iPod iPod making "spinning sound", constantly freezing

[ero87]

Hey friends,

So Apple has replaced my broken iPod Photo twice - and now my third seems to be having the same problem that the first two had. This one makes a spinning noise (hard drive?) as it tries to start up, and sometimes even after it starts up. I called Apple, they said it's out of warranty (they sent this to me 4 months ago, apparently that's the expected lifespan of an iPod?). Should I bring this into an Apple store and beg?

Right now, the only thing that sometimes works is banging the ipod against the palm of my hand as it starts up - this will sometimes give me 15 minutes of freeze-free music. Any suggestions?

P.S. I made an audio recording of the spinning sound, not sure how to post that though...

 

[axboi87]

hmm

I wonder if this has anythign to do with directory damage, something not physical. Do you have it completely full? does it act up when you use it as a disk? Try running Diskwarrior and repairing it and see if that helps.

 

[ero87]

I wonder if this has anythign to do with directory damage, something not physical. Do you have it completely full? does it act up when you use it as a disk? Try running Diskwarrior and repairing it and see if that helps.

it's not full, and i've never tried to use it as a disk.

not sure what DiskWarrior is, but i'm searching/downloading now...

EDIT: no use, my iPod won't mount.

 

[ero87]

update!

I finally got it into disk mode to try to do a full restore. However, iTunes didn't let me (see attached pic). So I tried to do a disk repair, and I got this message (see other pic.)

(sigh) anyone know what's going on?

 

[timnosenzo]

Well, if you're banging the iPod with the hard drive spinning there's a good chance that you could have damaged one of the disk platters. Once there's psychical damage to it, there's really no chance in fixing it. Not sure what could be causing all of these iPods to crap out on you.

 

[ero87]

well i only started banging it when it broke and these problems already existed.

maybe the ipods w/ video have better luck with hard drives? I'm about ready to give in and open my wallet for apple again...

EDIT: Anything else I can do within Disk Utility? Erase, partition, RAID, restore (the restore button is dulled out though)...

 

[princealfie]

well i only started banging it when it broke and these problems already existed.

maybe the ipods w/ video have better luck with hard drives? I'm about ready to give in and open my wallet for apple again...

EDIT: Anything else I can do within Disk Utility? Erase, partition, RAID, restore (the restore button is dulled out though)...

Send your ipod back actually. The hd is probably dead from being shocked very badly!

 

[ero87]

i wish i could send it back! The guys on the phone said that "there's nothing they can do."

Maybe at the apple store, talkign to real people, I'd have some luck?

 

[anjinha]

i had the exact same problem with my iPod and i started doing the same as you. but after 4 months the iPod started not recognizing the hard drive or something. basicly the iPod worked fine but altough it said it had 5 gb of music none of it appeared and also iTunes didn't recognize it. but since the iPod was over 2 years old i just bought a new one.

 

[ero87]

ahh why have we lowered our standards for apple! I want my iPod to last more than 2 years! This current one is 3-months old, and it's completely broken!

excuse my ranting, but I get frustrated when my favorite company lets me down.

(grumble grumble grumble)

I'm bringing the iPod to the Providence Apple Store this weekend to see if a human being might feel compassion for me.