Tips & Tricks

Apple provides excellent iPod Service & Support here.

You can also download all iPod manuals here.

Replace your iPod's Battery

Everything you might want to know about your iPod's battery (including its life expectancy) can be found on the iPod Battery Website. If your iPod battery has died or no longer holds a charge, you have several options.

If your iPod is still under warranty you need to contact Apple via its support website to arrange a repair. If your iPod is out of warranty, you can get your battery replaced at an Apple Authorised Service Provider (£49 - search for "Find Service") or use the online service (£69) here: Apple Out-Of-Warranty Battery Replacement.

Other (perhaps cheaper) options include UK iPod Repairs or iPod Doctor (who offer cheap self-fit kits), or Plugstore.

If you are a sucker for DIY (or don't fancy sticking your iPod in the post) you can always buy a new battery and fix it yourself. The following instructions give an example of battery replacement for a 3^rd generation iPod and first appeared in iCreate magazine:

1. Buy a new battery
You can buy a replacement iPod battery from UK iPod Repairs. The firm will fix it for you as part of the service, or you can opt to do it yourself ...

2. Do it yourself
Ease a flat-headed screwdriver between the white and silver parts of the iPod and work the top loose. Carefully work down one side of the iPod's body, unclipping the casing as you go.

3. We have lift-off
When you've got one side of the casing unclipped, lay the iPod screen down and the top should lift off. Now gently remove the hard disk from the iPod's body to reveal the battery.

4. Keep it straight
It's important that you pay attention to the position of the battery and the tiny power cable that connects it to the iPod, because you'll need to attach the new one in the same way.

5. Out with the old
Carefully remove the power cable connecting the battery to the iPod. Replace the old battery with the new one, tucking the power cable under the green plastic ridge to stop the wire getting in the way.

6. Charge it up
With this done, put the case of the iPod back on and charge the pod for at least 12 hours to get a full charge into the battery. Keep the old battery as a souvenir.

Managing songs and playlists - the basics

Firstly, here's a few general points:

In iTunes, if you the click the arrow icon to the left of your iPod you can see all the songs, videos (listed under "movies"), TV Shows, and playlists on your iPod:

You have to select your iPod in the Source list to see the iPod properties:

Then the iPod properties window appears

In iPod properties you can choose to "Manually manage music" or not. Let's consider these two options:

1) Automatically updating all songs and playlists

If you choose NOT to manually manage your music then your iPod is in Automatic Update mode: after you synchronise your iPod with your computer any modifications to tracks and playlists you have made in iTunes will be precisely copied onto your iPod. When in this Automatic Update mode, you cannot change the tracks on your iPod while your iPod is attached - the tracks in the song list when you are looking at the songs on your iPod appear greyed-out:

The idea is that you make your desired changes in iTunes with your iPod disconnected, and then you connect your iPod which will synchronise with iTunes.

See this Apple article on Syncing Music to iPod.

2) Manually manage music

If you select to manually manage your music, any changes you have made to songs and playlists in iTunes will NOT be automatically copied to your iPod. You will have to manually select and drag the songs from your library onto the iPod icon in the source list. For this reason, the tracks in the song list no longer appear greyed-out (you have to be able to select and drag them):

Note: the following does not apply to the iPod Touch. If you have an iPod Touch, refer to the iPod Touch Troubleshooting Assistant.

Apple have some great articles - you might find your solution in this list:

iPod Faults
The New User's Guide for iPod
iPod won't turn on
How to reset iPod
Restoring iPod to factory settings
iPod missing in "My Computer" or in iTunes for Windows
iPod does not show up in iTunes or as disk in Windows Explorer, or songs may seem to disappear
iPod shows up in Windows but not in iTunes
iPod not recognised by iTunes on a Windows PC
iTunes doesn't recognize iPod
iPod not recognized when connected to Windows laptop over USB
If you see a sad iPod icon
If you see a folder icon with an exclamation mark
iPod displays a red "X" icon
iPod only shows an Apple logo and doesn't start up
Disk errors on your iPod
Charging icon appears but iPod not recognized by computer
iPod shuffle troubleshooting and service FAQ

iPod Battery
iPod's battery doesn't charge
Getting the most out of your iPod battery
About iPod battery life
Charging your iPod battery

