It happened again! Son-of-a bitch! I actually had to listen to the god forsaken radio on the drive home from work!
So I just posted the below text in the Winamp support forums to see if anyone could help me. I’ve been searching online for hours for some answers, but I can’t seem to find anyone who is having the same exact issue as myself.
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Failed to eject iPod, then songs disappear
Sorry if this is long, but I wanted to provide as much detail as possible.
First a little background: I have an 80GB iPod Classic. I use iTunes at home on a Windows Vista machine to load my music onto my iPod. I manually manage my music and I have disk use enabled. At work my computer runs Windows XP and I use Winamp to listen to my iPod.
All had been working fine with this setup until this week. Now for whatever reason when I try to eject my iPod through Winamp, it says “Failed to eject iPod, is something else using it?” Nothing else is using it. The disk use option is enabled but I don’t have any directories from the iPod open, or any programs running that would have accessed the iPod, except Winamp.
At this point I close Winamp and choose safely remove hardware to eject the iPod. Once the iPod returns to the regular menu (on the device itself), it shows I have no music or podcasts anymore. My photos, notes, and games are still present. Also, I can tell the actual music and podcasts must still be present on the device because the used disc space is the same.
I’m guessing a file in the normally hidden iPod_Control folder that allows the iPod to “see” the music and podcasts has been corrupted. But what file? And what corrupted it? Was it Winamp? Or was it something else on my work machine? It might be helpful to note that I used to have administrative rights to my work machine and I no longer do. Is that related to this error? I’m not sure. It certainly doesn’t allow me to change many things to see if I can fix it.
Also, it’s worth noting that if I plug my iPod back into my work machine, I can still play music through Winamp, I just can’t see any playlists. When I plug the iPod into my machine at home and fire up Winamp, I can see my music and playlists, but it still gives me that eject error. Also, when I start iTunes, I’m told iTunes cannot read the contents of my iPod and I have to restore. Of course doing this puts everything back to the factory settings and I have to re-sync all my files. Not such a big deal since I have them all backed up, but it’s an inconvenience, not to mention it wipes clean my progress on any iPod games I’ve played.
I’ve done the restore once already and then the same thing happened two days later. Short of restoring every day, or forgoing using Winamp at all to listen to my music at work, does anyone have any suggestions?
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What sucks is because I’ve lost administrative rights to my work machine, I can’t download another program to use to listen to my iPod (like iTunes) if it is in fact an issue with Winamp. Windows Media Player has never even recognized the device at home or at work, so that’s out too. I might just have to plug some speakers into the iPod itself and listen to it that way. It just sucks because I don’t know if it’s the music program corrupting the iPod, or Windows. I’d like to still be able to use my iPod at work as a portable drive, but I’m weary now. I might have to go back to carrying around a thumb drive.
I’m restoring my iPod right now and plan to do a little testing at work tomorrow. Let’s see if I have to do a restore again tomorrow night!
Just curious… are you not allowed to use headphones at work? Just wondering why you don’t simply listen to your iPod directly via headphones.
kristi » We can use headphones but I’ve got people coming up to my desk or calling me constantly. In addition, I have to get up and retrieve items from the printer so often, it becomes a real pain to keep removing the ear buds. Plus I worry I’ll accidentally pull the iPod off my desk and break it. So what I did today was remove my speakers plug from the back of the computer and put it directly in the iPod. I have to access it more when when one album, podcast, or playlist runs out of music, but it’s certainly better than the alternative! I just don’t get why my work machine likes to feast on my iPod like it does. Oh well. Worst things have happened. :)
Okay, this just sucks. No two ways around it.
I actually just plug my iPod directly into computer speakers via a splitter. The splitter allows me to pick either the computer or my iPod. Works nicely and I don’t have to worry about my computer asking me to reformat my Mac iPod for Windows.