Ipod CLasic (160gb) Needs Restore but Won't Sync.

[Im Not Emo]

Maybe I can get some help here, cause I've looked everywhere without any success...

So, after disconnecting my Ipod from my wall charger I noticed none of the songs played. No matter which song I chose it always remained at time 0:00:00. After I restarted my ipod I got an error saying I needed to restore my ipod... Fine. I tried plugging it in to my PC (Running Windows 7) but Itunes/Windows can't see it. WHILE it's plugged in the Ipod goes into what looks like "Disk Mode," white background with a single line of black text in the middle saying not to disconnect.

After a few minutes of waiting, Itunes freezes and Windows kinda half ### sees it. Windows won't let me peek inside though, and the Ipod appears as a Removable Disk. If I try to get inside, the screen freezes.

So, any help? As much as I don't want to admit it, the fact that the music wouldn't play before it screwed up like this makes me think the poor thing is dead (even if I can feel movement inside). It's weird, because the Ipod worked fine literally 10 minutes before hand.

[Im Not Emo]

EDIT: 77 Views and no replies? That can't be good :P Looks like I may have to go spend the $120 on a replacement.

Whoops. sorry for the double post.

[kornchild2002]

These are forums, you can't expect someone to come up with a solution in a period of less than two hours. Forums are not meant for instant replies. You can find plenty of chatrooms if you need instant help, otherwise people in these forums (99% of which are doing this on their own watch for free) can take 1-2 days before getting back to you.

I suggest downloading a third party program (such as fat32formatter) and seeing if you can reformat your iPod's hard drive. You will need to use a third party program simply because Windows cannot format anything above 32GB using the FAT32 file system. Your iPod needs to be formatted using the FAT32 file system so you must use a third party program to do so. Then try restoring it in iTunes and see what happens.

You might also want to perform a scan on your iPod's hard drive to see if there is anything that Windows can come up with. Plug your iPod into your computer, open up My Computer (or just Computer if you are on Windows Vista/7), right-click on the drive that represents your iPod, left-click on Properties, click on the Tools tab, and perform a disk scan/check (I forget what it is called). That should let you know if there are any physical issues with your iPod's hard drive though Windows' disk scanning abilities are pretty shallow to say the least.

[Im Not Emo]

Originally Posted by kornchild2002

These are forums, you can't expect someone to come up with a solution in a period of less than two hours. Forums are not meant for instant replies. You can find plenty of chatrooms if you need instant help, otherwise people in these forums (99% of which are doing this on their own watch for free) can take 1-2 days before getting back to you.

I was trying to be a bit lighthearted (as that was meant to be an edit, not an extra post). If it offended you then I apologize, I know that in the case of forums it takes time.

Anyways...

Originally Posted by kornchild2002

I suggest downloading a third party program (such as fat32formatter) and seeing if you can reformat your iPod's hard drive. You will need to use a third party program simply because Windows cannot format anything above 32GB using the FAT32 file system. Your iPod needs to be formatted using the FAT32 file system so you must use a third party program to do so. Then try restoring it in iTunes and see what happens.

You might also want to perform a scan on your iPod's hard drive to see if there is anything that Windows can come up with. Plug your iPod into your computer, open up My Computer (or just Computer if you are on Windows Vista/7), right-click on the drive that represents your iPod, left-click on Properties, click on the Tools tab, and perform a disk scan/check (I forget what it is called). That should let you know if there are any physical issues with your iPod's hard drive though Windows' disk scanning abilities are pretty shallow to say the least.

I tried Fat32 Formatter with no luck, since errors start coming out. Errors included:
Cyclic Redundancy Check
IOCTR_DISK_SET_DRIVE_LAYOUT

As for the scanning, since Windows only "kinda" sees my Ipod whenever I try to peek inside or do anything Windows Explorer freezes on me. This is what led me to believe it might be a hard drive failure.

[Barney000]

I have exactly the same problem. Same errors. Have you managed to fix it? Are there any other solutions that anyone can suggest?

[kornchild2002]

Another solution would be to take the iPod over to a Mac and format it/restore it there. Mac OS X has a nice Disk Utility that can format hard drives using FAT32 and various other file systems. For whatever reason, Microsoft limited FAT32 formatting in Windows XP to just 32GB partitions and have completely taken it out of Windows Vista and Windows 7 when it comes to hard drives.