Song Problems
Troubleshooting songs and audiobooks that won't play
Troubleshooting songs that skip on iPod
Some songs in iTunes won't copy to iPod
iPod does not play content purchased from the iTunes Store
Some songs missing when browsing by artist
Artists do not appear in Artists menu on iPod

Video Problems
Viewing and syncing videos FAQ
Syncing videos to your iPod
Troubleshooting video problems
Can't transfer videos to iPod
iPod plays video but not audio of some exported files
Converting videos for iPod

iTunes
Can't connect to the iTunes Store
Songs and videos do not appear in iTunes
iTunes Store authorisation and deauthorisation
How to re-create your iTunes library

Miscellaneous
How to use your iPod to move your music to a new computer
How to use multiple iPods with one computer
How to use the Screen Lock
Is your iPod formatted for Windows or Mac?
How to rename your iPod
How to backup your songs and videos
Using iPod with multiple computers

If a sad iPod icon or an exclamation point and folder icon appears on your iPod's screen, or if you get a clicking sound or hard drive whirring, it is usually the sign of a hard drive problem and you have the power to do something about it now.

Your silver bullet of resolving your iPod issue is to restore your iPod to factory settings - see http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=60983

If you're having trouble, try these steps one at a time in order until the issue is resolved. These steps will often whip your iPod back into shape:

• Try another cable and port on your computer.
• Try these five steps (known as the "Five Rs") which should conquer most iPod issues: http://www.apple.com/support/ipod/five_rs/ This might be your best bet. Sometimes you have to try things several times.
• Try to put the iPod into Disk Mode if it fails to appear on your Windows' My Computer window or your Mac's Desktop - see: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93651
  This involves resetting your iPod by pressing and holding the Menu and Select buttons for at least 6 seconds until the Apple logo appears. When the Apple logo appears, release the Menu and Select buttons and immediately press and hold the Select and the Play/Pause buttons until the Disk Mode screen appears:
  
  
  With luck, your iPod should now appear on your Windows' My Computer window or your Mac's Desktop, and you should then be able to restore it with the iPod Software Updater.

If none of these steps address the issue, you may need to try the "Super Fix" described below.

Fix Your iPod (Part 2): The "Super Fix"

Note: the following does not apply to the iPod Touch. If you have an iPod Touch, refer to the iPod Touch Troubleshooting Assistant.

Is your iPod in a very bad way? Is it not being recognised by iTunes? Maybe it is displaying the dreaded "folder" or "sad iPod" icons? If you have tried all the solutions listed above with no success then this "Super Fix" solution will cure most problems.

What we are going to do is ERASE your iPod and then re-install the iPod's software. If your iPod has a software problem, this will probably fix it:

1) To erase your iPod, do the following:

ERASE YOUR iPOD (WINDOWS XP)

• Open My Computer on your Desktop
• Your iPod might be listed as Removable Disk (E:) or IPOD (E:)
• Right click it and chose "Format"
• When the Formatting window appears (see below), press "Start"

ERASE YOUR iPOD (MAC OSX)

• If you have OSX, you can use Disk Utility (in the Applications/Utilities folder).
• Select your iPod in the Disk Utility window and press the "Repair" button.
• Then press the "Erase" button to erase the iPod's hard drive.

2) After you erase your iPod, you need to run the Restore function from the iPod Updater program.

1. If your computer does not recognise your iPod and you are unable to format your iPod, try putting your iPod into Disk Mode (see the section above "Fix Your iPod (Part 1): Try This First" for information regarding Disk Mode).
2. It does not matter whether the format is completed or not, the key is to erase (or partly erase) the corrupted firmware files on the hard drive of the iPod. After that, when the iPod re-connected with a computer it will be recognized as an fresh external hard drive and it will show up on the iPod updater.
3. For more information about the Super Fix, see http://www.methodshop.net/gadgets/ipodsupport/erase/index.shtml

Fix Your iPod (Part 3): Get It Repaired

All Apple products are guaranteed against defects in materials and workmanship for one year (see the Apple Service FAQ). To obtain service you should contact your nearest Apple Authorised Service Provider (click here and search for "Find Service"), or else take your iPod to your nearest Apple retail store (see the front page of this website for a list of locations).

