Official Ipod Video / Classic 5g+5.5g+6g+6.5g+7g SSD Mod thread

[Zumpf]

Did you install a new battery?

Yes, put in a new 2000mah battery that I had on another iPod.

 

[dribgnikcom]

I got it working after around 6 solid hours around it. No joke
If you get the sad face or Red Cross it simply means its not connected properly via the zif cable. (too tight) Maybe put some electrical tape on the cable to prevent moving
You will need to add something around the bottom to stop it from pressing too hard onto the adapter.
I would not suggest doing if battery life or weight difference is important to you. Since there is virtually no improvement whatsoever. The only benefit from it is literally not having a faling HD.
Tarkan's iflash is certainly the easiest and least time consuming option. But the prices have gone up more than 10% in the last 6 months alone.

I would like to be the second person to confirm that the generic red SD to CF adapter (not the generic green mSATA adapter) works with the generic green CF adapter for the iPod 6th gen.

So it does in fact support 48-bit LBA.

The 128GB SD card was $18, plus around $10 for both of these, so that's $30 total minus all the other bits and bobs (New battery, screen protector film).

I had it installed and working in 15 minutes or so.

With Tarkan, the "iFlash Solo" would have cost $33 alone. The packaging on the back of the generic SD to CF adapter also indicates that a 4 slot "TF" version is also available. So it would really give Tarkan's $42 iFlash quad a run for its money. (but so far I've only found the 2 slot TF adapter on AliExpress).

Thanks everyone for your help.

 

[dribgnikcom]

Can someone do me a favor please?

The iPod 6 thick original HDD measures at about 7.6mm with the plastic frame and blue foam removed.

The SD->CF->ZIF combo measures at about 5.7mm

I need someone with a slim model to measure their HDD. I want to install a 2000mAh battery with this, but the listings say it's only for the thin version with a thick back cover replacement.

Yes, I'm aware that there's a 1900mAh version as well suitable for a thick model with a thick HDD, but why settle for 100mAh less if the reduction of HDD width negates the need?

Oh yea, avoid these style of batteries:

They do not work properly. The battery gauge never shows an increase even after it's charged.

Thanks

 

[ThinWalls]

I would like to be the second person to confirm that the generic red SD to CF adapter (not the generic green mSATA adapter) works with the generic green CF adapter for the iPod 6th gen.

So it does in fact support 48-bit LBA.

The 128GB SD card was $18, plus around $10 for both of these, so that's $30 total minus all the other bits and bobs (New battery, screen protector film).

I had it installed and working in 15 minutes or so.

With Tarkan, the "iFlash Solo" would have cost $33 alone. The packaging on the back of the generic SD to CF adapter also indicates that a 4 slot "TF" version is also available. So it would really give Tarkan's $42 iFlash quad a run for its money. (but so far I've only found the 2 slot TF adapter on AliExpress).

Thanks everyone for your help.

I haven't found that combo (classic + generic adaptors) works for me - my experience was it would only work for 5th gen. Also the generic green adaptor is a bit on the thick-side compared to Tarkan's so is tricky to fit (but not impossible). Maybe it varies by particular adaptor though, if you've found it works reliably for you (I seem to remember I had one that _seemed_ to work initially, but proved unreliable)..

But surely the point about LBA48 is you need it to go higher than 128gb? So I don't see how being able to get 128gb working means it supports LBA48. You can get 128gb working with LBA28. The difficulty arises if you want to go higher than that.

 

[MikeyFresh]

But surely the point about LBA48 is you need it to go higher than 128gb? So I don't see how being able to get 128gb working means it supports LBA48. You can get 128gb working with LBA28. The difficulty arises if you want to go higher than that.

Exactly, and the 6th Gen. Classic's LBA28 limitation is an Apple firmware thing, it won't matter if the adapters are LBA48 compatible when that iPod itself is not.

The only solution to that is Rockbox, at which point adapter compatibility would matter, but not with the stock Apple firmware which will limit a 6th Gen. Classic to 127.7GB and no more before becoming corrupted.

 

[dribgnikcom]

I haven't found that combo (classic + generic adaptors) works for me - my experience was it would only work for 5th gen. Also the generic green adaptor is a bit on the thick-side compared to Tarkan's so is tricky to fit (but not impossible). Maybe it varies by particular adaptor though, if you've found it works reliably for you (I seem to remember I had one that _seemed_ to work initially, but proved unreliable)..

No, it works perfectly. You are wrong.

The generic mSATA adapter doesn't work. You're confusing the two.

