[JohnnyGunn]

Hi there
I suspect it's either the CF-SD adapter or the CF-ZIF adapter (or both!).

I have a several CF-SD adapters that look similar to yours (Googling the description) and have used them ok with SDXC cards. For info, I have a Qumox microSD to CF adapter but it does not work in an ipod but works ok in a card reader.

Those cheap CF-ZIF adapters can be tricky to get the ribbon cable attached properly - the cable can go too far in and miss the contacts.

The fact you get gibberish in the ipod's diagnostics page points to some sort of communication problem. I've seen that with original drives and bad ribbon cables.

Time for some trouble-shooting :
1. Put the 30gb drive back in. Diagnostics info ok?
2. Double-check capacity of SD card in a card reader. Use something like h2testw. Test both with and without the SD-CF adapter.
3. If 1 and 2 check out ok then there's a fault or compatibility problem with the adapters. You might be better off going for one of Tarkan's made-for-ipod iFlash adapters https://www.iflash.xyz/store/

Thanks for the help Zedhed!

1.) a.) diagnostics are ok with the original HDD in.
1.) b.) I bought a new HDD ribbon cable, did nothing.
1.) c.) I tried it with a 4GB CF card (no adapter)...same thing, didn't work.
2.) SD cards (because I bought a 128GB SD card to replace the micro-sd) check out.
3.) I'm thinking the issue has to be with the CF to ZIF adapter.

I'm tired of fiddling with this thing and I need tunes while I'm on vacation in a couple weeks... so I just ordered the iFlash Solo! Haha!

Thanks for your help!

 

[vincert]

Hello everybody,
I came to this forum with a little problem. I got my Ipod Classic 5.5 30GB (A1136), a Lite-on 128GB SSD and that cheap chineese adapter, probably from Aliexpress.
My problem is the music transfer times are MUCH longer than with HDD and when I play music, the Ipod randomly freezes. It seems working as I can change volume, turn it off and on again, but the music is not playing, and when I press any button, the ipod freezes completely and a hard reset is needed. Any advices?

Edit:
I've got the latest version of itunes, tried formating the ipod a few times. SSD is formated in AOMEI as FAT32 and checked for bad sectors.
When there's just a few (200 or so) songs on Ipod, it's not freezing at all, but when it's 19k songs (about 100GB), the problem is present.

Edit2: With 8416 song (around 42GB taken and 76,8GB free) also seems to work without crashes

 

[morefilling]

Hello everybody,
I came to this forum with a little problem. I got my Ipod Classic 5.5 30GB (A1136), a Lite-on 128GB SSD and that cheap chineese adapter, probably from Aliexpress.
My problem is the music transfer times are MUCH longer than with HDD and when I play music, the Ipod randomly freezes. It seems working as I can change volume, turn it off and on again, but the music is not playing, and when I press any button, the ipod freezes completely and a hard reset is needed. Any advices?

Edit:
I've got the latest version of itunes, tried formating the ipod a few times. SSD is formated in AOMEI as FAT32 and checked for bad sectors.
When there's just a few (200 or so) songs on Ipod, it's not freezing at all, but when it's 19k songs (about 100GB), the problem is present.

Edit2: With 8416 song (around 42GB taken and 76,8GB free) also seems to work without crashes

The track limit on the 5th generation 30gb ipod with itunes is 10,000 to 30,000 tracks. You could try rockbox & see if that resolves your problem (Rockbox has no track limits). It could also be the Chinese adapter. The iflash adapter is more reliable.

 

[Jakelow]

Hi everyone,
I have this strange problem: I build an iFlash Quad with one Samsung Micro SDXC Evo Plus 256GB card in an iPod 5.5th (80GB).
When I sync the ipod with more than 1000 tracks the ipod crashes and won't list any music. It has to be restored to the factory settings. This only happens above 1000 tracks!
I've also tried this with an iPod 7th with exactly the same result.
I have no clue why this is happening.
Is anyone familliair with this?

 

[zedhed]

Hi everyone,
I have this strange problem: I build an iFlash Quad with one Samsung Micro SDXC Evo Plus 256GB card in an iPod 5.5th (80GB).
When I sync the ipod with more than 1000 tracks the ipod crashes and won't list any music. It has to be restored to the factory settings. This only happens above 1000 tracks!
I've also tried this with an iPod 7th with exactly the same result.
I have no clue why this is happening.
Is anyone familliair with this?

Possibly a problem with the SDXC card. Try checking it in a card reader attached to a computer. Run something like h2testw to check reading and writing to the entire memory card.

Or a corrupt or incompatible music file.

 

[dr408517]

It’s been a while since i posted on the thread, but i have some info to share today. I bought four 1T Sandisk MicroSD cards this week, loaded them into a Tarkan Quad, and went through the normal steps to build a Classic 6g TeraPod. Ipod would only read about 1.7T. Huh. I reformatted the cards to Fat32, repeat, same result. I pulled two cards out - ipod formats to 1.9T as expected.

I inserted two 250G cards into the Quad, with the 2 1T cards, and the format was back to 1.7T again. I repeated the process with a 7G. Same issue.

