Who has an iPod and can help me out?

I have one of those video iPods and I recently had to reformat my computer. So I lost a lot of stuff including my music. Does anyone know if I can get the music from my iPod back onto my computer? I am afraid to just plug it in because I have heard everything from it will erase everything from my iPod to it will just add the new stuff. Usually when you do it it does just add the new music but since I reformatted and everything and I lost all my music, had to reinstall iTunes and begin downloading, I dont know if that makes a difference.

Anyone have this happen before?

When you plug in your iPod whatever is stored on there remains on there, and you should get an iPod playlist. Now do you want to add those songs also to your computer or do you want to make sure if you plug it in you won't lose the songs you have on your iPod. (cause that shouldn't happen)

Both, I want to know if I plug my iPod into my computer, will it erase what is on the iPod and replace it with the couple of new songs I have since downloaded? I only question this because I had to reformat my computer and reinstall iTunes.

I also want to know if there is a way to get the music from the iPod BACK onto my computer or do I have to redownload everything?

You can't sync from your iPod to your iTunes (or even your computer). It's a one way connection. I was furious when I found this out as my iPod was stolen and my songs were trapped on a computer that I had to reformat. The only option you can do is burn copies of all your songs, print out a copy of your library (as burning the songs will lose the name etc information).

I have an iPod mini which i can only download from my computer. I cant upload from iPod to computer.

Its a pain but then most of my iPod music is from my own collection anyway. If you have a whole load of iTunes purchased music then you will need to put those onto CD-RW and keep it up to date. Then if anything happens you can upload it back into iTunes from the disc and then onto the iPod.

Originally Posted by Jen

I have one of those video iPods and I recently had to reformat my computer. So I lost a lot of stuff including my music. Does anyone know if I can get the music from my iPod back onto my computer? I am afraid to just plug it in because I have heard everything from it will erase everything from my iPod to it will just add the new stuff. Usually when you do it it does just add the new music but since I reformatted and everything and I lost all my music, had to reinstall iTunes and begin downloading, I dont know if that makes a difference.

Anyone have this happen before?

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I have had this happen and had to ask Apple to put all songs I purchased back on Itunes and they said they would only do it once I think

Originally Posted by Bella713

I have had this happen and had to ask Apple to put all songs I purchased back on Itunes and they said they would only do it once I think

Click to expand...

This is what I was going to recommend. You can call Apple or email them through their website. Make sure you have your iPod handy so you can give them your serial number. Be VERY nice to the person you speak with though They don't have to restore the music that you lost. I don't know if you have ever noticed, but when you purchase songs through iTunes a little pop up comes up and tells you how important it is to back your music up on to a disk because they are not responsible for replacing music that is lost.
Also, once you get your music back on the computer I would do an export of your play list and save that on a disk as well.

Set iTunes up to not auto sync completely with your iPod. I know that when I delete songs in iTunes is automatically deletes them on my iPod. It might be safest to call Apple and let them help you with this part also. Good luck!

Ok well most of the music I have on my iPod is either from my CD collection or it was downloaded, not bought. So there is really nothing I can do there. I can just recopy al my personal cds onto my computer and into iTunes again but there are A LOT OF THEM It would take forever.

I guess bottom line is there is no way to get the music from the iPod BACK into iTunes.

So the next problem is if I plug my iPod (it has all the music on it that used to be on iTunes before I reformated) into my computer which has all the music I have copied or downloaded since the reformat, will it REPLACE the music already on my iPod or add to it?

Is that what Squirtle is talking about when you said "Set iTunes up to not auto sync completely with your iPod"? If so, how? I am looking through options and preferences (in iTunes) and I cannot find anything referring to auto sync.

Thanks guys. I just want to be as sure as possible that I know what is going to happen before I plug my iPod into my computer.

I found something that might work.... You need to enable your iPod for disk use. Plug your iPod into the computer and tell iTunes not to auto update in any way (this is VERY important, do not let it update between iTunes and your iPod). Then, in iTunes, go to the "Edit" menu, then "preferences", then go to the "iPod" tab. There is a little box at the bottom that you can check to enable disk use. Check that box, then go to My Computer, and find where your iPod is. It will probably be the E drive. Once there go to the "iPod Control" folder, then the "Music" folder, then select any one of those folders and see if there is music there. If there is copy all of the music files onto your hard drive. This might work in recovering your music.

I should also add... once you have copied all of the music files onto your hard drive, which may take awhile, then you need to go through importing them back into iTunes. Once they are imported into iTunes you can update your iTunes with your iPod.

Hey great! I will give that a try and see how it goes! Thanks.

Originally Posted by Jen

Hey great! I will give that a try and see how it goes! Thanks.

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I really hope it works. I was playing with my iPod to try and figure something out for you. It worked for me as far as saving the music to my computer, so I couldn't see any reason why you wouldn't be able to update iTunes with it.

Good luck! Let me know how it goes

Jen, how did it go? Were you able to retrieve your music?

You can do a Google Search for a handy little program called "iPod Utility" (it's not through Apple, though) and it'll open a 2 way connection. This is how my friends and I share recordings.

MAKE SURE that you have iTunes set up NOT to automatically update, and put your iPod into disk mode.