It also fits with absolutely plenty of room to spare. This is a 6th gen thick iPod. Now the question is whether it can accommodate the 2000mAh battery or will it only take the thinner 1900mAh battery. If someone could measure the thickness of the original 5th gen HDD, it would be greatly appreciated as a point of reference.

Exactly, and the 6th Gen. Classic's LBA28 limitation is an Apple firmware thing, it won't matter if the adapters are LBA48 compatible when that iPod itself is not.

the point of contention was also whether the SD to CF adapter supported LBA48. The packaging clearly states that it can handle 2TB. So the dual and quad versions should work perfectly fine on stock 5th gen iPods as well as rockbox modded 6th and 7th gen iPods with more than 128GB.

 

[MikeyFresh]

the point of contention was also whether the SD to CF adapter supported LBA48. The packaging clearly states that it can handle 2TB. So the dual and quad versions should work perfectly fine on stock 5th gen iPods as well as rockbox modded 6th and 7th gen iPods with more than 128GB.

Right, forgive me if I missed it on some previous post of yours, but I did not see anywhere you were stating Rockbox as a requirement with the 6th Gen. Classic, and thats why I made that distinction, you mentioned adapter compatibility which is only part of the story when considering storage capacity greater than 128GB on a Gen. 6 Classic.

Anyone new to the thread or uninitiated might have read your posts and concluded they could get a 6th Gen. Classic to work with more than 128GB of storage capacity simply by using the adapters you mentioned, and thats not exactly right, they would also need to use Rockbox in place of Apple's firmware as an additional requirement.

Gen. 5 is a different story and has no such LBA28 firmware limitation, nor does the 7th Gen. "thin" (or so-called Gen. 7.5), each of those have LBA48 compatibility baked into their stock Apple firmware.

 

[ThinWalls]

No, it works perfectly. You are wrong.

The generic mSATA adapter doesn't work. You're confusing the two.

It also fits with absolutely plenty of room to spare. This is a 6th gen thick iPod. Now the question is whether it can accommodate the 2000mAh battery or will it only take the thinner 1900mAh battery. If someone could measure the thickness of the original 5th gen HDD, it would be greatly appreciated as a point of reference.


the point of contention was also whether the SD to CF adapter supported LBA48. The packaging clearly states that it can handle 2TB. So the dual and quad versions should work perfectly fine on stock 5th gen iPods as well as rockbox modded 6th and 7th gen iPods with more than 128GB.

I don't see how you can know I'm 'wrong', given that you aren't here to see that the ipods I've made that way don't work reliably. You are being a bit presumptuous there.

And no, I'm not 'confusing the two' (you are being kind of rude there), I know perfectly well the difference between the msata and cf adaptors - my first ipod mod 2 or 3 years ago was an msata one, but I long ago decided sdcards were more reliable (currently have four of them, ranging from 512gb to 768gb).

I do accept that it would fit OK with a thick back, the difficult fit I was referring to was with a slim back (I did build a few slim 128gb generic ones, but it's kind of obvious the fit is not great). If I was going to use a thick back I'd use a Tarkan adaptor so I could use a larger battery.

Regarding the width of the single-platter drive, you could probably just google it. I suspect you can't get a thick battery in there with a generic adaptors...though back when I was experimenting with it most generic sd-cf adaptors were the other, thicker, type anyway.

(Back then to use a thick battery even with a Tarkan adaptor you had to physically half-dismantle the adaptor)

As I said, it's absolutely possible those sd to cf adaptors vary, or have improved over the last year or so, despite looking the same. But I wouldn't take a manufacturer's claim that it 'supports 2TB' as a given till I'd seen them tested with >128gb. I only know ones I bought years back claimed to support sizes much higher than they actually could (e.g. ones claiming 256gb or 512gb would only work up to 128gb, at least when in an ipod, even 7th gen and rockboxed).

The point is merely that as you are only using 128gb, you can't really say for sure the adaptor truly supports LBA48. I was hoping you had actually got such an ipod working with 256gb or more, as that would have proved the adaptors now do actually support LBA48. It could be that they've just started claiming even larger capacities, while still not in reality supporting more than 128gb in an ipod. I have at least half-a-dozen cf-sd adaptors looking exactly like the one you picture, and most of them claimed to work at up to 512gb (then the largest available card) but didn't in reality go higher than 128gb.


Edit - if you _could_ test it with a 256gb card (and fill it beyond the 128gb mark) that would very useful information to share.

