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Ipod Collector

macrumors member
Feb 12, 2015
48
3
oh, yes, my bad, saw that one early this morning...

I have another thread for my 7.5G iPod Classic with all my mods.

Ahhh, ok, just now realized that you started both of these
threads, my bad. lol, learn something new every day.

on to the next...

I just got my Samsung EVO 1TB ssd delivered today
so time to have some fun with that. I tried it on my
5.5g board already just for the fun of it...
 

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noodles5666

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 27, 2010
247
86
Ahhh, ok, just now realized that you started both of these
threads, my bad. lol, learn something new every day.

on to the next...

I just got my Samsung EVO 1TB ssd delivered today
so time to have some fun with that. I tried it on my
5.5g board already just for the fun of it...

Will move to a 1TB when it becomes stable.
 

tmn103

macrumors newbie
Feb 20, 2015
4
0
How have you secured the sd card adapter within the shell? I've just done this upgrade, and have an annoying rattle!

Also, has anyone successfully installed a bluetooth adapter inside the mini?
 

noodles5666

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 27, 2010
247
86
How have you secured the sd card adapter within the shell? I've just done this upgrade, and have an annoying rattle!

Also, has anyone successfully installed a bluetooth adapter inside the mini?

You need to transfer the blue rubber from the Microdrive to the SD adapter.
 

rgarjr

macrumors 604
Apr 2, 2009
6,820
1,050
Southern California
How have you secured the sd card adapter within the shell? I've just done this upgrade, and have an annoying rattle!

Also, has anyone successfully installed a bluetooth adapter inside the mini?

Yeah there's 3 blue bumper pieces that need to be put on to make it tight. It's pretty tight inside the mini to put a bluetooth board, don't know if that's possible.
 

rgarjr

macrumors 604
Apr 2, 2009
6,820
1,050
Southern California
I placed Tarkans CF-to-SD adapter on mine today with a 32GB SD card (until I buy the 256GB), I'm using an OWC battery and its a bit bigger so it keeps everything tight inside without the bumpers.
 

noodles5666

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 27, 2010
247
86
I placed Tarkans CF-to-SD adapter on mine today with a 32GB SD card (until I buy the 256GB), I'm using an OWC battery and its a bit bigger so it keeps everything tight inside without the bumpers.

Link to the OWC battery?
 

antdavisonNZ

macrumors newbie
Aug 26, 2015
3
5
Auckland, NZ
Well finally finished my Mini upgrade.

nice working on finding the practical file count limits, you are very brave 8)

attached are some of my ipod mini mods
original apple anodising stripped - reanodised or chrome plated - black clickwheel plastics - dished or flat button - black end caps - coloured backlights (camera is turning green backlight cyan)

iPodMiniMods1.png
 
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antdavisonNZ

macrumors newbie
Aug 26, 2015
3
5
Auckland, NZ
sorry to hijack this thread - some people have asked me about the clickwheel mod .. here's the how-to

1) remove the 4 rear clickwheel screws, and disassemble as much as you can without pulling apart any glued components ... put both black and white glued-together clickwheel assemblies in a small container of methylated spirits for 1/2 an hour ... isopropyl alcohol would also probably work ... this will loosen the glue used to attach the plastics to the circuit board which tracks the finger movements

2) the black plastic outer has some protruding tabs on its underside which i removed with a sharp blade, they were used to align the plastic with the finger-track circuit board

3) from memory, i think i used a hand held spherical-looking grindstone to remove some material around the inside hole of the underside of the black plastic clickwheel .... do by hand, not with a machine, and slowly; i think i recall also using a flat blade around the inner bottom of the black clickwheel which stops the button rotating, as that portion interfered with the mini's finger-track circuit board

4) the inner clickwheel button also needs trimming with a small file, removing the 4 anti-rotation tabs on its circumference, and i think i sanded both it's bottom surface and circurmference; 5th gen are flat plastic, 6th gen are dished aluminium

5) removing the tabs as in #4 will cause the inner button to be able to rotate, so get the white button, sand the domed top surface off until it is quite thin, and glue that to the underside of the 'black' button, the tabs on the underside of the old white button will then locate into the mini assembly

6) everything needs to be fitted so the centre push button works correctly, but without any slop; so take your time, it is easy to remove too much plastic, too quickly ... put some tape over the clickwheel when re-inserting into the case, to stop it being scratched if the black click wheel is affixed to the finger-track circuit board, or better still, cut up a square of thin flat plastic sheet (like you find on a plastic blister pack), a bit bigger than the click wheel a put it above the clickwheel plastic, and slide it out after inserting the assembly into the case

7) you can get some special ipod clickwheel 3M adhesive pads from ebay to affix the black plastic to the finger wheel circuit board which is what i did, but double sided tape or easily dissolvable glue would work as well ... don't use water based glue ... take your time getting the alignment correct; the 3M pads only give you one chance

