iTunes 9 not Recognizing iPod Video, Classic, and others?

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Update 11 Nov 2009

I downgraded to iTunes 8.2.1 (6) on Mac OS 10.5.8 and have had no issues to speak of. I have not tried iTunes 9.0.2. Can you blame me? The only bright side is I did clean up my library a bit. Dupes, missing song or two, and the like.

My iPod 5th Generation model MA002LL/A is not recognized by iTunes 9 (fix it Apple!) and it would only show up as a drive on Macs and on Windows Vista.

I restored it a few times on both the Mac and the PC, changed the assigned driver letter in Vista, waved a live chicken around, etc.

I've tried Intel and Power PC computers OS X, both running iTunes 9.0.1 (9) builds and Vista on a PC runing 9.0.1.8 (so some curious naming conventions for updates) and nothing.

Also the Power PC is OS X 10.4.11 Server. The Intel Mac is 10.5.8. The PC is Vista Ultimate.

The only version that works is iTunes 8.2.1.6 on XP Home SP3. It connects and syncs fine.

So, guess what, I think we can safely say iTunes 9 is broken with older iPods! There's no way it works fine with 8, and does not work on iTunes 9 across all that hardware and software.

Fortunately, here's the link to the older versions of the software.

For Mac, you can downgrade as follows. WARNING: Back stuff up. I have not tried this yet but see not reason why it won't work.


1) Quit iTunes.

2) Delete iTunes from your Applications folder.

3) Go to your ~/Music/iTunes folder. Delete or rename the "iTunes Library" file.

4) Open the "Previous iTunes Libraries" folder and look for the backup of your old pre-9 library; it should be dated at about the time you first ran iTunes 9. Copy it back out to the ~/Music/iTunes folder, and rename it to "iTunes Library".

Comments

Anonymous said…
Thanks a bunch, I just got a 80gb 6g from a pawn shop for $50, but had itunes 9 on my imac. I followed your advise and now it is working great! Thanks again!
MSROZZ
avi to ipod said…
This is one of the problems that I trying to solve for over a month now. I am so glad that I found this very informative post. I wish that this info solve my problem.

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