[Boomer]

I am an idiot.

My laptop, which I seldom use except when I am on the road, went into the shop. It was in crisis. In spite of Norton. My computer guy asked me what needed to be saved. I said, "Not much. The pictures. Word docs. That's it."

But just now, I had a vision. A vision of all those iPod tunes that Mr. B had transferred there for me from all those old CD's and even tapes and yes....I admit it.... from vinyl. All that music had been a long time in residence on that neglected laptop of mine.

I just called the computer guys and said, "Hello, I am Boomer of the really messed up laptop that I had not used for a long time. Have you started on it yet? It really is OK if you have not."

But, alas, they had started. Almost finished. But he did say that the guy working on it might have saved the music anyway. I really do not know yet. For sure. There might be hope.

So all I am really asking here is whether or not all those songs -- B. B. King and classical stuff and country (all the way from Patsy Cline to now) and old rock and roll and lots of piano stuff (Vladimir Horowitz to Jerry Lee Lewis) and Ella Fitzgerald and Sinatra and The Rolling Stones and Jimmy Buffet (can't forget about him) -- about 7GB of my little world of the music I like -- if all those songs are gone from the laptop, can they be put back on from the iPod? Can it work both ways?

Mr. B just told me that he had backed up a lot of them, but not all. Well, that's a start. I was so afraid that if all of them are gone, I was going to have to listen to Mr. B's iPod which is way too full of music he listened to in his Army days in Okinawa in the 70's. Yeah, I love Santana. But that was on mine, too. You see, I am a multi-faceted woman. I had all kinds of music on my laptop. And iPods probably do not last forever.

So while I wait to find out for sure, if I really did cause my laptop and my iPod to break up, could somebody please tell me if there is a chance that I can get them back together?

Thanks.

Boomer

[collie1228]

Boomer, I don't think you are an idiot. You are just like most of the rest of us, slaves to Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, with not much hope of ever gaining our freedom. In fact, I had just completed this post and thought I had hit backspace, when evidently I must have hit enter and it all went into neutron heaven. That aside, now that I have retyped it, I suggest you cut and paste the following link into your browser:

http://www.tansee.com/ipodtransfer.html

I have no idea if this "free" Tansee software will work, but the description says it will transfer IPOD songs into your hard drive. Sometimes "free" software only gives you the basic package, and if you want the whole enchalada, you have to come up with cash. I don't know anything about this particular package, but I wish you good luck, and hope that the software works.

Collie

[tony]

Boomer,

This is odd. I have been looking into this. Mrs. Tony just bought an ipod and I am guessing that I will have to know this some day. But she has a Mac and a Macbook. So I don't know if I solved me potential problem, but maybe it will help with yours.

For now, put the Ipod on a pillow. Keep it away from water. Keep it charged. For safety. Don't do anything spectacular with it.

Now look here.

Software to restore from Ipod to PC

Another, commercial program

And yet another commercial program

[homeball]

Originally Posted by Boomer

I am an idiot.

My laptop, which I seldom use except when I am on the road, went into the shop. It was in crisis. In spite of Norton. My computer guy asked me what needed to be saved. I said, "Not much. The pictures. Word docs. That's it."

But just now, I had a vision. A vision of all those iPod tunes that Mr. B had transferred there for me from all those old CD's and even tapes and yes....I admit it.... from vinyl. All that music had been a long time in residence on that neglected laptop of mine.

I just called the computer guys and said, "Hello, I am Boomer of the really messed up laptop that I had not used for a long time. Have you started on it yet? It really is OK if you have not."

But, alas, they had started. Almost finished. But he did say that the guy working on it might have saved the music anyway. I really do not know yet. For sure. There might be hope.

So all I am really asking here is whether or not all those songs -- B. B. King and classical stuff and country (all the way from Patsy Cline to now) and old rock and roll and lots of piano stuff (Vladimir Horowitz to Jerry Lee Lewis) and Ella Fitzgerald and Sinatra and The Rolling Stones and Jimmy Buffet (can't forget about him) -- about 7GB of my little world of the music I like -- if all those songs are gone from the laptop, can they be put back on from the iPod? Can it work both ways?

Mr. B just told me that he had backed up a lot of them, but not all. Well, that's a start. I was so afraid that if all of them are gone, I was going to have to listen to Mr. B's iPod which is way too full of music he listened to in his Army days in Okinawa in the 70's. Yeah, I love Santana. But that was on mine, too. You see, I am a multi-faceted woman. I had all kinds of music on my laptop. And iPods probably do not last forever.

So while I wait to find out for sure, if I really did cause my laptop and my iPod to break up, could somebody please tell me if there is a chance that I can get them back together?

Thanks.

Boomer

External hard drives are worth gold when it comes to situations like this. And they are pretty cheap lately. I maintain two of them and have all my pics and docs backed up constantly both from the desktop and laptop. You never know when disaster will strike.

-Dave-

[Hawkwind]

Originally Posted by Boomer

I like -- if all those songs are gone from the laptop, can they be put back on from the iPod? Can it work both ways?

Boomer

Boomer
The condition of the hard drive and what the tech did to it would determine if you can get your music back. I have played with a lot of hard drives over the years and some I could get things off of and others I could not. Each one is an adventure. I even watched a guy take apart a hard drive, remove the platters, put them into another drive and get the data off. He did not use a clean room and had two drives that were the exact same model. It was just something he want to try to see if he could do it.

Also like Homeball mentioned external drives are fairly cheap and a good way to backup all your important music and files.