Edit2 - the other problem is that to use >128gb in a 6th gen you have to use rockbox, and rockbox itself is not 100% compatible with sd card adaptors - you get subtle sync errors (some sort of timing issue apparently). Using the right brands of sd cards seems to ameliorate this, and it also only seems to become a really bad problem at more than 128gb with the wrong card brand.

 

[dribgnikcom]

I don't see how you can know I'm 'wrong', given that you aren't here to see that the ipods I've made that way don't work reliably. You are being a bit presumptuous there.

And no, I'm not 'confusing the two' (you are being kind of rude there), I know perfectly well the difference between the msata and cf adaptors - my first ipod mod 2 or 3 years ago was an msata one, but I long ago decided sdcards were more reliable (currently have four of them, ranging from 512gb to 768gb).

Your assumption that there was something wrong with the SD to CF adapter could have been wrong. You could have had a problem with incompatible SD cards. In fact, Tarkan even used to sell exactly this combo himself. The only difference with his combo was that he fabbed his own CF to ZIF adapters (which isn't a big deal - these aren't converting any actual signals, it just adapts from a CF connector to a ZIF connector), and he rebranded the generic SD to CF converter/adapter. If you disassemble the CF adapter and find the same IC in it that's on Tarkan's SD adapter, then your argument is moot. ...and this could very well be the case here.

I do accept that it would fit OK with a thick back, the difficult fit I was referring to was with a slim back (I did build a few slim 128gb generic ones, but it's kind of obvious the fit is not great). If I was going to use a thick back I'd use a Tarkan adaptor so I could use a larger battery.

This thread has a report of the battery not fitting, but I'm not convinced. A Toshiba MK6028GAL commonly found in a thin IPC is spec'd at around 5mm thick. I measured my SD -> CF -> ZIF combo at 5.7mm. Would an extra 0.7mm prevent it from working with the 2000mAh battery?

It would be very helpful if someone could give actual measurements because there are different revisions of adapters with different thicknesses.

Regarding the width of the single-platter drive, you could probably just google it. I suspect you can't get a thick battery in there with a generic adaptors...though back when I was experimenting with it most generic sd-cf adaptors were the other, thicker, type anyway.

The 1900mAh battery OTOH is specified to fit... But I'd much rather use the 2000mAh ones because the seller looks like he has much fresher stock.

The point is merely that as you are only using 128gb, you can't really say for sure the adaptor truly supports LBA48. I was hoping you had actually got such an ipod working with 256gb or more, as that would have proved the adaptors now do actually support LBA48. It could be that they've just started claiming even larger capacities, while still not in reality supporting more than 128gb in an ipod. I have at least half-a-dozen cf-sd adaptors looking exactly like the one you picture, and most of them claimed to work at up to 512gb (then the largest available card) but didn't in reality go higher than 128gb.

Edit - if you _could_ test it with a 256gb card (and fill it beyond the 128gb mark) that would very useful information to share.

Edit2 - the other problem is that to use >128gb in a 6th gen you have to use rockbox, and rockbox itself is not 100% compatible with sd card adaptors - you get subtle sync errors (some sort of timing issue apparently). Using the right brands of sd cards seems to ameliorate this, and it also only seems to become a really bad problem at more than 128gb with the wrong card brand.

If someone would be willing to loan me a 256GB SD Card, I'd be more than willing to install Rockbox and run the experiment.

 

[MikeyFresh]

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[Crash_Override]

Hello! I recently found head-fi.org. I have an iPod 5.5 gen 80gb. I use it pretty much everyday still. I stumbled upon the ability to mod my iPod. I work on cars, and build computers, but never thought about modding an iPod. I have already modded it a little. I have installed: iVue clear front panel kit, new headphone jack and hold button, new dock connector spacer, iFlash dual ad card adapter, 2x 128gb sd cards, 3000 mAh battery, and covered the case back with 3M Di-Noc matte carbon fiber vinyl. I like quality audio, and want to get the most out of the iPod that i can. I am looking at doing the iFlash DiyMod, adding an lod, and a fiio a1 to start with. Does that sound like a good beginning? Or are there better beginner recommendations? Can anyone recommend a good lod cable, is btg a good one to get, or would whiplash audio be better? Thank you!

 

[Ilia_Z]

Hi All
how to fix the PLAY button on the main logic board. I disassembled the ipod and need to clean the button membrane or any advice welcome
thanks

 

[ThinWalls]

Replying to "dribgnikcom"

I'm pretty sure I did try at one point to get a larger battery in with a generic adaptor combo and it wouldn't fit at all. As I recall, though I built a few slim ipods with generic adaptors and normal batteries (mostly 5th gen) it was a real struggle to make them fit, and they felt like they might pop open at some point. The problem is the thickness of both the board itself and the CF plug compared to Tarkan's, especially since Tarkan went to the newer much slimmer adaptors with the sd converter built in.

