iPod New Nano FM Radio Question

I'll give you a bump because I was wondering the very same thing .

Yes and no...

I waited for someone to answer because I was a lurker and not yet registered, but since no one answered, here's my experience: When I put my new Nano onto my speaker (using the dock connector), I get a message reading "No Radio Signal. Please plug in headphones for radio reception." But my speakers have a line in jack, and with a line in adapter (the cord with what looks like a headphone jack at both ends) I can plug one end into the speaker and the other into the iPod, rather than docking the iPod, and the radio does work and plays through the speaker.

Hope this helps.

I have zero experience with the Nano and it's FM capabillities, but could the headphones be the antenna? So if there's no headphones attached, there's no antenna??? Just a thought...

Q-Dog said:

<crickets>

Has no one used the radio on the new nano?

Click to expand...

Didn't even know it had one so no

Yes you can. What i did was pull the jack end off of an old pair of headphones, exposing the bare wires. Then put the nano on with a good pair of headphones, tune into radio station you prefer, pull the headphone out, stuff in the bare wires and put on sound dock. works great for me.

I got this to work much in the same way jvcrew did. Be careful if you try this method. It's a little rough on the equipment, but I was determined to get the FM radio on the iPod to play through the Bose. That's why I bought it. I love radio.

I pulled the rubber coating off some picture wire, exposing the metal wires, and bent it so it was roughly the diameter as a headphone jack, then inserted it into the headphone jack. I then docked the iPod on the Bose speaker, bending the wire up and over the ipod. You can squish the wire down flat enough so that the iPod docks tightly. (I used a hammer to bang the wire very flat.) One thing I noticed is that if the end you put into the iPod doesn't hit the sensors in the right way the iPod will go to sleep even if it's docked. Also the Bose speaker is not charging my iPod, but my Bose is very old, probably second gen. I'm thinking of getting some conductive tape to wrap around the loose ends of the picture wire that goes into the iPod because they're sharp and I think they might damage the iPod.

new tip

I've been a frequent lurker of this site, but first time poster. I came up with a similar hack to enable my wife to use the radio on her 5th gen Nano while docked in a speaker dock. You can actually use the standard ipod headphones IF you remove the white plastic cylinder surrounding the metal jack post. I did this using a pair of pliers to crack it open. Be careful not to crimp so hard that you sever the connection between the post and the wires. With the hard white plastic removed from the tip, the headphone wire will now fit (many? most) speaker docks for the Nano-- enabling the headphone wire to act as the antennae. We use a Phillips brand dock purchased at Bestbuy and it works fine. Plus, the headphones actually still work even without the plastic casing around the jack post. Simple hack-- done in literally 30 seconds for me.

lurkers said:

I've been a frequent lurker of this site, but first time poster. I came up with a similar hack to enable my wife to use the radio on her 5th gen Nano while docked in a speaker dock. You can actually use the standard ipod headphones IF you remove the white plastic cylinder surrounding the metal jack post. I did this using a pair of pliers to crack it open. Be careful not to crimp so hard that you sever the connection between the post and the wires. With the hard white plastic removed from the tip, the headphone wire will now fit (many? most) speaker docks for the Nano-- enabling the headphone wire to act as the antennae. We use a Phillips brand dock purchased at Bestbuy and it works fine. Plus, the headphones actually still work even without the plastic casing around the jack post. Simple hack-- done in literally 30 seconds for me.

Click to expand...

Little late there lol maybe I'll try it on my old iPod 5

I know this is an old thread but I'm trying to do a similar hack of my own.

Me and my wife were given a soundlink air for Christmas and I'm trying to create a workaround of getting my iPod nano 5g to play radio through it.

But ofcourse as the new soundlnk doesnt have a dock ive bought a little cheapo desktop dock off amazon hoping to hack it to run a 3.5mm jack to the headphone port to receive the fm signal.

Alternatively I could do what the op in the thread I've linked below has done.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/990733/

*Silly question alert* Would sticking a wire up the headphone port really work at receving the signal it's just that I've read suggestion like that floating around the Internet.