Industry guru Dave Taylor answers free tech support questions about a wide variety of business and technical topics, including blogging, Google AdSense, MySpace, Sony PSP, Apple iPod, Mp3 players, management, Linux, SEO, Mac OS X, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Microsoft Windows.

SupportSpace: Immediate Live Tech Support. Free Assessment + $10 coupon!!

I can't get iTunes to see my new iPod?

I have an iPod that I've been using on my Mom's macintosh, but now I want to use it on my PC. How do I get my PC to see the iPod, and then how do I connect the two so I can transfer stuff?

Dave's Answer:

When you're used to working with the Macintosh, where the core software for working with iPods is installed with the OS itself, it's frustrating that there's a bit more effort involved in getting the PC to see and work with an iPod.

First off, though, the bad news: you're going to have to reformat the disk on your Mac-bsaed iPod to get it to work with the PC. Once you've done that, though, it'll work for both Mac and PC. I'll document exactly how I dealt with the siutation your'e talking about when I got my shiny new iPod Video so you can see how that might not be a huge crisis.

The first step - and if you don't have a Mac or an iPod that's already full of music, you can skip this step - is to connect the iPod to your Mac then sync the two. Now you have a complete copy of the iPod data on the Mac and won't have to panic when it comes time to reformat the iPod's disk. Right? :-)

Now, plug in the iPod to your PC and you'll doubtless see an error message like this:

Since you probably don't have the original CDROM you can just grab the software from the Apple site as the dialog box suggests. Go to the Apple iPod Download Center to grab the necessary drivers and utilities for your computer, install them, and reboot.

Now you should be able to install iTunes if you haven't yet (you need iTunes to work effectively with the iPod) by grabbing it from the Apple site too. You can easily download it from Apple iTunes Download Center.

Start up iTunes once it's installed then hook up your iPod to your PC. You'll now see this scary message:

Click on "Update" and you'll be taken to the iPod Updater:

(Your version number might vary slightly as Apple's constantly tweaking the OS on the iPod: this is the version as of mid-February, 2006).

Click on "Restore" and it'll wipe your iPod clean and reformat the disk to work with Windows XP, which is - believe it or not - what you want! This takes a few minutes of time.

The next (and last) step is for the iPod Setup Assistant to run. It gives you a chance to name your iPod and set a few important preferences:

You can see the two options you have here: I have the app automatically sync the songs on my PC with my iPod (though it doesn't work in the other direction: if I add songs to my iPod from another computer, I need to manually copy them from the iPod onto my PC when I want to complete the transfer).

Once you've set things as you'd like, click on "Next" and it'll actually format and configure your iPod. Then you're done! Congratulations.

If you want to restore all that music you pulled off the iPod just before you reformated it, eject the iPod from your PC, unplug the iPod from your PC and plug it back into your Mac. Now it'll show up in iTunes, but won't autosync. Simply drag and drop the music you want to restore back onto the iPod name on the left side of the iTunes program.

Hope that gets you up and running!

Help others find this article at Del.icio.us, Digg, Netscape, Reddit, and Simpy.

Categorized: Windows Help (Article 5934)
Tagged:
Previous: How do I invite someone to join my LinkedIn network?
Next: Should I buy you two cups of chai, or one for your wife too?

Subscribe!

Never miss another useful Q&A article again! Subscribe to AskDaveTaylor with Google Reader.

Comments

I have an iPod full of songs, but my laptop burned out so I lost my iTunes songs. The songs are still on the iPod, but if I install iTunes on my new PC and reformat my iPod, it will erase all the songs. Do you have any ideas on how I can keep my songs and also reformat it to my new PC?

Posted by: JAMEL at February 22, 2006 9:07 PM

Jamel, pop over to http://www.download.com/ and search for 'ipod sync' tools. There are various shareware and freeware programs available that should be able to help you with your current dilemma. Good luck!

Posted by: Dave Taylor at February 23, 2006 12:22 AM

i lost all of my songs and i have no back up for them can you help me?

by the way thanks for getting back to me

Posted by: jamel at February 26, 2006 12:29 PM

Sorry, if you don't have any sort of backup, sounds like you've lost a lot of data. There's no way I know of to recover them short of sending your iPod to an expensive data recovery company, but that could easily cost hundreds of dollars...

Posted by: Dave Taylor at February 26, 2006 8:36 PM

I lost my iPOD and now need to get a new one. I had the 30/video ipod. I still have my songs on my computer. When I connect a new iPOD my computer will not see this new iPOD. Is this correct? Is there a software that I can get to restore my stuff back on the new one? or any other ideas?

