolved it. Looks like from that guys post Apple are telling people just to alter the UK date/time format and that'll do the trick. So It was the MM.DD.YYYY US date formatting then! Hehehe my mates an xml legend!
So i'm guessing the reason P diddgy got his -48 error was due to the clock settings being UK. It is annoying. I got around it by downloading a widget with a clock on it. :O)
Hurray for us! wooooo

Dec 30, 2006 8:13 AM in response to Made of rain

But Apple is saying just to alter the time zone, not the date/time format, so does this mean that the date/time format is not relevant to the problem?

Adrian

Neal Jackson Author

Level 1

82 points

Dec 30, 2006 9:13 AM in response to iPod_nano_1_GB

At the third stroke, the time sponsored by Apple will be; -48 and thirty seconds.

Dec 30, 2006 9:37 AM in response to Adrian Langford

I am having the same problem also with my 5th gen ipod which i previously used on a windows computer. after recently converting to mac i reformatted it and came to this error (-48).
I followed apples steps to reset the ipod manually without it being conncted to the mac or computer. Hey presto it worked for me.
I also manage my ipod manually not syncing it with any playlists like some of you have mentioned above.
so manually reset your ipod, not reformat! do the hold switch thing and then hold menu and middle button.
hope this helped J.

Dec 30, 2006 11:15 AM in response to Neal Jackson

Well switching to Cupertino time didn't help me - still getting lots of -48 errors.

Am now trying to restore while Cupertino time set to see if that makes a difference.

This procedure will fix Error -48