My friend upgraded her old 5 gb to a new 30 gb and gave her old one to me. She is a mac user and had her ipod formatted for a mac, it worked perfectly well. I downloaded the windows updater and ephpod w/ a macopener. I have the ipod connected to my pc, it recognizes it as an Ipod, but everytime i try to restore with updater it says "firmware update failure. Disk write error" if i try again, it says can't mount ipod. My ipod shows a -do not disconnect- sign permanently until it runs out of batteries and then it has the hazard and the folder sign on. Ephpod tries to upload but theres a windows delayed write failure and then ephpod crashes. Its such a disaster. At this point i'm thinking to just return it to my friend. How do i fix it? Should i even try?

p.s. I just got ipod manager from a cd and i tried updating again and this time i got the error message "updater can't install firmware on connected ipod. The ipod's hardware and the updater firmware are not compatible." Is that the last hurrah? Should I give up this free and amazing ipod or is there still something I can try?

raybar,
I believe the answer to your problem may be very simple....
I have been battling with my new iPod today, and have finally got it working! :-)

I experienced the same "firmware update failure. Disk write error" as you are getting. This got me thinking, and I tried simply copying a file over to the iPod, and this also failed. I tried the firewire card on my laptop and the update worked first time.

Therefore I think the problem could be with your firewire too. Now I am using the laptop to transfer stuff, it seems to be working very well, maybe the iPod is extremely fussy about firewire.....

Anyway, hope this helps you. I do have one question of my own to ask people though;
What PCI firewire cards (powered ones) do other people recommend? I need to buy one ASAP for my main comp, so any suggestions would be appreciated!

Thanks,
Dave.

I dont think i understand. Do i need a new firewire card? what exactly did you do with the firewire to make it work?

If you are windows user you DO NOT need macopener. Get the ephpod version for windows. It sounds like you also need a new firewire card. 90 to 95% of all ipod problems IMHO can be directly related to the firewire card.

Disk Write errors are almost always due to cards that are not compatible with the iPod.

As far as cards that do work, here's list in decending order of "goodness"

1. Adaptec 4300
2. OrangeLink Cards (from OrangeMicro)
3. Belkin Cards (not from Apple)
4. Any cheap card w/the VIA chipset

NEVER get an Audigy card.

Adam

Yes, sorry to confuse you
I do think you need a new firewire card... Once I tried a different firewire card it worked straight away. Firmware installed without problems, and I got the iPod working within minutes!

Get yourself a compatible firewire card, and enjoy music on the move

i think i'll spend money on another card now then...