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iPod Mini + USB 1?


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iPod Mini + USB 1?
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thuh Freak
Finally broke the seal
 
Join Date: May 2004
 
2004-09-27, 23:29

the little sister decided, against my advice, to buy the mother an iPod Mini for her birthday. the mum was overly excited (so much that she forgot to even try to use the little bugger for about a week). anyway, i asplain to all interested parties that (a) my computer runs gnu/linux and is therefore (as far as they're concerned) blind to the 'Pod, and (b) i'd be moving outie sooner than soon. the older sister has an original (ie: bondie blue, 233 MHz) iMac. this of course, has only usb 1. this pos hasn't been used in a king's age. for a lark, i plugged it in, and put it on the internet. fucker didn't have software updates from '02. takes forever to do anything. but i digress...

so i bring the imac up to date, and give the 'pod a whirl. to my delight, it shows up on the desktop. BUT, of course things couldn't be that easy, it doesn't show up in iTunes. to make things peculiar though, it does startup itunes when its plugged in. so it knows that something is happening.

the imac has osx 10.1.5. it now has all updates available from software update. my curiousity: is it possible to use an ipod (peticularly an ipod mini) with the usb2 wire on a mac with only usb1. note: the fam is quite opposed to putting any money toward the computer. its a pos, and i aint about to spend twice its worth on any upgrades, nor would i encourage them to. i did a bit of googling, and noticed that someone out there in the world has claimed to have a usb1 machine and a usb2-ipod setup working. it was lax on details though.
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Luca
ಠ_ರೃ
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Minnesota
 
2004-09-27, 23:41

It should work. iPods now work with either USB or Firewire when connected to a Mac, and USB 1 uses the same physical connector as USB 2. It'll work, just more slowly. To avoid putting too much strain on the little hard disk, I'd suggest only updating a few songs at a time, so you're not spinning it for hours at once.

It'll only be able to transfer about 350 MB per hour. That's how slow USB 1 is. Just set the preference in iTunes to not auto-sync, then you can move all the music over slowly and it won't try to constantly update the iPod whenever you connect it.
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usurp
High Monarch of MacDebate
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Kuwait
 
2004-09-28, 01:46

i thought the mini was only USB 2.0 so when my sister got hers working on her pc using a USB 1 port i was suprised
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thuh Freak
Finally broke the seal
 
Join Date: May 2004
 
2004-09-28, 09:08

Quote:
Originally Posted by Luca
It should work...
yes, yes i agree it should work. but i don't know what step i'm forgetting. i thought the steps were, "1. turn on computer 2. plug in ipod 3. touch self inappropriately 4. enjoy iTunes<->iPod connectivity." i'm having trouble after step 3. ipod doesn't show up in iTunes, thus the enjoyment factor reduced. i don't have osx 10.a.b where (a>1 || b>5), but for a curve ball, we discovered (and this may defy your knowledge of sense and reasonability) that this sweet little bundle of joy of an imac breaks the cd-rom drive, from the firmware level, when osx>=10.0.0 is put on. remove osx, put os9, cd-rom works. osx, no cdrom. i mean like, i drop into openfirmware, dey aint nothing to show for a cd-rom at that level. so installing a new os is a challenge, to say the least.
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Luca
ಠ_ರೃ
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Minnesota
 
2004-09-28, 09:32

I think I remember reading a knowledge base article about it - that USB connectivity with Macs, even with just USB 1, WILL work. But then I'm not in your situation so obviously I can't say for sure it will work. If everything else is working right, THEN it will work. I'm thinking of, say, a DVI to VGA monitor adapter. You don't have to download a driver for one of those to work, as long as the DVI port itself is functioning properly. Same with USB. As long as USB is supported, it doesn't matter what version it is, it'll transfer data as fast as it can.

Anyway, I've had the dreaded Bondi iMac CD Failure as well. It's happened to two of the three Bondi iMacs I've used. And it's especially annoying because there's no Firewire (no way to install using Firewire target disk mode) and you can't boot from a USB CD-ROM drive. The only way, I think, would be to do a network install, or maybe a Carbon Copy Clone over a network (will that work?). Now, one thing I have heard is that OS X actually fixes the CD problem (I've only had it in OS 9), but I guess that's not necessarily true. Maybe you need 10.2 or something.

So wait... your family doesn't have a PC to connect it to either? You said you have one running Linux, but your mom or sister doesn't have one? Because even if you do get the CD drive working in the iMac, it's going to take a huge amount of time to rip all your mom's CDs to MP3 format. Think 2x importing.
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thuh Freak
Finally broke the seal
 
Join Date: May 2004
 
2004-09-28, 12:59

Quote:
Originally Posted by Luca
I think I remember reading a knowledge base article about it - that USB connectivity with Macs, even with just USB 1, WILL work. But then I'm not in your situation so obviously I can't say for sure it will work. If everything else is working right, THEN it will work. I'm thinking of, say, a DVI to VGA monitor adapter. You don't have to download a driver for one of those to work, as long as the DVI port itself is functioning properly. Same with USB. As long as USB is supported, it doesn't matter what version it is, it'll transfer data as fast as it can.

Anyway, I've had the dreaded Bondi iMac CD Failure as well. It's happened to two of the three Bondi iMacs I've used. And it's especially annoying because there's no Firewire (no way to install using Firewire target disk mode) and you can't boot from a USB CD-ROM drive. The only way, I think, would be to do a network install, or maybe a Carbon Copy Clone over a network (will that work?). Now, one thing I have heard is that OS X actually fixes the CD problem (I've only had it in OS 9), but I guess that's not necessarily true. Maybe you need 10.2 or something.

So wait... your family doesn't have a PC to connect it to either? You said you have one running Linux, but your mom or sister doesn't have one? Because even if you do get the CD drive working in the iMac, it's going to take a huge amount of time to rip all your mom's CDs to MP3 format. Think 2x importing.
i have about 4 computers: the iMac, a b&w g3 (my linux box), a dell lt from work, and a tablet from work. as of this friday only one, the iMac, will be left behind. so i figured its best if the mother would just learn to work on one of those, and not go through windows, then drop it in a few days. the two work computers aren't exactly top of the line either, both, iirc, have usb1 or 1.1 and no firewire.

i don't think she minds the cd->mp3 acquisition faise. she buys all of maybe 1 cd/yr, so after the initial hump it'll be a nonissue. i'm gonna go googling for that kbase article.
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ThunderPoit
Making sawdust
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Minnesota
 
2004-09-28, 15:23

not quite sure where i read it, but im almost positive that while the ipod will be readable through the finder on USB 1, as far as iTunes is concerned, on a mac, its firewire or bust. sorry for the bad news
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adam_tj
Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: OUTSIDE of Redmond
 
2004-10-11, 20:32

An iPod mini WILL work on USB 1, but you have to have iTunes 4.6. I don't think that is availible on OS 10.1. I have tried this on a 333mhz Imac, and the mini works as long as you don't plug it in to the keyboard.
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FFL
Fishhead Family Reunited
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Slightly Off Center
 
2004-10-11, 20:42

I'd pull the iMac HD and put it into the PowerMac just long enough to Install/Archive with 10.2 or 10.3.
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