iPod nano "Not enough free space" Help!

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iPod nano "Not enough free space" Help!

Using Mac OS 10.6.8, iTunes v. 11.4, and a 8GB, 3rd gen iPod nano. I use the nano mainly for podcasts,and some music (no photos, movies, TV shows). No problems loading and deleting them onto the iPod before today. Suddenly, when I connect the iPod I get an error message that says:

"The iPod cannot be synced because there is not enough free space to hold all the selected items (additional 54.2 MB required). Would you like iTunes to turn off podcast syncing for this iPod?

You can choose specific podcasts to sync to this iPod in the Podcasts tab in the iPod preferences."

I don't understand what this means.

The iPod shows in the iTunes window when I connect it to my Mini, but the message above then comes up instead of syncing as usual.. When I click on the iPod icon in iTunes, the window for the iPod with the tabs to choose music, video, etc. appears in the iTunes window, but when I click on the Podcasts tab, the window for podcasts where you add and/or delete podcasts on the iPod is whited out. The blue bar below in that window shows audio capacity on the iPod is not to full capacity, and iPod shows 40.1 mb free.

When I added and deleted some podcasts to the iPod last week, it went like this: I connected the iPod to the Mini after opening iTunes. iTunes told me to wait while it was syncing the iPod. When it finished, I added and deleted some podcasts/episodes, and clicked "Sync". It then went through the syncing process, and it told me I could disconnect, which I then did by using the Eject button in iTunes. It worked fine as it always does; never had a problem before.

I checked my hard disk and I have 53 GB free space. Software for iTunes and iPod are up-to-date. I've reset the iPod, and it's fully charged. I'm baffled.

I have another iPod 3rd gen, 8GB. Just checked and it syncs just fine. No error message.

Please, it anyone can help me, I'd be ever so grateful!

iPod nano, 3rd generation

Posted on Jun 7, 2018 3:58 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

the fiend

Level 7

23,490 points

Jun 8, 2018 2:34 PM in response to Esther Le Sieur

As Neil has pointed out, it's not your computer's space that's the issue, it's your iPod.

Although Apple think the message is clear and simple, you're not the first person to be mis-lead by it. The message is saying that in order to fit everything onto the iPod that you have asked to put on there, it needs an additional 54.2MB. But that's not how much iTunes is trying to put on there, it will be trying to add more. In other words, it needs all the existing free space AND an additional 54.2Mb.

Apple have decided (in their wisdom) that if this conflict occurs, they presume that you wish to keep your music library on there rather than Podcasts, so it's asking if you want to stop putting Podcasts onto it. It doesn't seem to have occurred to Apple that you might want to keep the Podcasts and remove the music instead

Whether that makes it more clear to you, I'm not sure, but more crucially, why has this happened now and what can you do about it?.

The first thing to check is how much Other is on the iPod. Other is files that have become corrupted and can no longer be read by your iPod. It stays on there and takes up space, therefore you have less space on the iPod and eventually you get that message. Don't panic - it can be sorted. It just happens, sometimes.

First of all, connect the iPod to iTunes and look at the capacity bar at the bottom of the iTunes window. Hover your mouse over the coloured segments until the Other appears:

If there is a significant amount of Other, a second or even a third Sync might sort it out. If not, you may have to perform a Restore, which is done by clicking on the Restore button that you can see (on the right in my screenshot).

On my iPod, you will notice that there is 4.36GB of Other. While that's quite a lot, my iPod has a very large capacity and so Other is not yet an issue and it may be corrected automatically by iTunes before I need to do anything myself.

Be aware that a Restore will remove all the content from your iPod and put back only what is in your Library. You will have to set the Sync preferences again as well. This includes Podcasts.

and

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Answer 2

Jun 8, 2018 2:47 PM in response to the fiend

Thank you to both of you for replying. Very helpful information!

I got around the issue (for this time at least) by connecting the iPod, agreeing to turn off podcast syncing in the pop-up window , then going to the podcast tab in the iPod window. There was a box at the top to check if you want to sync podcasts, which I checked. The list of podcasts went from being grayed out to normal. I deleted some podcast episodes and added others, and then the clicked "Sync" at the bottom of the window. It then psyched them. (Yay!). Since this may not work next time, I'm grateful to have your replies to refer back to.

Thanks again. :-)

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Answer 3

Niel

Community+ 2026

Level 10

743,165 points

Jun 8, 2018 2:33 PM in response to Esther Le Sieur

The iPod has 40.1MB free space, and would need to have at least 94.3MB to sync the podcasts. The amount of space free on the computer’s hard drive doesn’t matter for this.

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iPod nano "Not enough free space" Help!

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