iPod Using ipod ás emergency backup

[Amanda Ripanykhazova]

I have a music library of 300 CDs all backed up to time machine. It has taken me over a decade to build it up. My MBP died so I tried to restore onto my new MBP but shock horror I have started to get the dreaded clicking off the HDD.

Assuming a few spells in the freezer don't help to stop the clicking, is there any way to upload what is on my ipod or iphone back to the computer?

 

[arw]

Hopefully you have synced the tracks to the iPod in the original quality and not a transcoded AAC version?
Then it should be fairly easily:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/i-found-my-old-ipod.2377868/post-31900196

Otherwise, the application "iMazing" seems to always be able to extract all music with metadata from iDevices. It's not free though.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/i-found-my-old-ipod.2377868/post-31901145

iMazing | iPhone, iPad & iPod Manager for Mac & PC

iMazing lets you transfer music, files, messages, apps and more from any iPhone, iPad, or iPod to a computer, Mac or PC. Manage and backup your iOS device simply without iTunes. (was DiskAid)

imazing.com

 

[clueless88]

Is the HDD that is clicking in the time machine? Do you still have your old MBP? If so, you could open it up and pull the hard drive out and install in an external enclosure or use a USB to SATA adapter to connect to your new MBP. Find your music folder on the old drive and copy it to a similar location in your new MBP. If you are able to pull this off, you should periodically copy your music files/library to a couple of suitably sized flash drives--so you'd have 2 additional back ups.

 

[Amanda Ripanykhazova]

Hopefully you have synced the tracks to the iPod in the original quality and not a transcoded AAC version?

Thank you for that, i did now find a backup of the library in .a not-too-old ™ backup but you raise an interesting point. What is the optimum way of ripping and copying to the ipod/phone? i used default at first and then raised it to 256k for the rest of the library, principally because I never felt I could either have the space on my computer for lossless. But also because in those days there werent ipods that could use 300 lossless CDs.

Should I not be using aac on the phone?

 

[clueless88]

Can you hear the difference between aac, alac and cd through the speakers/headphones/sound system you typically listen with? I have old ears and less than cutting edge speakers/headphones/earbuds and really can’t appreciate the differences in formats.

The idea of re-ripping 300 or so CDs to a lossless format sounds like an onerous task.

 

[arw]

As computer disk space is significantly cheaper than 10-20 years ago, best practice is to rip CDs as lossless (alac/flac) to have a bit-perfect copy for archival purposes. (imho, XLD is the best Mac choice in regard to error correction, which is important for older CDs)
I do prefer alac (Apple Lossless Audio Codec) due to the perfect integration in iTunes/Music.
300 CDs populate ~100 GB of space.
I am not claiming I could hear a difference between 256 kbps AAC and ALAC on my Mac with my current speakers but I like to have a lossless master and convert from that depending on the device / use case.
This way only one single lossy conversion is performed, independent of the target codec / bitrate.
A.e. for my iPods / iPhone I have ticked "Convert higher bitrate songs to 192 or 256 kbps AAC" depending on the device. For my headphones / car stereo that's more than enough and saves space.

So I have to concur with @clueless88, re-ripping existing CDs is not mandatory if you already have a 256 kbps AAC rip - although that's exactly what I did to put my old Power Mac G5 to use. For your older AAC rips (I suspect 128 kbps) I'd just re-rip one CD in lossless and check if you can hear a difference with your setup to decide if it's worth the hassle.

And a disclaimer: alac is not the recommended archival format as it lacks an internal Audio MD5 checksum in contrast to flac. But I keep my drives connected to an UPS and backed up.

edit: and glad to hear you found a viable backup

 

[Amanda Ripanykhazova]

Thanks for those extremely helpful responses, which basically confirm that my procedure is largely the optimum one, - always provided that most of my ripping was done at 256k AND that I am not using one of the stupid MBPs that doesnt have a proper hard drive/disc!

BTW I DO have aac checked but that is on the device side, not the ripping side. Now I'll have to try to figure out how to change the device settings to 256 and just re-sync the player.

Oh, and one other thing I hadn't mentioned, - I use Android! So in fact I can just buy a bigger SD card and go lossless on the device side as well! Which I may well do once I figure out how to replace Doubletwist with something that works on more modern MBP OSs.