Ipod 7th Gen Mod with CF compact flash (dual microSD adapter to Compact Flash -

[mattybelts]

Hi there, I'd appreciate any advice regarding my modified ipod. I understand using rockbox on a 7th Gen ipod is unstable. The old hard drive was not working so I read a few guides and decided I had nothing to lose and had a go at modifying it.

I'm not super technical but here goes:

I took out the original ipod hard drive and replaced it with a dual microSD to CF Type 1 adapter plugged into a CF to 1.8 ZIF CE 50pin adapter, then I put rockbox on it. It shows up on my computer as having a 239GB hard drive. After lots of trial and error and reading more guides - it works - I can load files on in small transfers, playback is fine, but I have had a couple of problems.

1. There are some errors with transferring - I have put this down to it being unstable and not too worried. I have been using the fallback image and rebooting when I eject the ipod from the file menu, not system tray
2. Occasionally when above errors have occurred I have not been able to delete the particular folder off the ipod, I assume this is probably a similar problem?
3. I think it can only write to half the drive - whenever I have got close to transferring 100+ GB of music it seems to crash and I have to reformat the data partition and start again. It's frustrating, but I'm in the process of copying up to 100ish GB of music onto it. If there was a way to get more than that I'd love to know. If I just have to live with it using half the drive then ok.

The microSD cards are authentic and have full capacity - I checked them first.

The Rockbox version I currently have on the player is 1ccada1f-150911 (updated it today 22/9/15)
EmCore is 2.3 r859

I'd apprecciate any advice as I have another 7th Gen ipod that I want to fix and I'd like to know if I should do something different, e.g. a different type of hard drive

I hope I've been clear enough. Thanks in advance!

[[Saint]]

USB drivers in the ipod6g target are actually fairly stable now.

I would find it infinitely more likely that the adapter cards you are using are causing the trouble. Loose or dodgy connection, underpowered perhaps (voltage drops), some subset of ATA commands used and unexpected or expected but unused, etc. and so on.
These adapter plates can add a practically limitless source of unexpected and unaccounted for variables to the equation.


[Saint]

[yithar7153]

My guess is that you probably bought cheap parts from whatever site. I really recommend buying this stuff from Tarkan because his parts are high quality. That's assuming the parts you're using haven't damaged it in any way. "The cheap generic  Taiwan made ZIF to CF adaptors found on the web use very cheap and poor quality Zif connectors which do not work well with the Apple ribbon cable and are likely to damage the delicate connections."

I've been using his ZIF->CF adapter for almost 2 years with no problems so I'd say it's your adapter. Pretty much you get what you pay for.

[mattybelts]

Thanks Saint & yithar7153 for your replies. The adapters I used were definitely cheaper than those you have suggested from Tarkan, not that the Tarkan ones are super expensive. Shame I didn't see them before. I can see how there is a lot of potential causes for errors with the adapters. I'll give the different adapter a go, hopefully the parts haven't been damaged. I can definitely try the different adapter on my other ipod so thanks again for the suggestions, appreciate your time. It has been fun to tinker with the ipod, and a good learning experience!

Cheers,

Matt