Forgotten my iPod touch password

[Saskia]

Is there any way to reset it without deleting my photos, apps and music?

[Jesse Hollington]

Unfortunately, not directly. If you are using automatic sync and are regularly backing up your iPod touch to your computer, however, you can simply "Restore" it in iTunes, which will erase it and set it back to factory defaults. You can then restore the backup from iTunes, which will replace all of your settings and application data, and then re-sync your media content from your iTunes library. The password is not restored when restoring this backup -- you will instead be prompted to set a new one once the restore operation has completed.

Note that the backup made by iTunes does not include your media content that would normally be synced from your computer. If you have music, videos, and photos on your device, you will need to ensure these are already in your iTunes library before you restore your iPod, or they will be lost. If you've been using automatic sync, then everything should already be in iTunes. However, if you've been loading content onto your iPod touch manually, then you may need to copy that content back to your computer before restoring. There are third-party tools that can do this for you. See our article on Copying Content from your iPod to your Computer for more information.

Note that photos and videos you have taken yourself and stored in the camera roll are included in the backup. Only photos and videos that would originally have been loaded on via your computer are not.

[Saskia]

Originally Posted by jhollington

Unfortunately, not directly. If you are using automatic sync and are regularly backing up your iPod touch to your computer, however, you can simply "Restore" it in iTunes, which will erase it and set it back to factory defaults. You can then restore the backup from iTunes, which will replace all of your settings and application data, and then re-sync your media content from your iTunes library. The password is not restored when restoring this backup -- you will instead be prompted to set a new one once the restore operation has completed.

Note that the backup made by iTunes does not include your media content that would normally be synced from your computer. If you have music, videos, and photos on your device, you will need to ensure these are already in your iTunes library before you restore your iPod, or they will be lost. If you've been using automatic sync, then everything should already be in iTunes. However, if you've been loading content onto your iPod touch manually, then you may need to copy that content back to your computer before restoring. There are third-party tools that can do this for you. See our article on Copying Content from your iPod to your Computer[/url] for more information.

Note that photos and videos you have taken yourself and stored in the camera roll are included in the backup. Only photos and videos that would originally have been loaded on via your computer are not.

Oh no! Thank you, I don't really understand what you mean by the last bit? Does it mean I can keep my photos that I took on the camera roll? x

[Jesse Hollington]

Correct. Photos you sync through iTunes (via the "Photos" settings) are not backed up separately, since iTunes assumed you already have those photos on your computer. Photos you've taken yourself (anything in the "Camera Roll") does form part of the separate backup.

Basically, following a restore your iPod should be in the same state that it is now, except that it won't have a password set. The only information that isn't backed up is stuff that you originally loaded on through iTunes -- music, movies, TV shows, audiobooks, podcasts, iBooks, etc. As long as that stuff is still on your computer you can reload it yourself, and if you've been using automatic sync, iTunes will actually do that for you as soon as your restore completes.