Posted by: Judy at August 31, 2006 4:39 PM

I just bought my first ipod nano to download audiobooks--it did not come with a disk and I followed instructions to go to iTunes the connect the ipod to download the drivers--it didn't work, after several attempts from myself, my daughter & her computer savy boyfriend, my computer crashed!! I did get it going again, but still can't use my ipod. I have a Microsoft Me computer--not sure if i should return the ipod or what?

Posted by: Ann Hebert at October 21, 2006 4:54 PM

Hi Dave,
I have a problem when connecting my iPod to different pc's. I connect my ipod to my laptop or my desktop at home, and Itunes is able to see my ipod in both places, recognizes the music and I can sync it, create playlists, etc. My problem is when I connect it to my desktop at work. It has Itunes installed, yet when I connect my ipod, it recognizes it just as a hard drive, and not as an Ipod. I look at my task manager and services.exe and Ipodservice are eating up 100% of my CPU. Have you ever seen this before, or do you have any ideas what might be causing it? I'm pretty tech saavy, so feel free to lay it on thick.

Posted by: Josh at November 9, 2006 10:12 AM

Lost all my Itunes. They are there in print but when you click on them it says the file is not found, even though the files are still there. Is it possible I accidentally hit some key that has disabled my music? If so, how can I fix it?

Posted by: C Bertuccelli at November 15, 2006 3:26 PM

I just got an iPod nano, and I already have all of my songs downloaded on Limewire. I also downloaded iTunes, but when i go to "My Music", and the nto iTunes, it just has 3 different folders. One labeled iTunes Music Library, iTunes Library, and iTunes Music. None of them work, and I cant get song t ogo onto my ipod nano. Im really confused, and if you help me, i would greatly apprecaite it.

Posted by: alyssa at December 25, 2006 8:23 PM

I have a new ipod. Can't get it to show up as a device and just can't get it to work.
please help.

I've downloaded the software.
what a pain
this stuff is

Posted by: robyn at January 3, 2007 8:52 AM

this is stupid. get a new zune, ipod was made for plle and since all of us are trying to restore or do something with our ipods through windown, it doesn't accept the command

Zune is half the price with a microsoft interface, better quallity, and more storage space, hell you can even open the hdd through your usb and add music songs and etc!

Posted by: Insolvant at January 28, 2007 11:44 PM

hi there ive just put on itunes 7 and now its not letting me connect to it ive even tryed to put on a older itunes but thats dosnt seem to work any help will be gr8 thanks

Posted by: lee at March 4, 2007 7:40 AM

I have an iPod 30gb photo, I take good care of it and it has never failed before... However today it started as normal and then froze, it would not start again so I reset it (held select+menu). When it restarted it had lost all the songs (the photos remained though). I believe that the songs may still be there though as in the 'about' section it says its capacity is 27.8gb and that only 5.4gb are available. Also it used to be called "TIM'S" now it is called "TMM'S" so I think something has been corrupted. Long story short, is there anyway to recover the songs?

Thanks.

Posted by: Tim Evans at March 26, 2007 1:08 AM

When i first got my ipod my computer wasnt working so i had to use it on my uncle's computer. Now that i have my new computer whenever i try and sync my ipod none of the songs will sync. The photos got sync'd but the songs wont no matter what i try. I already reinstalled the iTunes software manually like i was told on the apple website but it still doesnt work. Is there any way to be able to sync my ipod or am i stuck with the songs currently on it forever?

Posted by: Deena at April 23, 2007 7:05 PM

Hello Dave, I had a virus on my computer. after it was fixed I cant find the music i have alredy down loaded nor will it let me download anymore.
It will find my ipod info but asks me to sync with the other user on my computer. what can I do to find mine?

Posted by: shelly at June 11, 2007 3:20 PM

For alyssa , i had the same problem, so to get the music you should go to drive c and then your name or folder or wateva, and you will see shared music and thatswhere it will be.

Posted by: pinkpanther at July 5, 2007 4:58 PM

My ipod will not connect to the computer...I need help.

Posted by: Kaitlin at July 15, 2007 11:04 AM

I have a 30GB ipod video, which has songs, video and photos still on it. i lost my itunes somehow... and it doesnt detect my ipod in itunes, but the computer does detect it. is there any way i can get the stuff on my ipod onto itunes?

