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Fzarpo

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 13, 2018
7
1
I still use my almost two-dimensional little iPod nano 5g and will continue to do so until one of us croaks.

With iTunes going away I believe Finder will take over syncing, and I'm hopeful that this applies to clickwheel iPods as well.

I did come across this blogpost so am optimistic, but would still like to request definitive confirmation.
 
Last edited:

ruslan120

macrumors 65816
Jul 12, 2009
1,417
1,139
*Sigh* *

Confirmed.

* Had to look for my old Classic and 30 pin cable to check. :p
 

iRock1

macrumors 65816
Apr 23, 2011
1,081
144
I just wonder if there still are problems related to gapless playback on classic iPods.

Also, what’s with Doug Scripts’ functionality? Is that totally broken now?
 

retta283

Suspended
Jun 8, 2018
3,180
3,479
I just wonder if there still are problems related to gapless playback on classic iPods.

Also, what’s with Doug Scripts’ functionality? Is that totally broken now?
There's a chance that I will be installing it tonight, so I may be able to aid in testing.

Do you know which iPod was the first with gapless? I only have a 3rd, 4th, and 6th gen Classic, along with a lot of early Nanos and shuffles.
 

Slix

macrumors 65816
Mar 24, 2010
1,432
1,966
There's a chance that I will be installing it tonight, so I may be able to aid in testing.

Do you know which iPod was the first with gapless? I only have a 3rd, 4th, and 6th gen Classic, along with a lot of early Nanos and shuffles.
Had to look it up to be sure (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gapless_playback#Hardware) but the 5th gen Classic was the first to support Gapless Playback. I know it doesn't work on my 4th gen as well. :)
 

dauber

macrumors regular
Jan 10, 2012
155
20
Chicago
My 7th-generation iPod Classic seems to work...fine...with Catalina, but there are issues. I don't like the new methods. My issues:
  1. You will likely have to reformat your iPod for Catalina to work properly with it.
  2. When my podcasts transferred to the iPod, none of them had artwork.
  3. I now have to use two apps to add music and podcasts to my iPod -- it was much easier when I could use just iTunes. Never understood the vitriol for iTunes.
  4. I don't know if this is necessary Catalina-related, but...this same thing was not an issue under Mojave. I just got the 50th anniversary editions of Abbey Road (the full "super deluxe" edition) and Chicago Transit Authority. I ripped both with XLD, latest version, in Apple Lossless. The Abbey Road stuff transfers with no problem, but I had problems with Chicago Transit Authority. First, every song except "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?" would transfer to the iPod -- and without the artwork. I reformatted the iPod, and then suddenly NONE of the CTA tracks would transfer. (Again, all of the super-deluxe edition of Abbey Road, ripped the exact same way with the exact same software in the exact same session, went over with no trouble.) I used iTunes Apple Music to convert the CTA tracks to MP3 (256kbps), and those also wouldn't transfer over. They play fine on the computer, but they will NOT be copied to the computer. They won't drag-and-drop, and if you try the "Add to device" option, the iPod doesn't show up when any of the tracks are selected. Every single track copied over fine under Mojave though.
  5. There is no support for modifying playlists on the device itself.
  6. No "Column Browser," either in the app or on the device.
  7. You can't delete stuff by hitting the Delete key or cmd/Delete combination.
  8. Apple Music has a nice feature that, if you hit shift/cmd/F, you get a filter prompt. Type what you want, and whatever songs has what you type will show up. Very handy. Except you can't do that on the device!
  9. I cannot eject my iPod. Ever. It always tells me that there's another app using it. If I want to safely eject my iPod, I actually have to shut down my Mac.
  10. No progress indicator when adding stuff to the iPod. It just says "Syncing..." (And it makes me cringe seeing that spelling! Listen, Apple...it's "Synching...", not "Syncing..." "Syncing" is pronounced like the prison in Ossining, NY!) So you have zero idea how far your transfer is unless you actually open up the iPod in the Finder and drill down into the file system and watch the cryptically named files and folders generate.
 
