Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with ipod and usb

Decent iPad/iPod cables?

monju_bosatsu — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 07:30:53 -0800

Decent iPad/iPod cables? iPad and iPod usb cables infuriate me. The cables invariably fray at the connector junction, and the cable coating on several has simply disintegrated. Is there anywhere I can get solid iStuff cables that won't need replaced every 3 months? Preferably with some sort of reinforcement at the connector junctions? An Amazon search just gives me miles of what I presume is junk.

Firewire to USB

chavenet — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 02:33:18 -0800

While reading the iPod anniversary post, I remembered that I had a 2nd-gen iPod tucked away. It only has a Firewire port. My Macbook is long retired. If I buy a Firewire to USB adapter, will I be able to use the iPod as a hard disk? (And get the music files off it?) Will it charge the iPod? What is the best adapter (or brand) to buy? There is a related AskMe here, but it's from 2005 & doesn't really help.

USB charger + iPod = static

BungaDunga — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 20:08:07 -0800

Cheap wall USB charger seems to interfere with iPod headphones, do I just need a better charger? So, I bought a $2 usb wall charger online. It seems to charge my iPod Touch, but the main point is to keep my iPod charged overnight. I listen to streaming radio while going to sleep, and my iPod battery will be near death in the morning unless I remember to set a sleep timer.

Anyway, the problem is that it seems to cause some nasty (if fairly quiet) static to come through my earbuds while plugged in. This doesn't happen when plugged into my laptop. Is it just a crappy charger? For that matter, how do my headphones pick up static from it? Is it more likely to fry my iPod? Other than playing online roulette or paying more (I don't think I want to pay more than ~$10) is there any way to guarantee that I won't have this problem with another one?

How to get rid of Interference on Car USB Adapter

Popcorn — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 23:54:18 -0800

How can I get rid of the audio interference caused when I use a 12v charger with an mp3 player in my car? I've got a late 80's full size ford truck that has a 3.5mm aux-in that I plug my mp3 player into. I have a 12v cigarette lighter to USB adapter that I use to charge the device.

I saw this thread, but it's doesn't answer all my questions.

http://ask.metafilter.com/77906/iPod-car-charger-BZZZZZZ

When the device is charging, there is a high pitched hum that tracks with the engine rpms. So, it seems like some interference from the alternator. When the engine is off it charges fine and there is no interference.

So, my question is, which of the following would be the best option.

Are these Pyramid-NSXX items the right thing for the job?

http://www.amazon.com/Pyramid-NS12-InLine-Noise-Suppressor/sim/B0007V5X4U/2/ref=pd_cp_e_sexpl

This one in particular because of the high amperage.

http://www.amazon.com/Pyramid-NS50-InLine-Noise-Suppressor/dp/B0002BBP5Q/ref=pd_sxp_grid_pt_0_1

Where would I install this? Can it go under the hood or do I need to get up in the dashboard?

This thing below seems to get rid of the noise after the mp3 player. Seems like a silly way to go about it. Do these things actually work compared to something that actually conditions the 12v power?

http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/noise-reducing-audio-cable

Then there is this one that uses RCA cables, but it has those two additional brown wires. What are those for?

http://www.amazon.com/PAC-SNI-1-SNI1-Noise-Isolator/dp/B000K50HJE

Also, can anybody explain or give me a link to what is going on here? I'd like to know what, specifically , is causing the noise? What currents are actually going through the wire? Is it 12v DC plus some other AC current on top of it? Is that even possible? Also, what kind of components are in the devices linked above? Capacitors?

Finally, as a bonus question, does anybody know where one can find PDF versions of those Chilton repair manuals for ford trucks? I've searched high and low to no avail.

Thanks in advance!

Please recommend a car stereo with a USB input jack.

reenum — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 09:04:27 -0800

I want to buy a car stereo with a USB input. Any suggestions? My friend has a car stereo with a USB input jack, and it is awesome. He's able to use an 8 GB thumbdrive to keep all the most awesome tunes on hand at all times.