Everything works great up to 2T. Anything larger formats down to about 1.7T.

Anyone else seen this phenom?

 

[morefilling]

It’s been a while since i posted on the thread, but i have some info to share today. I bought four 1T Sandisk MicroSD cards this week, loaded them into a Tarkan Quad, and went through the normal steps to build a Classic 6g TeraPod. Ipod would only read about 1.7T. Huh. I reformatted the cards to Fat32, repeat, same result. I pulled two cards out - ipod formats to 1.9T as expected.

I inserted two 250G cards into the Quad, with the 2 1T cards, and the format was back to 1.7T again. I repeated the process with a 7G. Same issue.

Everything works great up to 2T. Anything larger formats down to about 1.7T.

Anyone else seen this phenom?

I don't recall anyone on this forum attempting this before. Have you asked Tarkan? Figuring it has to be a limitation with either the motherboard or his adapter.

 

[dr408517]

I don't recall anyone on this forum attempting this before. Have you asked Tarkan? Figuring it has to be a limitation with either the motherboard or his adapter.

I haven’t asked Tarkan - I try to start with the forum first. But it is on my list.

 

[ThinWalls]

It’s been a while since i posted on the thread, but i have some info to share today. I bought four 1T Sandisk MicroSD cards this week, loaded them into a Tarkan Quad, and went through the normal steps to build a Classic 6g TeraPod. Ipod would only read about 1.7T. Huh. I reformatted the cards to Fat32, repeat, same result. I pulled two cards out - ipod formats to 1.9T as expected.

I inserted two 250G cards into the Quad, with the 2 1T cards, and the format was back to 1.7T again. I repeated the process with a 7G. Same issue.

Everything works great up to 2T. Anything larger formats down to about 1.7T.

Anyone else seen this phenom?

That's very interesting to know (crikey, four 1Tb cards must cost a humungous amount! I suspect you are the first to try this). I was wondering if there was any upper limit due to the hardware (as I've reached about 1.5Tb myself).

Does it show the full capacity if you don't restore the ipod the normal iTunes way but just format it from within windows? That's not a usable solution, obviously, though if it worked to that extent, you might be able to install rockbox (perhaps using the old emcore method?), which might give a clue as to what might be going on. Would be sort-of-usable, except you'd be stuck syncing with rockbox, with all the disk error problems that involves, so until they fix rockbox's ata driver that wouldn't be a real solution.

Is it any different with a 5th gen?

Wouldn't surprise me if there were a limit with the Tarkan adaptor.

Oh, also windows device-manager or disk-manager can sometimes 'see' a more complete disk capacity than explorer does. Is there any difference in this case?

 

[davidcotton]

That's very interesting to know (crikey, four 1Tb cards must cost a humungous amount! I suspect you are the first to try this).

Is it any different with a 5th gen?

Doesn't the 6th gen have some sort of file limit on stock firmware that isn't present on fifth or 7th gen?

 

[ThinWalls]

Doesn't the 6th gen have some sort of file limit on stock firmware that isn't present on fifth or 7th gen?

Yes, but the poster did say he also tried it with a 7th gen. Assuming by 7th gen he means the one with firmware 2.04/2.05, i.e. the one that also gets called 7.5gen!

Though now you mention it, I'm confused how he got a 6th gen to see as much as 1.7Tb, unless he's already using rockbox?

 

[davidcotton]

Yes, but the poster did say he also tried it with a 7th gen. Assuming by 7th gen he means the one with firmware 2.04/2.05, i.e. the one that also gets called 7.5gen!

Guessing it's either a)a natural file limit, don't imagine apple for one moment thought someone would build a 4tb ipod! or b)the chinese adapter.

 

[ThinWalls]

Guessing it's either a)a natural file limit, don't imagine apple for one moment thought someone would build a 4tb ipod! or b)the chinese adapter.

No chinese adapter in this case, though, he's using the Quad, presumably Tarkan's quad.

Curious to know if it can be formatted to full capacity from windows, and it's only the iTunes restore process that can't see the full size. That would offer a bit of hope. Otherwise it sounds like a major hardware limitation.

 

[dr408517]

The storage limit on the 6G can easily be overcome by reformatting after an iTunes restore. ITunes limits the 6G to 128GB, but if you then install RockBox, then reformat and recopy the RockBox directories you and exceed the iTunes imposed limit. 7G classics will format all the way up to what ever you’ve installed as memory without the limit, with the caveat of the limit I just observed with the Quad and 4TB.

I’ve built four 2Tb iPods now. Three are built with the Tarkan Quad, and one with a Tarkan dual. I use PNY and Sandisk SD cards. I’ve wanted to try to build a 4T for several years now, it was just too expensive.

 

[reptillikus]

Im betting youre at the limitation of the hardware, and software.

Win7 will only recognize up to ~2TB max on HD size, with Win 10 recognizing 16TB. It has to do with the hard drive sector format. I seriously doubt the Apple & Tarkan parts can support the required 4k sector to get beyond 2TB. Even my FiiO M6 stops at 2TB storage space, id bet for the same reason.

https://www.minitool.com/partition-disk/win-10-max-drive-size.html