[Ooper]

If you have your music on your Ipod, you have not lost it. I transfer music and audio books back and forth all the time with my Ipod. Audio books take up a lot of space so I usually only put 1 at a time on my Ipod. Once I have finished it, I move it back to my computer and put a different one on my Ipod. It works with any type of files, music, videos, etc.

[tony]

Ooper,

What kind of computer do you have? What software do you use?

[tpop1]

As Ooper said any of the files that you had out on the IPod should be there, if the IPod was not damaged.

When I plug my IPod into the USB port of my PC it shows up as an external storage device, just as if I plugged in a thumb drive.

It must need ITunes on the PC because, on my new laptop with Vista , the IPod shows up, but the files do not list. I have not yet loaded Itunes on this laptop but the files do show up on my XP desktop just fine.

Good luck in recreating you music.

Len

[Hawkwind]

Originally Posted by tpop1

When I plug my IPod into the USB port of my PC it shows up as an external storage device, just as if I plugged in a thumb drive.

It must need ITunes on the PC because, on my new laptop with Vista , the IPod shows up, but the files do not list. I have not yet loaded Itunes on this laptop but the files do show up on my XP desktop just fine.

Len

I have been researching this problem for some time now with no results. I have 3 external USB cases that I have placed old hard drives in to use for backup storage. On my XP box I have no problem as the computer sees the drive as another hard drive. This is not he case on my Vista box. The Vista sees the hard drive but treats it like you mentioned a thumb drive.

From CompUSA (actually Tiger Direct) I purchased a USB to ISA and SATA cable set that allows me to plug any of my drives into the USB port of the computer. This kit comes with its own power supply and has adapters for all types of drives. If I take the drive out of one of the external cases and use the cable kit the Vista now sees the drive as a hard drive with no problem. The cable kit was about $25.00 and there is a CompUSA store in Altamonte Springs.

In researching the problem I found some to say it is caused by incorrect power to the drive but I have proved that to be wrong.

Hopefully Windows 7 will correct this issue.

[Boomer]

Thank you for your help and for letting me know that if my songs were lost, I could get them back. That really did make me feel better while I waited for my laptop's return.

It is now back home and my songs were there. But the iTunes program had to be downloaded again. Now, all is well.
,
And that is really good advice about the external hard drive. We have one, but everything had not been backed up on it. It is now. All my songs are on my iPod and my laptop and an external hard drive.

I learned that if we had needed to transfer from the iPod back to the computer, the files would need to be transferred first and then the iTunes program downloaded afterward. If the program is loaded first, when it syncs, all the songs will get wiped out.

(I really hesitated to write the above paragraph. I hope I am saying it right. Mr. Boomer is off to a meeting so I cannot ask him for sure. But as I understand it, the order has something to to do with the program as the master and the iPod as the slave. I could be saying something really dumb or giving wrong advice or even stating the obvious.)

Hawkwind,

I had to laugh about what you said about the guy who was doing all that stuff. I don't know what you meant by "platters" but I instantly thought of that long ago group who sang "Smoke Gets in You Eyes." And I was not sure about the "clean room" part either, but I think it might be a computer term......

But the part about just doing it because he wanted to see if he could, that I understood....... I have always thought that those who are really good with computers are also intuitive about it. I have known a lot of computer people. And it seems to me that there is something in the really good ones that separates them from the basic tech types. I think the outstanding ones have some kind of intuition where computers are concerned. It's a feel. And for them, it is not just a science, it is also an art. (But all of it confuses me. I do not begin to understand how computers do what they do.)

collie 1228,

What you said about our enslavement -- that sure is the truth. And it all happened so fast. We did not know what hit us. Well, I sure didn't. It seems like only yesterday that I thought I needed to get something called Prodigy.

Boomer

[Hawkwind]

Originally Posted by Boomer

I had to laugh about what you said about the guy who was doing all that stuff. I don't know what you meant by "platters" but I instantly thought of that long ago group who sang "Smoke Gets in You Eyes." And I was not sure about the "clean room" part either, but I think it might be a computer term......

Boomer

Boomer
Look at it platters as if they are a stack of old 45 rpm records on a spindle. They have enough room between each record (platter) for the read / write head (needle) to access the record and access the music (data). Now compress that down into something the size of your iPod and you have a hard drive.

The clean room is a totally dust free room where the hard drives and other electronic things like chips are made or assembled. I am sure you have seen pictures of people working on say NASA satellites in white outfits assembling things, that is a clean room.

As far as playing with computers I go back to the old Altos computer days. That was even before the IBM PC.

[Boomer]

Originally Posted by Mary Edwards

Boomer Hi, My friend just called me to ask who to take his HP laptop to. It won't even boot up sounds like its trying but that's all. Any ideas???????? Thanks Mary

Hi Mary,

I am not in TV yet so I don't know who to recommend there, but I bet somebody here helps you. People here on TOTV are really good about helping.

(You know, sometimes I have days where I feel like I am trying to boot up, but can't seem to get there either. Like right now, for instance, I am trying to boot up myself out of this chair in front of this computer.)

Boomer

[Ooper]

Originally Posted by Boomer

I learned that if we had needed to transfer from the iPod back to the computer, the files would need to be transferred first and then the iTunes program downloaded afterward. If the program is loaded first, when it syncs, all the songs will get wiped out.


Boomer

I have such a large library of songs, audiobooks, and videos, they all do not fit on the Ipod. Therefore, I have my Ipod set up so it does not sync automatically. I just manually choose the files I want on it and copy only those from the PC. When done with them, I just delete them from the Ipod making room for other files I may want to copy. I have not lost the files I just deleted rfrom the Ipod since I only copied them from my PC where they still exist and can copy them again if I want. I use iTunes to do all this.