iPod Social Outreach Program

Nov 19 2006

Job No. 19

Published by Scott at 8:17 pm under iPod 4G

iPod repair log.

Model:
4G 20GB
(windows formatted)

Initial Condition:
light scratches on front and back
small dints in back
iPod inactive

Action:
Connected iPod to Mac
– iPod boots to “do not disconnect”
– iPod appears on desktop
– iPod appears in iTunes

Charged iPod for 1 hour

Disconnected iPod

– iPod boots to bad folder

Connected iPod to PC
– iPod appears in task bar
– iPod appeared in “My Computer” folder
– iPod didn’t appear in iTunes
– Windows 2000 started being unresponsive

Restarted PC
– during start-up Windows 2000 gives message “One of your disks needs to be checked for consistency”, checks iPod, displays “Windows has made corrections to the file system”, then PC stops responding.

Restarted PC
– iPod appears in task bar
– iPod doesn’t appear in “My Computer” folder
– iPod doesn’t appear in iTunes
– the USB Storage Device Manager reports that the device failed to start (error code 10)

Disconnected and reconnected iPod
– iPod appears in task bar
– iPod appeared in “My Computer” folder
– after some delay iPod appears in iTunes

Backed up iPod tracks using Senuti
– 2.44 GB backed up
– backup process seems to slow down at track 29 (“They can’t take that away from me”)
– drive sounds like it’s having trouble reading data

Erased iPod with Disk Utility then partitioned selecting “Free Space” as the partition type (see HD repairs for details)

Connected iPod to PC
– iTunes gives warning that the the iPod is corrupt and should be restored

Restored iPod
– restore process is successful
– iPod boots to select a ‘Language’ menu

Restarted iPod
– iPod boots to normal menu

Connected iPod to PC
– iTunes asks to name iPod

Copied test track to iPod

Disconnected iPod
– iPod boots to normal menu
– iPod plays and functions normally

Copied tracks back onto iPod (66 songs wouldn’t copy because “the audio format is not supported”)

Reset iPod
– iPod boots to normal menu
– no songs visible on iPod

Opened iPod

Disconnected battery

Disconnected hard drive

Installed known working hard drive
– iPod appears to be fully operational

Re-installed original hard drive
– iPod boots to normal menu (no songs are present)

Connected iPod to PC
– iTunes reports the iPod as corrupt and suggests ‘restore’

Again restored iPod with iTunes, copied tracks back onto iPod and reset iPod
– no songs visible on iPod

Connected iPod to Mac
– iTunes reports the iPod as corrupt and suggests ‘restore’

Restored iPod with Mac, copied tracks back onto iPod
– iTunes gets stuck at track 359

Again restored iPod with Mac, copied tracks in batches of 50 onto iPod
– iTunes gets stuck at track 350 (approx. 1.53 GB)

The iPod probably has an error 1.53 GB into the hard drive

Used Terminal to delete the iPod partition map and move the data partition 2 GB into the drive (refer to HD repair for details).
– received In/Out errors
– moved 4 GB, then 8 GB into drive and still got errors

Connected iPod to PC and restored iPod

Report:
Backed up tracks, erased hard drive, and restored iPod. The iPods hard drive has errors that seem to start at the 1.5 GB point; if you copy more then 1.5 GB of data to the iPod then it will probably start to fail. Apart from the hard drive the iPod is fully functional.

Notes:
Your music tracks have been backed up to DVD, please pick this up with your iPod.

Component Summary:

HD (hard drive has errors from 1.5 GB into drive)