Back Up an iPod on Two Different Computers

Have multiple computers and want to back up your iPod on some of them? This simple guide will show you how, completely free. It also works great for copying your friends' music off their iPod too.

Steps

  1. Have the "View Hidden Files and Folders" option enabled. To view them go to my documents and then tools>folder options>view. Then click the "Show hidden files and folders" under the "Hidden files and folders" section. (You will not have to scroll down the list to see it)
  2. Plug the iPod into the computer that you wish to back it up on.
  3. Open up a Windows Explorer Window, from the accessories folder of the programs listing.
  4. Navigate to the "My Computer" icon.
  5. Expand the folder, and find the drive that has the name of your iPod.
  6. Expand your iPod's folder, and find the folder: "iPod Control".
  7. Expand "iPod Control" and find the folder "Music".
  8. Look for a series of folders with strange names.
  9. Select all of the files. Do this by going to: Edit>Select All>. Alternatively, you may hold the Control key and click all of the folders.
  10. Copy all of the folders, by going to Edit>Copy or by right clicking one of the selected folders and clicking copy. This will copy all of the folders.
  11. Paste the music in the desired folder by using Edit>Paste.
  12. Open each folder, and copy the MP3 files into the desired folder, or you can leave them where they are. The music will have non understandable names, like "EDCI" and "DLXE", 4 letter names are normal.
  13. Open the music up in the music player of your choice if you wish. Do this when all of the music has been extracted from the original iPod folders.

Tips

  • This can be used to copy friend's music.
  • The copying of the music takes some time.
  • This works on both PCs and Macs, but these instructions are for PCs. Mac computers work similarly to this.
  • Get a good MP3-Tagger-Program e.g. mp3tag (freeware) and automatically rename the files if you want to use them on your PC
  • Most music player programs can decode the names into the original names, and artists.

Warnings

  • Do NOT mess around with any other file(s) on the iPod
  • Do not remove any songs from the list.
  • Do not try to manually rename each song.

Things You'll Need

  • A click wheel iPod such as an iPod Classic, iPod Nano etc. If you have an iPod Touch or an iPhone, you will need third party software such as TouchDrive to put your device into disk use mode or TouchCopy to copy your music straight into iTunes.
  • A computer.
  • A USB connector for your iPod

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