Ipod nano 1st generation don't start

[ercoppa]

Hi, I install today rockbox (rbutilqt-v1.0.5.tar.bz2) on my Ipod Nano (1st generation) from a GNU/Linux system. Tre procedure (Automated Installation) go good. After 3/4 hour of use (settings theme, play music, create playlist, load music, restart to apple firmwire, etc) the ipod don't start (it seems died). It not even shows the apple logo (not responding to the reset sequence). It isn't recognise by the OS (linux or windows).

Thanks for the help

P.s. the battery is charges (70/80%) before died

[bluebrother]

It not even shows the apple logo (not responding to the reset sequence). It isn't recognise by the OS (linux or windows).

Sounds like a flat battery or wrong battery readout by the OF. Try
- giving it a long charge -- the OF bootloader (which always runs upon startup) sometimes reports a wrong battery state
- reset it, even if it looks being dead. Don't forget that you need to hold the button combination for quite a while.

[ercoppa]

Thanks for the answer. I try to charge all day and reset, for now nothing happens 

[Chronon]

Make sure you hold the key combination for long enough.  Sometimes when the unit freezes it can take upwards of 30 seconds for it to respond to the hard reset.

[ercoppa]

Today (after a night without charging) the ipod re-birth  . Thanks for the answers and help 

[wwywong]

I confirmed with ercoppa that the same situation happened to me!

ercoppa, thanks for your reply. No matter how I tried before, none of the method works, but after I waited around 1 full day, the ipod nano can be turn back on. I don't need to try those reset tricks. And it immediately goes into rockbox (which it normally should). Then I am greet by "low battery" message, but at least I am glad that it is finally booting up. Then I quickly reboot it and put it on official fw and then put it to charger.

The funny thing about this whole scary incident is that before the crash/dead happened, my battery level is around 60-80%. I think there is something screwy about the battery calibration (ipod ofw or rockbox). It's either that or it's been using up all the battery during a full day sitting there. Anyway, I am not sure how it works, but I am sure glad that it does finally (after 1 full day of panic). I've just learn a lesson of the story: If it happen to any of you out there, don't panic, and just let it sit for 12hr to a day (in my case without charging or anything). It might work itself out eventually! 

[Atma]

I have deal with the same issue twice, hope it has a better solution soon.
If there is someway that I could help, boot report etc, just tell me.

Regards

[SuperBear]

Call me stupid but to verify that this is a real problem, I tried the steps mentioned in this related thread: http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php?topic=25671.0 on my 1st gen iPod Nano. My iPad nano is dead (at least apear so) at this moment. It does not charge, does not response to hard reset sequence (yes, I put it flat on a table and my finger tips are very small), and computer does not recgonize it. Let us wait and see if tomorrow it will come back to life.

I am pretty convinced that this is a Rockbox bug. The error can be reproduced following the steps from Section 3.1.3 of the user's manual: You can also load the original firmware by shutting down the device, then clicking the Hold switch on and connecting the iPod to your computer.

Doing this will only give you a frozen apple logo screen. And when you are out of patience eventually and reset the iPod, congratulations baby, you just got yourself a "dead" iPod.

[[Saint]]

When you say "the error can be reproduced by..." do you mean to say that you have done this multiple times, or is this just what you believe the cause to be?

I'm confused.

Do you have a pile of "dead" Nano 1st Gens now?

Or does a "dead" Nano not mean what I think it means?



[St.]

[SuperBear]

First of all, no offence to the Rockbox development team. I myself is a software architect. No software can be bug-free. And Rockbox has achieved a very high quality considering it is a freeware.

The reason that I said "the error can be reproduced" is that wwywong and ercoppa both experienced the problem, and they encountered this issue in their normal usage; while I simply repeated what they did as described in this thread: http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php?topic=25671.0, and I got the same result. I think that can be called reproduced.

