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iPod stuck in restart loop? don't panic

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lOth:
[Edit by moderator -- the problem discussed here no longer exists with MC11.1  See lOth's post here: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?board=8;topic=30493.5#msg209911 ]

I'll start a specific thread for this because I wish there was one when the problem happened to me and I started freaking out.

Symptoms:

your iPod keeps restarting : the iPod logo is displayed for a few seconds, you can hear some hd activity and suddenly it shuts off, display the logo again, etc, etc... forever.

resetting it manually (hold select and menu for a few seconds) doesn't get you out of the loop? it won't enter disk mode (hold select and play for a few seconds)? Fear not: there's the diagnostic mode.

First, I did this with a 4G (40gb photo) iPod and assume it will work with all 4g, probably with minis, (5g please let us know how to get into disk mode on 5gs) and nano.
Then please note that if you follow these instructions all content will be erased from your iPod, but you'll be out of the RLOD (restart loop of death).

Here's what I did and you might want to try if you're stuck in that dreadful loop:

_make sure MC and/or iTunes (or any other program communicating with the iPod) is closed. If you really want to be sure, open the task manager (CTRL+ALT+DEL) and kill ipodservice.exe and ituneshelper.exe if they're in the list of your running tasks.
_plug your looping iPod to the computer
_wait for the next restart
_when the apple logo appears hold the menu and back buttons together until the iPod restarts in diagnostic mode.
_in the iPod diagnostics menu, scroll down to diskmode and select
_your iPod should restart, but this time it will display the 'do not disconnect screen'
_wait for the iPod to appear as a disk drive on your computer
_run the latest iPod updater from apple (http://www.apple.com/ipod/download/, beware: 55Mb download)
_choose restore and follow the instructions
_once the process is completed, please initialize your iPod to work with MC (of course  ;) )

After a couple hours of intense anxiety, I have a working iPod again.

Hope it will help.

For more info on 'diagnostic mode':

http://playlistmag.com/features/2004/11/ipphpotpour/index.php

http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/ipod-photo-diagnostic-mode-revealed/

SteveG:
IOth,

Thanks for sharing this and for taking the time to post it for other's benefit.

Steve

Chris Shaw:
How odd. I had exactly this problem over the weekend. And found the same solution, fortunately. I resynced it overnight to get all my stuff onto it and found it constantly rebooting in the morning again. This time, I did the same but instead of a restore, I flashed to the newest firmware, did a quick resync with MC and it was back up without losing any data.

NoCodeUK:
Hey guys.

This has just happened to me.  I bought a brand new shiny iPod 5th gen and tried to use it with MC.  All appeared to be fine and MC said tracks were transferred.  I disconnected iPod and there were no tracks so I reconnected and asked MC to rebuild iPods db.  Again all seemed fine I disconnected iPod and it got stuck in infinite restart loop.

I managed to get into disk mode but the updater does not seem to recognise ipod.  I did get it to recognise once, started a restore but it bombed out almost staright away and iPod is still poorly.  Any one any ideas or I may have to return it to the shop and get a new one which is frustrating as I haven't even listened to any music on it yet!!

Adam

SteveG:
Adam,

What version of MC are you running?

Steve

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