Posted by: katrina at August 20, 2007 2:41 AM

Can you tell me what it means when my ipod shuffle flashes a quick green then orange light (3 times). than nothing. I plugged it up to my computer (win XP) and iTunes doesn't recognize the ipod.

Posted by: Erica at August 28, 2007 12:31 PM

hii dave
well my problem is that i had to reboot my computer and that means me loosing my current itunes libary. But once i plug my ipod in it doesnt show all of my files in the libary.
i was wondering if there was a way i could add all of my old files of my ipod onto the new libary. because i want to add new songs along with it. as i currently have 636 songs which i dont want to loose. please help :(

Posted by: sarah at September 18, 2007 3:55 PM

hey am glade thier is some one who might be able to help me with my ipod problem see dave i bought this 4 gbipod about a month ago and at first it was fine and seemed ok but its recording system didnt work but i didnt need that to work i just wanted the music and amv to work and i connected it with a pc and added some songs in it it worked well but some virus got in on it from the pc and made the recording work i know this b/c in the recordings local folder option their wore the virus's with thier stupid file names and when i dissconected it from the pc i didnt ejected it but the next time i connected it didnt connecte with the pc but it chargs thou and ive tryed to connect it with several different pc's it wont connect but charges what do i do please helpe me write me some solution at akanystheking@yahoo.com please

Posted by: yonas at October 14, 2007 9:06 AM

At the top of this page you show an info box from "iTunes Helper". Gad would I like to see that on my system. My partner gave me a 30gb ipod for xmas and I have been unable to get it to do anything on my sys except stare at me and puzzle me. I am not a novice to computers but this thing has me completely
stumped. I have tried the software that came with the ipod, I have tried the new versions from Apple and no combination of software or magic seems to work. Great site. Bookmarked for sure. Could use any help that you could offer.
Richard

Posted by: Richard Mansfield at November 4, 2007 8:25 PM

I just got an ipod touch i've download'd the latest version of itunes and i still cant get it to connect to my ipod!! I have download'd it twice! Also when signing up for an account why does it ask for a CC?(I thought it was free)

Posted by: M!chy at December 18, 2007 10:08 AM

I just bought my wife a new 80 GB ipod and was trying to inport discs into her itunes. Every single cd I import comes up with all the songs remaining untitled. This didn't happen to my ipod when doing this. Is there any way of being able to fix this?

Posted by: Bman at December 27, 2007 12:06 AM

Ihave just gotten an ipod and have downloaded itunes 7.5 but i can't get the ipod set up assistant and can't sync any songs,it also won't stop asking me to register my ipod even though i have done it many of times
help me please i'm tearing my hair out here.

Posted by: robbie at December 29, 2007 11:45 AM

Hi there. I'm wondering if you could help me. I have just finished downloading all my songs into iTunes, and now want to sync my ipod, however the Summary Tab is missing and also, under File, 'Sync iPod' is not an available option. How do I get my songs onto my iPod? Please help...

Posted by: Melinda at January 5, 2008 4:20 AM

Hi Dave,
can you send me the answer to one of your previous post - i have the smae problem:-

I have a problem when connecting my iPod to different pc's. I connect my ipod to my laptop or my desktop at home, and Itunes is able to see my ipod in both places, recognizes the music and I can sync it, create playlists, etc. My problem is when I connect it to my desktop at work. It has Itunes installed, yet when I connect my ipod, it recognizes it just as a hard drive, and not as an Ipod. I look at my task manager and services.exe and Ipodservice are eating up 100% of my CPU. Have you ever seen this before, or do you have any ideas what might be causing it? I'm pretty tech saavy, so feel free to lay it on thick.

Posted by: Josh at November 9, 2006 10:12 AM

Thanks Neil

Posted by: Neil at January 7, 2008 8:13 AM

Hello My laptop crahsed along with my Itunes and music!! I now have a Desktop computer I downloaded the Itunes and had to download a program i found called Aimersoft IPOD copy Manager, that program was able to take all my music and copy it off from my ipod and put it back on Itunes. But I did notice that not all music was done so by this program. But my real question is Now im loading some new cd's I just bought on my Itunes and when i hook up my IPOD it is not loading the cds on my IPOD im very frustrated on what im suppose to do now!! HELP i just want those cd's to load on my ipod from my itunes!!!!

