Transfering songs off my ipod?

[Kajimo]

I recently reformatted my hard drive, and am trying to get my songs copied from my ipod to my computer so I can listen whenever I want, but I'm not sure how to do this (all the music on it was taken off various CD's which I no longer have so it's not the itunes transfer limit)

[bwh79]

You can do this with a third-party tool such as YamiPod (check the third-part software forum for more info on that or any other program) if you want to transfer the files as well as playlists, ratings, and play dates/counts. If you don't care about any of that, just want the files themselves, and don't want to mess around with any software you can just put the iPod in manual mode and pull the files straight off the iPod's \iPod_Control\Music folder. They'll have odd-looking filenames but the internal tags are still intact and you can have iTunes rename everything if you 1) put them in the "iTunes Music folder" (as defined in Edit->Preferences->Advanced->General) and 2) select "Keep iTunes Music folder organized" in the same preferences window.

[Kajimo]

How do I start manual mode?

[bwh79]

Try reading some of the older posts before you ask the same questions that have been asked over and over again already. I know you weren't looking for the answer "Look it up", so I'll answer this one for now, but maybe next time see if it's been asked already, eh?

Open iTunes and connect your iPod. Your iPod should look at the library, compare it with the one it last synced with, and see that they are not the same. So it will ask you if you want to erase everything on it and sync with this library instead. You do not want to sync at this point, or it will do just what it says: erase everything and sync with this (empty) library instead. End result: empty library, empty iPod, and no way of recovering your lost data. So when it asks, you can politely decline with a simple click of the "Cancel" button.

Now at this point I don't know exactly what will happen. It could be that, since you told it you did not want to sync, then it will just switch you to manual mode automatically. Or it could be that it just won't sync this time but will remain in autosync mode and ask again next time. If that's the case, you'll need to enable manual mode yourself. To do that, you find and select the iPod device in the source pane (the left-most column of the iTunes window with headings such as "Library", "Store", "Devices", "Playlists" -- the iPod should appear under "Devices").

When you select an item in the source pane, the main window changes to display the selected item, so when you select the iPod you'll see the iPod info in the main window. There are now several tabs along the top of the main window including "Summary", "Music", "Podcasts", etc.. If "Summary" is not the selected tab then you should select it. The "Summary" page has three sections: "iPod", "Version" and "Options".

The "Options" section has four entries, and the one you're concerned with is called "Manually manage music and videos" (or simply "Manually manage music" if it's not a video iPod). Put a check in this box, and then read the little box that pops up. Read it again: it says you will have to manually "Eject" the iPod each time before you can safely unplug it from the computer. Don't forget to click "Apply" after you close this box or else the change you made won't take effect.