I think at least the RB team shall give it a try as well. And if the error is reproducible, a warning shall be fan out indicating the effect of following the instruction in 3.1.3 of the user's manual. This can save some panic for the users. To be honest, I will be shocked if I did not do it deliberately.

Again, RB is so popular for a reason. And RB team has done a great job. I am a RB user and I just hope more people can enjoy it. Issue like this is not a big deal. Once we know the root cause, we can either walk around it or fix it when we have time. But awareness is very important here; otherwise it might turn people away.

[saratoga]

The reason that I said "the error can be reproduced" is that wwywong and ercoppa both experienced the problem, and they encountered this issue in their normal usage; while I simply repeated what they did as described in this thread: http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php?topic=25671.0, and I got the same result. I think that can be called reproduced.

Usually reproduced means you can do it over and over again whenever needed (e.g. for debugging).  it sounds like this is just a crash that gets the ipod stuck in a state where it needs the power disconnected before it'll reboot.  If you can figure out a way to reproduce that, please mention it, it'll help debug it.  But my guess is this is just a random crash that wont be possible to repeat.

[SuperBear]

Folks, it looks like none of you read this thread: http://forums.rockbox.org/index.php?topic=25671.0

wwywong gave a very precise approach to reproduce the issue:
"But then I following the manual and turn the ipod off from rockbox (holding play) and put the hold switch to on and plug into the pc, then problem start to happen. I see apple sign, then for a long while thing happen, so I hold "menu" + "select" so the ipod is turning off (the screen image start disappearing)

Then the ipod nano 1st gen is dead "

I did exactly the same and the problem happens. I only did it once and it happened. It seems wwywong also did it just once and it happened. So I really do not believe it is random.

There is a simple way to confirm it if you happen to have a 1G nano. Just follow the steps above once. If no problem found, then it is a random crash; otherwise you probably can do it again and again, of course you have to wait until the nano exhaust all power before repeating.

[Llorean]

I can confirm that with SVN revision 28861 and the currently available official bootloader (the most recent as I begin typing this post) neither method of booting the OF described in section 3.1.3 of the manual causes my first generation iPod Nano to freeze, let alone be "dead."

Please provide further details, as this certainly isn't able to be reproduced in any reliable sense on what little information is here.

One thing worth noting is that this original thread was posted two years ago. Any problem you're having now is almost certainly entirely unrelated unless you happen to be using a two year old build/bootloader in which case, update!

As it stands, the bootloader hasn't changed in ages, and thousands of people have used it. If the problem were to occur during boot (as would be necessary if it pertains to section 3.1.3 of the manual) then it would certainly be reported quite some time ago.

So please provide more information about the exact situation (software version, bootloader version, RBUtil version used to install both of these, etc) to help clarify what's going on.


One thing about wwywong's description - he doesn't tell us how long "for a long while" is with the Apple logo. It displays for longer than some people might consider a reasonable time before the Apple software boots, and during that time the Apple software is doing who knows what. He could've interrupted Apple's own boot process if he forced a hard reboot at this point. While I'm hesitant to claim that's what happened, rebooting while the Apple logo is displayed and having things not work as expected afterward is hardly solid evidence of a Rockbox bug, especially when plenty of us are having no issues getting in and out of the OF with current versions of the Rockbox software.

Further research is warranted, but it will have to be by people who can actually reproduce this issue, and preferably without intentionally interrupting Apple's boot process as that has nothing to do with us.

[SuperBear]

I do agree with Llorean that the time waiting while apple logo screen is on might be a decisive factor. I admit that I did not wait long enough, probably less than 1 minute. Maybe I was a little fast there.

[Llorean]

I'd say it's between 8 and 12 seconds (don't have something to time with) before the iPod boots into the Apple firmware from first press of "menu" which can seem like an awful long time compared to the normal boot time of Rockbox. But if you waited longer than that, there may be more to investigate still. Either way though, I believe that once the backlight comes on behind the Apple logo, you're no longer in Rockbox.