If your iPod is out of warranty you may be able to get it repaired more cheaply at UK iPod Repairs.

Copying Your Music Off Your iPod

Note: the following does not apply to the iPod Touch.

If you want to transfer music to your iPod, you use iTunes. But that if you want to get your music back off your iPod? In general, you cannot transfer songs back from your iPod to your computer (an exception to this rule is that you are able to transfer your iTunes purchases from your iPod back to iTunes - we'll consider this in a moment).

However, there are techniques which allow you to to copy music on an iPod back to a computer's hard drive: see Moving Music Off the iPod. You can also get file manager utilities which allow you to copy your music back: see the list of file managers on the links page of this website, or for a full list see here.

But as previously stated, you can use the "Transfer Purchases" feature in iTunes which allows you to transfer your iTunes purchases from your iPod to iTunes on your computer. Here are the steps to reverse sync purchases from your iPod:

• Make sure that you are using the latest version of iTunes and your iPod's software.
• Authorize your computer by choosing "Authorize Computer" from the Store menu in iTunes.
• Attach your iPod to the computer that contains purchases.
• From the "File" menu, choose "Transfer Purchases from iPod".

For more information see the Transfer Purchases from iPod article, also see In sync with iTunes.

Multiple iPods or Multiple Computers

In this section we examine the implications of using multiple iPods on one computer, or using one iPod on multiple computers.

Firstly, let's consider using multiple iPods on one computer. This is relatively straightforward. When you connect your iPod to your computer, your iPod communicates a unique device identification number to your computer. This allows iTunes to recognise your particular iPod, and distinguish it from other people's iPods who might be using the same computer. In this way you can each transfer custom playlists to your individual iPods. It's even possible to each have multiple music libraries on the same computer. See the Apple article on How to use multiple iPods with one computer (basically, you have separate user accounts on the computer).

Secondly, let's consider using one iPod on multiple computers (for example, using an iPod with your computer in the house and also with your work's computer). If your iPod is set to automatically sync (i.e., your iPod is not set to "Manually manage music") then your iPod has to have an associated "home" computer (with which it keeps in sync). When you first connect your iPod to your computer, iPod recognizes that computer as its "home" computer. Each time you connect, your iPod automatically downloads the music library stored on it. When you connect your iPod to a different computer, iTunes will inform you that your iPod is linked to a different iTunes library and will ask whether you wish to erase your iPod's contents and sync with the new computer's library:

If you will be connecting to multiple computers frequently, configure your iPod to manually manage music. This will allow you to selectively drag songs, albums, or playlists from the second computer to your iPod without compromising its existing music. Here is the Apple article on Using iPod with multiple computers.

Save YouTube videos to your iPod

If you have a PC then you could use iTunes or QuickTime 7 Pro to convert videos to play on your iPod - see this Apple article on Creating Video for iPod. If you're a Mac user then you could use iSquint. Also see this iPod Video Guide.

However, there are also online (i.e., in a website) video conversion applications which means you do not have to install anything on your computer. They also work with both PCs and Macs. I have been using MediaConverter (www.mediaconverter.org), and we can can use MediaConverter to download any YouTube video and save it on our iPod to watch again and again.

MediaConverter allows you to convert a YouTube video directly. Simply enter the web address of the video (see left).

Choose "mp4" as your selected file type (MPEG-4 video format).

When you get the converted video file, import it into iTunes (File->Add File to Library). It should appear under "Movies". Next time you sync your iPod the video will be copied to your iPod.

iPod Touch Tips

If you're like me, you have found the iPod Touch so easy to use that you haven't bothered downloading the manual (from here). If that's the case, here's a few selected tips from the manual which may tell you some things you didn't know ...