8) painting the white plastic end caps requires vinyl paint, like you get in an auto-parts store for car upholstery ** ... i used a mini-airbrush to apply it, but spraying straight from the aerosol can would probably work too ... don't worry if it looks like you applied too much paint ... just let it dry ... vinyl paint is very forgiving in its application, and is great for other plastic types as well, and is the only thing that will stick to PVC plastic, and remain scratch resistant .. the high level of strong solvent in the vinyl paint melts the surface of the plastic, etching it, for a good bond ... enamel paint will not stick well and can create a thick layer which can interfere with the tight tolerances apple uses... clean the white end caps with methylated spirits or isopropoyl alcohol before painting

**
vhtpaint.com/specialty/vht-vinyl-dye
duplicolor.com/product/vinyl-and-fabric-coating

plastikote.com/products/Specialty/Vinyl-Paint.html

I went thru the drama of painting pvc, and auto/car upholstery paint was the best and most scratch resistant I found ... the black is mainly carbon black and MEK (methyl ethyl ketone) and butane propellant... MEK is a very strong and nasty solvent, and also the most active ingredient of pvc pipe primer ... it will "melt" the top layer of pvc allowing the pigment to bond. It is also great for acyrlic (perspex) and ABS plastics, and doesn't really effect dimensional tolerances

9) to remove the endcaps without damage, i drop one or two blobs of hot melt glue onto them (without the hot melt gun metal tip touching and hence melting the end cap), and press a cable tie into the hot glue, when the glue is cold and hard, pull on the cable tie to remove the endcap, then remove the glue by twisting the cable tie, and any remaining glue with your fingernail

10) black clickwheel and silver button looks good on a silver case, you can get brand new, cases on ebay .. they dont have the apple branding, disksize logo or other text, as those are probably laser-ed on after anodizing, and the text can come in different languages, it will make you mini look like a macbook .... re-anodizing is quite an involved process, you need sulphuric/sulfuric (car battery) acid, a controllable powersupply, and optionally, some water soluble pigment dye ; strip old anodizing with phosphoric acid which you can find as clear-as-water 'rust remover' at a hardware store -- it can take a day or two if the concentration you are using is like 33% ... chroming requires the stripped and polished case to be 'zincated' for the underlying copper plating to adhere to the aluminium

11) there are spare clickwheel assemblies on ebay

12) the backlight mod will only work on one of the two types of display the gen2-MINI used, the moddable ones are marked "made in thailand" ... i haven't tried modding a gen1 display


other related threads
http://forums.ilounge.com/ipod-classic-legacy-ipods/281039-mini-projects.html
http://www.head-fi.org/t/566780/official-ipod-video-classic-5g-5-5g-6g-6-5g-7g-ssd-mod-thread/6390
 
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JazzBrewer

macrumors newbie
Dec 18, 2015
3
10
Sorry to resurrect, and in my first post no less, but I'm having issues with a 256GB card in my mini. This past summer I upgraded my mini to a PNY 128GB 90MB/s card that, while slow to startup, has been working beautifully. Now I'm trying to upgrade to a PNY 256GB 95MB/s card, and I can't seem to get a restore to work.

If I format the card (via Disk Utility on my MacBook Pro, any format: FAT32, exFAT, Mac OS Extended,) put it in the iPod, and plug into the computer, iTunes asks if I want to restore the iPod, then after clicking restore I get a "iTunes could not restore the iPod. Error #..." Then I get the "Plug in iPod" image, so I do and it seems to restore from the wall charger. After that I still can't restore from the computer, but it lets me sync. Once the sync has finished (about 117GB transferred) and I disconnect the iPod, nothing shows up. iTunes shows that the disk is about half full meaning that the data is there, but nothing's showing up in the iPod menus.

What am I missing? I'm assuming the card used in this post was one of the older 90MB/s cards but mine is the newer model; does that have something to do with it? Am I skipping a crucial step?

Thanks in advance!
 

rgarjr

macrumors 604
Apr 2, 2009
6,820
1,050
Southern California
Sorry to resurrect, and in my first post no less, but I'm having issues with a 256GB card in my mini. This past summer I upgraded my mini to a PNY 128GB 90MB/s card that, while slow to startup, has been working beautifully. Now I'm trying to upgrade to a PNY 256GB 95MB/s card, and I can't seem to get a restore to work.

If I format the card (via Disk Utility on my MacBook Pro, any format: FAT32, exFAT, Mac OS Extended,) put it in the iPod, and plug into the computer, iTunes asks if I want to restore the iPod, then after clicking restore I get a "iTunes could not restore the iPod. Error #..." Then I get the "Plug in iPod" image, so I do and it seems to restore from the wall charger. After that I still can't restore from the computer, but it lets me sync. Once the sync has finished (about 117GB transferred) and I disconnect the iPod, nothing shows up. iTunes shows that the disk is about half full meaning that the data is there, but nothing's showing up in the iPod menus.