I currently have a factory stereo in my 2000 Honda Accord sedan, and it is lacking in many aspects. I expect to have this car for at least a couple more years, so I want a new stereo.

Ideally, I'd like to spend $150 or less, but can go higher in price for an exceptional unit. Thanks!

Plugging in my iPod crashes my USB ports. Halp!

GilloD — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 07:17:56 -0800

Maybe 3 out of every 5 times I plug my iPod in, it causes Windows to wig out my USB ports until I restart. Can we make it stop doing this? Here is what happens: I plug in my 3rd gen iPod touch. It works fine- It charges, iTunes sees it, I can transfer stuff just fine. But Windows keeps making that "Hey you unplugged a USB device/Hey you plugged in a USB device" sound, maybe every 30 seconds. And it pops up a warning that "A USB Device is Not Recognized or Malfunctioning". It also kills the power to all of my OTHER USB ports- No mouse, no printer, no USB stick. It's a huge pain in the butt.

Any ideas on how I can fix this? Everytime I plug in my iPod I end up having to reboot my machine. le sigh, indeed.

is there a "smart" way to get my computer to shut down after my ipod is charged?

pennstatephil — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 00:49:05 -0800

is there software or a trick to shut down my computer after an ipod finishes charging? Recently moved to an iTouch, and the old wall charging brick (firewire adapter) won't work with it, so I've got to use my computer. I'd love some sort of tool that would auto-shut down the computer when the battery was charged. Is there such a tool, or (I'm a programmer) is there some way to interface with itunes' battery status meter to run something when the ipod is fully charged? I know there are plenty of programs that can shut down at a certain time, but I'd rather something a bit "smarter."

I Ch-Ch-Charge you

gensubuser — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 09:10:49 -0800

Where would you go to get a cheap iPhone/iPod wall charger and/or USB cable? From looking at amazon and a couple other vendors, it seems there is a very popular tactic of ramping down the product quality in successive batches. By the time an item has 4star reviews, the next shipment could very well fry your device. I have a 2G Touch.

Can you recommend a vendor that either: A) has a large inventory in stock of the same device, such that I can rely on the reviews, or B) is semi-branded such that their reputation matters?

Or, some other tactic.

Why does my iPod hate my computer (or vice versa)?

Bromius — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 20:34:41 -0800

My iPod has recently stopped communicating (almost) entirely with my computer. I'm really at a loss to explain it. So here's the story:

5g 80 gig iPod, and I'm using Windows. I've had this iPod for almost 2 years and have had no serious problems until now. When I plug in the iPod to my USB hub, the computer makes the *donk* noise (albeit in a stuttery way) and gives me the standard "this device can perform faster" message.
Problem is, the iPod doesn't show up in My Computer, or in iTunes. The iPod doesn't even draw a charge through the USB cable. I've tried the 5 Rs (reset the iPod, retried a different port, restarted my computer, reinstalled iTunes, restored iPod) with no success. Even though I couldn't restore the iPod on my own computer, I tried my friend's laptop (with the same USB cable, just in case that was the problem) and the iPod showed up just fine. I restored it and tried it again on mine. Nothing.
Why is the USB message and sound triggered when I plug in the iPod, but nothing else? I've even left it connected overnight, just in case it took a while to synch. Again, nothing. So what could the problem be? Is there anything else I can do? I'm really at my wit's end.

Experiences with recent iPods as auxilliary hard disks?

hwestiii — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 12:22:24 -0800

How efficiently do the current generation of USB only iPods run off of PC USB ports? I currently own a 3G iPod that will work with both FireWire and USB, but whenever I hook it up to a laptop PC via a USB port, the battery is sucked dry in about 15 minutes. It appears to draw no power at all from the PC via the USB port.

I'm also in the market for a new iPod and I'm looking that the 160 GB variety with an eye toward dumping my Complete New Yorker (~80 GB) onto it with disk use enabled for easier transportation and viewing. I'm worried, however, that if the power performance of these new iPods matches what I experience with my current one I'll just be wasting my money.

