IPod menu on TV screen

[staffy]

Hi, Im new to Ipods,I have the 80gb Classic and I have it connected to my home cinema setup.

The Ipod is in a Marantz dock and connected via analogue cables to my amp.
The quality of the music is superb,however I have one big problem??

I cannot get any menu details to appear on my plasma TV. I Purchased an S Video cable and connected that to the dock and plugged the other end into the S Video input on the Pioneer plasma but no picture of the menu's.

Their are input connections on the amp 1 for monitor and 1 for S Video input.

I have been told you actually need a special lead from Apple,in order to get the menu onto a screen.

Any advice is very welcome.

[kornchild2002]

iPods are unable to output their menus to TVs. I am not sure who told you that you needed a specific Apple lead but that was false. There are some third party docks that are able to output their own menus to TVs technically allowing you to browse your iPod using your TV. These docks are expensive ($80 or higher) and I am not sure if they are compatible with the iPod classic. I know that Apple's website used to sell a dock that did this but I can no longer find it there.

You can try looking at other websites (such as Amazon.com) if you feel the need to drop down $80 (or more) on a new dock.

[jasoncordelle]

Yes - the docks that output a menu are expensive and they are known to be generally buggy.

There are some nice ones out there, but a cable on its own is not going to allow you to output the menu to the TV.

You can use the cable mentioned to output movie/video files to your TV - I use one that I got for around $NZ20.00, but it has to have the authentication chip in it - hence it clips into the dock connector port, not the headphone port.

Generally speaking, unless you are deperate to have the menus on the screen, I'd learn to live with it.

[kornchild2002]

Another option would be to plop down ~$50 for a DVD player with a USB input that works with iPods. I have a friend that purchased an Insignia upscaling DVD player for $40 and he can plug his iPod into it and browse content (he can playback ALL songs even if they contain DRM and videos that don't contain DRM) using his IR wireless remote. I think that would be a better option that purchasing a more expensive buggy dock that may not work with the newer hardware.