What am I missing? I'm assuming the card used in this post was one of the older 90MB/s cards but mine is the newer model; does that have something to do with it? Am I skipping a crucial step?

Thanks in advance!

Let me guess, you're not using Tarkans CF-to-SD adapters are you? Generic adapters don't work with large 256GB cards.
 

JazzBrewer

macrumors newbie
Dec 18, 2015
3
10
Let me guess, you're not using Tarkans CF-to-SD adapters are you? Generic adapters don't work with large 256GB cards.
<hangs head in shame> No. Tarkan's PayPal links weren't working for me when I was looking to make the initial mod, so I found one that people seemed to be having success with on Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/Digigear-Extreme-Ultimate-Compact-Adapter/dp/B00EPMWT1M/). It's been working smoothly for me since this summer, just not with the 256GB card.
 

teamphil

macrumors newbie
Nov 2, 2010
2
2
I tried this about a year ago with a 256gb sdxc card and my ipod mini kept crashing after 170gb (22,000 songs) of music was on it. Tarkan said the firmware couldn't handle it. I have a 128gb mini that works great, but I would really like a 256gb one. Any suggestions on why mine didn't work?
 

noodles5666

macrumors regular
Original poster
Aug 27, 2010
247
86
I tried this about a year ago with a 256gb sdxc card and my ipod mini kept crashing after 170gb (22,000 songs) of music was on it. Tarkan said the firmware couldn't handle it. I have a 128gb mini that works great, but I would really like a 256gb one. Any suggestions on why mine didn't work?

22,000 was about the limit the mini could handle. 256GB mini is better suited if you are using Lossless files.
 

zebity

macrumors member
Aug 1, 2008
68
17
Australia
Retro iPod Mini Users,

22,000 was about the limit the mini could handle. 256GB mini is better suited if you are using Lossless files.

I have a few iPod Classics (1 x Enhanced 5.5 & 2 x 160GB Gen 7) and had upgraded then to use Tarken Dual SD card adaptors and 256GB & 512GB SanDisk Extreme Pro SDs.

I found super cheap 512GB SD on eBay, which I could not resist, so they are all now upgraded to 512GB SDs.

So I ordered a Tarken Compact Flash SD adaptor and put 256GB SanDisk Extreme Pro SD from iPod Classic into a iPod Mini Gen 2 6GB that my sister happened to have lying about (as per this thread).

Removed 6GB MicroDrive and installed SD and restored to Macintosh format using iTunes.

Now running with no problems, with over 24,000 Songs...

See attached picture...

ipodmini256gb-01.png


So it is possible to more than 24,000 songs on 256GB mini.

Cheers from Australia.

Zebity
 

deany

macrumors 68030
Sep 16, 2012
2,873
2,086
North Wales
Retro iPod Mini Users,



I have a few iPod Classics (1 x Enhanced 5.5 & 2 x 160GB Gen 7) and had upgraded then to use Tarken Dual SD card adaptors and 256GB & 512GB SanDisk Extreme Pro SDs.

I found super cheap 512GB SD on eBay, which I could not resist, so they are all now upgraded to 512GB SDs.

So I ordered a Tarken Compact Flash SD adaptor and put 256GB SanDisk Extreme Pro SD from iPod Classic into a iPod Mini Gen 2 6GB that my sister happened to have lying about (as per this thread).

Removed 6GB MicroDrive and installed SD and restored to Macintosh format using iTunes.

Now running with no problems, with over 24,000 Songs...

See attached picture...

ipodmini256gb-01.png


So it is possible to more than 24,000 songs on 256GB mini.

Cheers from Australia.

Zebity

very nice, really made up for you.

I've just ordered a 256GB the other day and all the bit & pieces needed for my 1st gen bought from new 11 year old blue iPod mini.
I'm not the handiest person, really hoping all goes well with the upgrade.

Can I ask did you just connect to iTunes and the firmware installed or was the drive formatted on your mac first, prior to iTunes. Also encode are your music files to get over the 24K?
Cheers
 
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Jack Neill

macrumors 68020
Sep 13, 2015
2,266
2,291
San Antonio Texas
I tried to put a new SSD in my 2nd get mini and now it won't power on from the cable, but if I put to on a dock it does the folder picture.

EDIT well now my Macbook recognizes it but i get error 1432 when I try to restore it. the click wheel on this thing appears to be dead too. bummer.
 
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deany

macrumors 68030
Sep 16, 2012
2,873
2,086
North Wales
I tried to put a new SSD in my 2nd get mini and now it won't power on from the cable, but if I put to on a dock it does the folder picture.

EDIT well now my Macbook recognizes it but i get error 1432 when I try to restore it. the click wheel on this thing appears to be dead too. bummer.

Hi
Was the mini / clickwheel etc all working fine before replacing the hard drive?
I think the SSD has to be a particular type & with 256GB+ a special adapter ie https://www.iflash.xyz/store/sdcf-adapter/ also I know this sound silly but the SSD has to be the right way round I've read.
Cheers
 
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