The fit with a fat-back and larger battery would be worse than with a slim back and standard battery. 0.7mm is a very significant amount in terms of closing an ipod without breaking everything. There's nothing in there that could safely be compressed by nearly a mm.

I do believe Tarkan's boards are built to a better standard than the generics, he did go to some trouble to find an sd/cf converter stage that was properly ipod-compatible (I don't know if it's as simple as just supporting LBA48, it might be whether it can do so in a way that is specifically acceptable to the ipod - there seem to be complicated timing issues involved that are beyond my technical knowledge). Between their being thinner than the generic zif/cf adaptors and more able to support >128gb than the generic sd/cf adaptors, I think Tarkan's are worth the extra cost...but generics do work for 5th gens at least and <128gb. Maybe they can be gotten working with 6th gens, I couldn't be bothered experimenting any more after the first couple of failures, as I need more like a Tb anyway.

Seems plausible that _eventually_ generic Chinese adaptors might appear that can work with >128gb, but I know that they have always _claimed_ to work with 256, 512, etc, but in reality don't go higher than 128 in an ipod (plus there was one that claimed 128 and would only go to 64 in an ipod). I suspect its something specific to ipod compatibility (those who know just seem to mutter something about 'timings') rather than solely about LBA48. And as I say, that one looks exactly like the ones I've tried before, just with a bigger number on the packaging.

I'd rather just wait and see if someone happens to pop up who has found one they've confirmed can work.

In fact I think there are still issues even with Tarkan's adaptors compatibility, just much less than with the generics...or maybe the issue is with Rockbox. Which is why people consistently find you can't sync a modded ipod reliably using Rockbox (and why ssd ipods need beyondwinds slightly-hacked rockbox, which apparently 'relaxes' timings in a way rockbox devs don't seem to entirely approve of). You can use dual-boot to sync in original firmware and get round it...except for 6th gens with more than 128gb...in that one case you are a bit stuck.

It would be neat if that remaining issue could be solved. Unfortunately I think if you ask either Tarkan or Rockbox devs they'll say the problem is with the other (and obviously the philosophy of open source kind of implies if you want something done you should do it yourself). Worse, hardly anyone uses stand-alone DAPs these days, so there probably are fewer-and-fewer people who care anyway (edit - one reason why the minority who do should try not to fall out?).

 

[ThinWalls]

repllying to "MikeyFresh, post: 13484175"

Thank you a lot for the support, though I would say I didn't think dribgnikcom's last post was offensive, and I would very much hope for a 'can't we all just get along?' sort of outcome.

I'm not lending anyone a card though, because I don't think the chances of success are high enough as I don't see much reason to believe that adaptor is different from the ones I've already tried. And if I thought it was worth trying I'd just buy a generic adaptor myself and have a go. The trouble is experimenting means dismantling working ipods and it takes an eternity to resync hundreds of gb of music.

 

[MikeyFresh]

repllying to "MikeyFresh, post: 13484175"

Thank you a lot for the support, though I would say I didn't think dribgnikcom's last post was offensive, and I would very much hope for a 'can't we all just get along?' sort of outcome.

I'm not lending anyone a card though, because I don't think the chances of success are high enough as I don't see much reason to believe that adaptor is different from the ones I've already tried. And if I thought it was worth trying I'd just buy a generic adaptor myself and have a go. The trouble is experimenting means dismantling working ipods and it takes an eternity to resync hundreds of gb of music.

Understood, and I did not mean in any way to sound like I was speaking on your behalf.

However I've seen this thread spiral out of control once before with similar "I am right, you are wrong" dogma, and a general lack of respect towards members who have only been positive contributors over time, so much so that I unsubscribed for a period of months.

I too wish for a "can't we just all get along" scenario and don't understand why some seem inclined to post in such a negative "roll up their sleeves for a fight" type of way. That isn't what makes these forums go, or what makes a thread like this one so valuable. I'm tired of that as are many others, there is such a thing as "netiquette" not to mention just an overall common sense approach to addressing others in a polite fashion. Life is too short.

I'm not lending out any cards for this either, however I can confirm the "thin" Toshiba HDD is 5mm thick (without the blue foam padding) as measured by a Wiha caliper.