I've little or no experience with any of the USB-only iPods, but I'd like to hear some feedback from people who do have them and use them occassionally or frequently as general data storage devices as well as music and video players.

I have to think things are better now than when mine was manufactured, but I don't want to drop $350 just to find out that nothing has changed.

iPod usb device not recognized

lola — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 10:48:16 -0800

Connected our two iPods, both devices got this error message, on windows xp. I attempted to update my usb drivers per this. In device manager iPod and USB Mass Storage Device are not listed. The iPod is represented by unknown device, and was not successful.

This didn't work because I couldn't delete the listed files.

Please help!

A watched ipod never syncs

pardonyou? — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 10:40:27 -0800

Any ideas why transferring files to my ipod (over usb 2.0) starts out fast then gradually slows to a crawl? A little background: I had a hard drive failure a couple of weeks ago, and had to reinstall Windows XP. I then bought a new ipod, and have been trying to sync my ~10GB music library over to it. If the computer's been off for some time, the transfer will begin at normal speeds (say a song every couple of seconds), but by the time 75 or so songs have transferred, it will be going painfully slow (a song takes a minute or more), and on several occasions my laptop has suddenly just shut itself off (I assume because the processing load got too high?). Any subsequent attempts to transfer will be at the slow speed, unless I shut down the computer for some time and restart.

This never happened with my old ipod. I'm confused as to what could be causing this apparent bottleneck. I appreciate any suggestions or thoughts.

What's the deal with my PC's USB ports?

shallowcenter — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 03:03:45 -0800

My new HP printer/scanner/copier doesn't want to play nice with ... well, everything. Ever since I installed the thing, funky things have been happening with my PC. First I had trouble printing with it. An hour or so with HP tech support resolved that, but then last night the device wouldn't scan; the PC couldn't locate the scanner, according to the error message. An hour or so with tech support again resolved it -- until this morning, when the same problem happened.

On top of that, the new iPod I bought after installing the printer won't sync. The error message I keep getting tells me it's corrupted; I can't even restore it to factory settings. It's possible, of course, that the iPod really is on the fritz, but the timing has me curious. Is it possible that the HP device effed up the USB ports? Before chucking both the printer and the iPod and getting new ones, I thought I'd check out the collective wisdom here. Thanks!

Does the iPod Nano (2nd generation) work as a mass usb storage device ON MAC?

sparrows — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 22:07:33 -0800

Does the iPod Nano (2nd generation) work as a mass usb storage device ON MAC? The answers I found suggest it does this only on Windows. Oddly Apple's own specs say nothing about it. But many reviews mention it.

How do I bring my Ipod back to life?

slc228 — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 14:19:51 -0800

Yet ANOTHER Ipod question: This morning it was working great, now it is dead as a doornail. Please help me bring my Ipod back to life! It is too young to die. This morning I was listening to my Ipod, everything was fine. I turned it off and went to work. After I got off work I went to plug it in my car and.....nothing. This is a 1.5 month old Ipod, and the battery was more than half charged. I tried using an old charger that you hook to an outlet, and still there was nothing. I am trying to connect it to my computer as I am typing this, and my computer doesn't even recognize that I have it plugged in. I even tried restarted my computer and, you guessed it, still nothing! Any ideas?

Help me not have to go to the apple store, and I will love you forever!

Please hope my USB devices!

joshuaconner — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 00:00:41 -0800

My 5-year-old Dell stopped recognizing my USB devices. What's going on? How can I fix it? Went for a run yesterday and when I got back my computer had turned itself off. When I turned it back on, it wouldn't recognize my (usb) printer/scanner/copier thing, my ipod or my girlfriend's ipod, though the ipods would show the "charging" screen (instead of the usual "do not disconnect" screen) when we plugged them in.

Any ideas about this one? If it helps, the computer's a Dell Dimension 2100 running Windows XP.

Is there a way to back up the songs on my iPod to a USB flash drive?

zembla3 — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 14:19:20 -0800

Is there a way to back up the songs on my iPod to a USB flash drive?