Posted by: Suzana at January 20, 2008 4:18 PM

Hi Have just downloaded a music video from itunes store. When I come to play it. I can hear the song but cant see the video. Just get a green screen were it should be. Please can you help.
Best Regards
Mark

Posted by: Mark Fraser-Townsend at February 29, 2008 2:13 PM

I have an iPod Mini and pressed the 'restore' button to go back to factory default settings. It's now telling me that I have to connect to power at a socket (at least a pictogram is!) and won't do anything else. I haven't an AC adapter - is there any way round this?

Posted by: Charlie at March 9, 2008 2:54 PM

There’s a great troubleshooter over at helium, it covers everyting for all iPod models (including touch and shuffle): http://www.helium.com/items/921479-heres-trick-freak-friends

Posted by: Jake at March 13, 2008 9:45 AM

dave i had my ipod for about 9 months now and i got a music card for it but it says i need itunes i tried downloading it but it doesnt load to my computer wat should i do

Posted by: stephanie at April 2, 2008 11:45 PM

Same here! please help. Driving me crazy

Posted by: Kasey at April 5, 2008 6:02 AM

I had to use my ipod shuffle on my old PC then my family got a new PC and i downloaded my old songs onto the new PC. And so i plugged my iPod into charge and to transfer my songs but it didn't work. Nothing popped up saying my iPodd is connected and the little lights didn't bleep saying that it was charging. SO i clicked on file to see if i could transfer my library onto it and maybe it just didn't recognize the iPod so i rtied clicking on it but it said that no iPod is connectec. What do I do ?

Posted by: Kaylin at April 11, 2008 5:24 AM

I just got a new 80 gig ipod and i've had one before so already had itunes but i have to download a new version of itunes and my internet connection it too messed up and i can't ever get it to download 100% is there any other way i can get the new version of itunes?

Posted by: ashley at April 11, 2008 6:24 AM

my friend got an ipod from his old friend. he installed itunes and got all the songs he wanted into his library. but itunes doesnt realize the ipod. how can he have itunes recognize the ipod?

Posted by: rose at May 26, 2008 8:48 PM

Hello Dave,
i need some of your help please i can't register my ipod on itunes because i can't scroll to 'register now' on itunes the only button i can click is 'register later'

& can u tell me how to put the ipod setup assisstant window on please

thank you

Posted by: Raj at May 30, 2008 6:02 AM

Hi, i just bought ipod classic 80gig, downloaded i tunes from the apple link given in the documentation. I installed it but whenever i connect the ipod itunes gives an error message saying it cannot read ipod and i must restore it. whenever i click on restore it tries connecting to the internet and i dont have at home so how can i fix this? I cannot set anything in itunes the only option i have on the summary tab is restore which doesnt work, and there are no other options only the summary tab. PLEASE HELP!!!

Posted by: yusuf at May 30, 2008 12:44 PM

Hey! everytime i try to sync my ipod itunes says it is missing the file it needs to sync it. So i tried to download the new version and still no luck.

Posted by: erin at May 31, 2008 11:00 AM

Hi, I just purchased an Ipod classic (80gb) and I have added songs to it and music videos to it without an issue. However, I recently found out that I should have a music tab underneath my ipod device in the source list...Is this correct? I don't have this tab..I don't have any tabs. I only have these tabs under my library. Everytime I plug in my ipod, the device icon is shown and on the right hand side, the agreement comes up. I have agreed to the terms and saved several times but it still comes up. Is this normal?. Also, what is this about registering your ipod? I don't think I was given the option to do this. So, basically, I am able to add songs to my ipod but I am unable to delete, make playlists or add album artwork after the song has been added as I don't have that music tab (I only have the ipod icon under the heading "device").
Can you please help and let me know what I need to do? Thanks!!

Posted by: Tara at June 2, 2008 4:40 PM

For those of you who keep getting the registration page and/or can't see the Accept button to move beyond saving the terms of agreement, make sure your monitor resolution is set to 1024x768. That way you can see all the buttons.

Posted by: celebfan at June 9, 2008 7:00 PM

Ok, so I have gotten to the part where you are supposed to see iPod not readable. But this screen is not poping up when i plug my iPod in to the computer. What am I supposed to do? I am getting really frustrated! please help as soon as possible!

Posted by: Kailee at June 16, 2008 2:35 PM

ok what if I dont have a mac comp though? im trying to put music from my ipod onto my comp but I cant...is there anyway I can?

Posted by: siana at July 2, 2008 2:19 AM

I have a lot to say, but ...

I have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but most of all I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a chai!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!