Potentially Bricked iPod

[Lunaluu]

I recently installed Rockbox on my iPod Classic, and in a rather stupid move decided to format the second, blank/unformatted drive that shows up when I connect it to my PC. After a little while I went to uninstall Rockbox temporarily and format the iPod using iTunes, yet I found that the software wouldn't recognize the iPod. Instead of playing it safe and installing Rockbox again, I formatted the iPod completely. iTunes can tell there's an iPod in need of recovery now, when I actually have it start the process, it tells me that "An iPod has been detected, but it could not be identified properly. Please disconnect and reconnect the iPod, then try again." In addition, it shows error code 1675. The iPod itself no longer shows anything on the screen, nor does it appear in file explorer.

I don't know how I got to the thought process I did, but I would greatly appreciate any kind of help in getting it working again, if that's possible at this point.

[Frankenpod]

Don't really know what's going on with your ipod, though had endless issues like this when getting flash modded ipods going.  Have really come to hate those uninformative iTunes error messages (especially the "an unknown error has occurred" or the "ipod needs to be restored" loop).  Haven't seen such issues arise with the original hard drive, to be honest, except when it was physically failing.

Are you putting the ipod in recovery mode? (i.e. hold down centre button and menu button for 10+ seconds when it's connected to the PC).

Are you saying the ipod itself goes 'dead' after you attempt restoring?  I've had that happen with those flash-mods as well, requiring the battery to be disconnected and reconnected before it comes back to life.  It's possible the hard drive is failing.

[Lunaluu]

I've tried putting it into recovery mode a few times, and nothing happens on the iPod or the PC.

The screen doesn't show anything no matter what button combo I attempt, and the drive doesn't spin up either. The hard drive most likely isn't the issue, due to the fact that it worked perfectly prior to installing Rockbox. I believe the issue is that there's nothing bootable on it - no Apple firmware, and no Rockbox; even the bootloader was removed after I formatted it. I am by no means an expert on this, but I don't believe that removing the software would kill the drive.

[Frankenpod]

Still not clear on what exactly you say is happening.  When you try putting it in recovery mode, what do you mean by 'nothing happens on the ipod'?  It doesn't reboot, show the apple logo, then go blank again?  Does it just not reboot at all?  Or it does the reboot but then goes completely dead with a blank screen?

Can you boot it into disk mode?  (reboot with centre+menu then reboot with centre+play)?

[Frankenpod]

When you say you reformatted the ipod completely, how did you do that?
I've found (when trying to get flash modded ipods functioning) that reformatting the thing with AOMEII (as FAT32) often helps with then getting iTunes to restore it.  Maybe you reformattted it with Windows and it's no longer FAT32 formatted (e.g. NTFS instead), so it might help to do that.

[Lunaluu]

When I tried recovery mode, it wouldn't do anything at all - no disk spinning, nothing on the screen.
I just tried getting it into disk mode, and fortunately it was able to boot. iTunes immediately recognized it as corrupted and I got it working again.
When I had formatted the iPod, I simply used the format tool in file explorer. I never considered that it'd have to be formatted to FAT32.

Either way, it was thankfully able to boot to disk mode and I recovered it from there. I had never even considered trying that, so at least I know now that's an option. Thanks for your help :3

[dashlix]

Hi.

I just bought an iPod Classic and the guy told me it has Rockbox installed. I've been trying to dual boot but doesn't work and potentially remove Rockbox.

I have the same issues as you @Lunaluu. When I press MENU+SELECT, it goes to the Rockbox boot loader. If I hold it down longer while plugged in, the screen remains black and blank. iTunes then picks up the iPod, but I cannot restore it. I've also tried going into the boot loaders 'Disk mode' but it does nothing for iTunes. I've tried to go to the default Disk Mode using MENU+SELECT then LEFT+SELECT, but it just goes back to the Rockbox bootloader.

Can anyone provide some assistance? I cannot get the Apple logo to show at all.

FYI, the Disk mode partition is FAT32, but iTunes still gives me an error 1675.

Thanks.
Dash

[philden]

What happens if you turn the hold switch on immediately after rebooting? It should try and load the Apple firmware.

[Frankenpod]

Hi.

I just bought an iPod Classic and the guy told me it has Rockbox installed. I've been trying to dual boot but doesn't work and potentially remove Rockbox.

I have the same issues as you @Lunaluu. When I press MENU+SELECT, it goes to the Rockbox boot loader. If I hold it down longer while plugged in, the screen remains black and blank. iTunes then picks up the iPod, but I cannot restore it. I've also tried going into the boot loaders 'Disk mode' but it does nothing for iTunes. I've tried to go to the default Disk Mode using MENU+SELECT then LEFT+SELECT, but it just goes back to the Rockbox bootloader.

Can anyone provide some assistance? I cannot get the Apple logo to show at all.

FYI, the Disk mode partition is FAT32, but iTunes still gives me an error 1675.

Thanks.
Dash

Is that mistyped, or do you mean you used MENU+SELECT then LEFT+SELECT ?  Because LEFT+SELECT, as far as I know, is 'diagnostic mode', not disk mode.  Disk mode is SELECT+PLAY/PAUSE.  Or maybe you actually did that and mistyped in the quoted message?

[dashlix]

Hi @FrakenPod.

No mistype.  First i've tried 'MENU+SELECT' for 5-8 seconds to get into DFU mode. It goes into DFU (with the DFU mode showing in emCore I believe) while plugged into my computer. I then open iTunes and it recognizes my iPod but when I click on restore/recover (can't remember off-hand now), it gives the 1675 error, and I cannot proceed.

I then read online to press 'LEFT+SELECT' after 'MENU+SELECT' to get to either Boot into Apple's OF or get to Diagnostic mode, but it doesn't do either.

So either which way, I can't seem to get back Apple OF and i get an error 1675.

@phildon, I've tried that, and it just keeps a black screen...nothing comes up. When I switch back the hold switch, it goes back to the RockBox boot menu.

Any thoughts?

[dashlix]

...Also, I tried SELECT+PLAY/PAUSE and it does nothing. 

[dashlix]

Hi all,

Ok, after typing the last two replies...I had an idea. I have a 2015 27" iMac packed away and decided to see if I could restore the software using that. I plugged it in and it detected it straightaway. It then said it had to prep a restore so i selected that. Afterwards, it asked me if I wanted to recover it and I clicked recover/ok. It gave a 1434 error, but when I looked at the iPod, it showed the original firmware connected-to-pc screen. I disconnected and reconnected it, and clicked on recover again and it worked! It formatted the iPod and loaded the original firmware and is working excellently.

Thanks for the quick responses, and even though the solution was not quite along the original lines, I hope others who are in the same predicament come here and see this and can resolve it using a Mac.

Regards
Dash