Help my iPod know (in the Biblical sense) some other equipment

grumblebee — Sun, 06 Aug 2006 15:29:27 -0800

I'm having trouble connecting my iPod to my PC and to an external speaker system.

I had an old 3G ipod. I broke it. So I just bought a new one -- a 5G 6GB Video iPod. To my shagrin, it needs a USB 2.0 port. My creaking old PC, with my music library on it, only has USB 1.0 ports. It didn't occur to me that I'd need USB 2.0, because my 3G iPod connected through Firewire.

I bought a USB 2.0 card and tried to intall it, but it screwed up my computer (Ethernet stopped working), so I removed it.

Is there such a thing as a USB to Firewire converter? If so, will it work with my iPod? Is ther ANY way I can plug my new iPod into the Firewire port on my old PC? My guess is no, but I quake at the prospect of trying to get USB 2.O working on this old machine. Has anyone had similar problems installing USB 2.0? How did you get around the hardware conflict?

I have a speaker system with an iPod dock connector built into it. It works great, but in order to plug my iPod into it, I have to remove the iPod from it's protective case. (The case makes it too big to fit -- even though the case has a hole in it to supposedly let it plug into a dock.)

I HATE removing it from its case, because that's how I broke my old one. I'm a butterfingers and I drop the iPod often. As-long-as it's in its case, it always seems to emerge okay.

Is there such a thing as an iPod extension chord? I've searched and can't find one. To be specific, I want something that I can plug into the bottom of my iPod, and, at the other end, into a dock. I hope that makes sense.

Self-powered USB Hubs?

AndrewH — Fri, 16 Jun 2006 19:18:16 -0800

Hello MetaFilter. This is my first question, so I thought I'd start with something easy. I'm looking for a a USB hub that runs off it's own adapter. Any recommendations? I have a G4 PowerBook with two under-powered USB ports. USB thumbdrives and mice work fine, but iPods don't. My iPod Photo is dead, and the 5G iPod Video is USB only. I was considering a PCMCIA USB card, but I'm not really sure I trust those (if my USB ports are under-powered, what else is?) and it seems like a hub would be cheaper.

So what does the MetaFilter community like?

PowerBook slow to recognize my iPod

fearless_yakov — Wed, 17 May 2006 07:52:08 -0800

Why does my PowerBook G4 take so long to recognize my 60g iPod? I recently purchased a used 60g iPod (4th generation). When I connect it to my PowerBook, it takes quite some time -- usually over 30 seconds, sometimes over a minute -- before the PowerBook "sees" the iPod. This seems to happen regardless of whether I connect via USB or Firewire. My previous iPod (4th gen 20g) typically connected and was recognized within just a few seconds of connection to the PowerBook (or my desktop pc).

Why the delay with the new(er) iPod?

Connecting an iPod to a Linux box

Johnny Assay — Fri, 09 Sep 2005 14:10:39 -0800

Can a Mac-formatted iPod and a Linux box play nicely together? My home machine: a Mac running OSX 10.3.
My work machine: a Linux box running SuSE Linux 9.2, and (usually) KDE 3.3, to which I do not have root access.
My toy: a fourth-generation 40 GB iPod.
My dream: to be able to plug my iPod into the USB port on my work computer, mount it as an external hard drive (essentially), and listen to my MP3s via the computer's sound system. (Having headphones in all day is kind of antisocial, and is uncomfortable to boot.)

Is this at all feasible? I'm something of a Linux tyro, so be gentle in explaining how to go about it (or explaining to me why it can't be done.)

I tried Googling on "Linux iPod", but this returned umpteen pages on how to install Linux on your iPod. Not what I'm after -- I just want to be able to access the files via Linux.

FireWire?

rtimmel — Fri, 18 Mar 2005 21:44:59 -0800

An iPod question that has me stumped. I have an old firewire only iPod (2nd generation). I would like to sync it to a Windows computer that has an absolute lack to slots for a PCI card, but has four open usb 2 slots. I cannot find any sort of converter. Does anyone know if such a thing exists? They seem so similar.