iPod my 1st ipod nano - a few questions

[dragade3789]

i just bought an ipod nano (3rd gen?) which is 8gb. this is my first mp3 player from apple. i have owned a mp3 player from creative labs (a 512 mb one). I wanted a change so i went with apple. It works for me ok.


Just from so basic "poking" around the nano seems not to be able to (1) play on any other computer (ie: if I plug it into a mac, I am not able to listen to music off of the nano) and (2) upload music from the nano to any other computer. Personally I find this to be very offensive that I can not use this to transfer music from one computer to another. I am sure there is a method to upload music to other computers.

I first used the ipod on a pc (like i uploaded music to it via the pc). I want to get an apple computer so it would be great to upload music to the nano from both macs and pcs (can this be done?)


I am not too worried about ethics so does any one have any method to exploit the ipod?


THANKS.

 

[cherry su]

i just bought an ipod nano (3rd gen?) which is 8gb. this is my first mp3 player from apple. i have owned a mp3 player from creative labs (a 512 mb one). I wanted a change so i went with apple. It works for me ok.


Just from so basic "poking" around the nano seems not to be able to (1) play on any other computer (ie: if I plug it into a mac, I am not able to listen to music off of the nano) and (2) upload music from the nano to any other computer. Personally I find this to be very offensive that I can not use this to transfer music from one computer to another. I am sure there is a method to upload music to other computers.

I first used the ipod on a pc (like i uploaded music to it via the pc). I want to get an apple computer so it would be great to upload music to the nano from both macs and pcs (can this be done?)


I am not too worried about ethics so does any one have any method to exploit the ipod?


THANKS.

(1) if you "manually manage music" then you can play the tracks on the nano from your computer.

(2) i don't think this can be done yet

 

[dragade3789]

(1) if you "manually manage music" then you can play the tracks on the nano from your computer.

(2) i don't think this can be done yet

bout (2). I was able to find something called "senuti" which seems to work well (at least with Tiger)

 

[nintendude]

i think you can upload the music but you need to Authorize the computers you want to play the music on

 

[chewbacca390]

i'm pretty sure you can upload music or associate with only up to 5 computers too right? It's pretty annoying when all you want to do is play the music...

have you ever tried Idump? that program works well for me.

 

[dragade3789]

nope.

I dont know if it is true for all generations of ipod but mine has been working with 5 computer so far. I will try to see if it works on a 6th computer but that doesnt seem to have a problem (chewbacca390's comment doesnt seem to be true, do you have proof for this?)

 

[pmayor]

I'm wondering if they have improved the track wheel performance with the 3rd gen nano. I bought the first gen and the track wheel is way too sensitive. It makes it very tricky to select the right menu option. Just as you are pressing "select" any small movement of your finger can force it to change the selection.

 

[Scarlet Fever]

If you want to transfer music between computers, just set the iPod to act as an external storage device and put the music on the storage part. It's not as elegant, but it works.

 

[DukeofAnkh]

nope.

I dont know if it is true for all generations of ipod but mine has been working with 5 computer so far. I will try to see if it works on a 6th computer but that doesnt seem to have a problem (chewbacca390's comment doesnt seem to be true, do you have proof for this?)

Music you buy from the iTunes store can only be authorised to play on up to 5 computers. Music from other sources (your own CDs, non-DRMed downloads) can be played on anything. It tells you when you authorise a new computer that you have x remaining.

I think you can plug the ipod into as many computers as you want (though I haven't tried with more than two). Like someone said, you "manually manage music" you can play songs on your ipod from any computer, so long as it's PC formatted (was first plugged into a PC when you got it). If it's Mac formatted, it won't be seen by PCs.

There are ways to copy music from an iPod to a computer, but they require some third party software. Also, you have to authorise that computer if you want it to play your DRMed music.

 

[dragade3789]

(1)Music you buy from the iTunes store can only be authorised to play on up to 5 computers. Music from other sources (your own CDs, non-DRMed downloads) can be played on anything. It tells you when you authorise a new computer that you have x remaining.

(2)I think you can plug the ipod into as many computers as you want (though I haven't tried with more than two). Like someone said, you "manually manage music" you can play songs on your ipod from any computer, so long as it's PC formatted (was first plugged into a PC when you got it). If it's Mac formatted, it won't be seen by PCs.

There are ways to copy music from an iPod to a computer, but they require some third party software. Also, you have to authorise that computer if you want it to play your DRMed music.

(1), I buy my music from a store in a CD formate so I have never run into that problem.

(2)sounds about right, it is messed up that apple forces you to find other means that other mp3 player companies would never dream of doing.

If you want to transfer music between computers, just set the iPod to act as an external storage device and put the music on the storage part. It's not as elegant, but it works.

I have come up with 2 ways to effectively use the ipod to transfer music to a computer. (1)the hard way, to find the terminal in the utilities and enter the following string "defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool YES" Then log out then log in to the same account. Then you will see hidden files. Music on the ipod are just in hidden folders. Then you can copy these files into your hard drive and what not. The files still have the same information even if they are renamed. It doesnt work if you want specific files. (2)the 'easy' way, download "senuti" (itunes spelled backwards), this program has the only purpose for transferring music from the ipod to itunes (I dont think you can control where the files go to). There are versions for leopard and tiger (I dont think you can use the tiger one on a computer with leopard). I am not sure if there are ones that predate tiger or not).

I'm wondering if they have improved the track wheel performance with the 3rd gen nano. I bought the first gen and the track wheel is way too sensitive. It makes it very tricky to select the right menu option. Just as you are pressing "select" any small movement of your finger can force it to change the selection.

I think it has been improved. I have never really used an ipod (or anything with a scroll wheel) before this one. I dont have too much of a problem using the scrol wheel and select button.

 

[DukeofAnkh]

I have come up with 2 ways to effectively use the ipod to transfer music to a computer. (1)the hard way, to find the terminal in the utilities and enter the following string "defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -bool YES" Then log out then log in to the same account. Then you will see hidden files. Music on the ipod are just in hidden folders. Then you can copy these files into your hard drive and what not. The files still have the same information even if they are renamed. It doesnt work if you want specific files.

Once, before I got a Mac, my computer crashed and a lost a few (I think it was 4) music files from it. I did a windows search for the band name on the ipod and it came up with the relevant files since the search looks through ID3 tags. I just tried the same on my Mac (after enabling hidden files like you did - btw, you don't need to log off, just "killall Finder" in terminal will do) and the same doesn't work. For whatever reason Spotlight won't look at the ipod files, even if you navigate to a folder and search for something you can see RIGHT THERE.

If you have access to a PC/windows then there's a nice little program called mp3 Tag Editor into which you can copy these randomly named files and then instruct it to rename them all to "<artist> - <title>.mp3" or whatever based on the ID3 tags.

 

[nfg315]

sorry to bring this topic back up, but i have a clarification question.

i have a pc formatted nano which i would like to reformat as mac so that i can get updates for it. however, i would also like to plug the ipod into my pc at work and listen to songs off of the ipod. the problem is that i cant install 3rd party software on my work computer. if i reformat the ipod as a mac will i still be able to play songs off of it on my pc computer?

 

[dragade3789]

sorry to bring this topic back up, but i have a clarification question.

i have a pc formatted nano which i would like to reformat as mac so that i can get updates for it. however, i would also like to plug the ipod into my pc at work and listen to songs off of the ipod. the problem is that i cant install 3rd party software on my work computer. if i reformat the ipod as a mac will i still be able to play songs off of it on my pc computer?

Do you have itunes on your pc at work?