Magic iPod Shuffle fixer-upper saves my tunes
Yesterday. I managed to render my new iPod Shuffle into an inert piece of plastic and metal. How? I have no idea, but probably because I pulled it out of the USB port before it was ready. It was so cooked that none of the computers in the house could peek inside it or even format it. iTunes said it was corrupt, but failed to repair it, and the Apple Updater also fell flat on its face.
I was resigned to taking the thing back to the store to get a new one, until I discovered after considerable searching online Apple’s own anti-nuke solution — the iPod shuffle Reset Utility 1.0.1. It saved my little iPod Shuffle from oblivion.
It was just released, so word of its arrival has not spread across the ‘net yet. I am adding a post about to help speed the news to other broken iPod Shuffle sufferers.
So, to avoid this problem, watch the blinking amber light on your Shuffle. Don’t remove the iPod from the USB port until the light stops blinking, or you risk corrupting the flash memory. In my case. the corruption was so bad that Windows and Linux could see the drive, but not recognize the data partition. Result: dead Shuffle.
I read online that many other “Shufflers” have had the same problem, to such an extent that Apple dealers don’t argue or attempt to fix the units. They just exchange them. I guess Apple corporate got tired of the piles of defunct Shuffles cluttering up the back room and asked the firmware programmers to whip up a solution. Thanks for the Christmas present, guys!
January 4th, 2007 at 12:37 am
Congrats!
Glad to hear you didn't get the pod cooked completely. Nice description of the case too.
How are you otherwise, Mr. Wheaton? That is, aside from the troubles surrounding your electronic gadgetry?