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iRock1

macrumors 65816
Apr 23, 2011
1,081
144
My 7th-generation iPod Classic seems to work...fine...with Catalina, but there are issues. I don't like the new methods. My issues:
  1. You will likely have to reformat your iPod for Catalina to work properly with it.
  2. When my podcasts transferred to the iPod, none of them had artwork.
  3. I now have to use two apps to add music and podcasts to my iPod -- it was much easier when I could use just iTunes. Never understood the vitriol for iTunes.
  4. I don't know if this is necessary Catalina-related, but...this same thing was not an issue under Mojave. I just got the 50th anniversary editions of Abbey Road (the full "super deluxe" edition) and Chicago Transit Authority. I ripped both with XLD, latest version, in Apple Lossless. The Abbey Road stuff transfers with no problem, but I had problems with Chicago Transit Authority. First, every song except "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?" would transfer to the iPod -- and without the artwork. I reformatted the iPod, and then suddenly NONE of the CTA tracks would transfer. (Again, all of the super-deluxe edition of Abbey Road, ripped the exact same way with the exact same software in the exact same session, went over with no trouble.) I used iTunes Apple Music to convert the CTA tracks to MP3 (256kbps), and those also wouldn't transfer over. They play fine on the computer, but they will NOT be copied to the computer. They won't drag-and-drop, and if you try the "Add to device" option, the iPod doesn't show up when any of the tracks are selected. Every single track copied over fine under Mojave though.
  5. There is no support for modifying playlists on the device itself.
  6. No "Column Browser," either in the app or on the device.
  7. You can't delete stuff by hitting the Delete key or cmd/Delete combination.
  8. Apple Music has a nice feature that, if you hit shift/cmd/F, you get a filter prompt. Type what you want, and whatever songs has what you type will show up. Very handy. Except you can't do that on the device!
  9. I cannot eject my iPod. Ever. It always tells me that there's another app using it. If I want to safely eject my iPod, I actually have to shut down my Mac.
  10. No progress indicator when adding stuff to the iPod. It just says "Syncing..." (And it makes me cringe seeing that spelling! Listen, Apple...it's "Synching...", not "Syncing..." "Syncing" is pronounced like the prison in Ossining, NY!) So you have zero idea how far your transfer is unless you actually open up the iPod in the Finder and drill down into the file system and watch the cryptically named files and folders generate.

Yikes. It looks like the relationship between classic iPods and Catalina is far from being perfect.
 

dauber

macrumors regular
Jan 10, 2012
155
20
Chicago
Oh...and I'm confirming that the Chicago Transit Authority issue I was having is Catalina-related. I just reverted to Mojave and tried transferring it...iTunes gladly tossed it onto my iPod.
 

ScreenSavers

macrumors 68020
Feb 26, 2016
2,115
1,688
Bloomingdale, GA
Sort of unrelated but sort of related as well… I tried to restore an iPad mini with Catalina today and it absolutely wouldn’t work. Ended up having to dig out my surface three with Windows 8! Thanks Apple.

Catalina is great in theory – but Finder syncing is currently a disaster.
 

Fzarpo

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 13, 2018
7
1
Yikes, Catalina is really shaping up to be a mess. I might sit this one out completely.
Hear, hear!

Mojave introducing Dark Mode was a major draw. Don't really see anything momentous enough here.
 

Fzarpo

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 13, 2018
7
1
Yeah, it seems more notable for removal of features than the addition of new ones.
 

dauber

macrumors regular
Jan 10, 2012
155
20
Chicago
I'm not planning to update to Catalina, mainly because I'm cheap and I would have to buy updated versions of some of my most important work-related software (32 bit).

That's another thing for me...I use Jing and Levelator regularly. But...they're 32-bit apps. Jing theoretically could be updated, but the Levelator dev retired the project.

Geez...when the next-gen Amigas came out in 2003, they would run *any* Amiga apps, no matter how old, whether for 680x0 processors or PowerPC processors. The super-old 680x0 apps would run via JIT emulation. Why on earth couldn't Apple do something like this? If the obscure Amiga can do it, then certainly a Mac could do this.
 

WilliamDu

macrumors 6502
May 22, 2012
267
98
My 7th-generation iPod Classic seems to work...fine...with Catalina, but there are issues. I don't like the new methods. My issues:
  1. You will likely have to reformat your iPod for Catalina to work properly with it.
  2. When my podcasts transferred to the iPod, none of them had artwork.
  3. I now have to use two apps to add music and podcasts to my iPod -- it was much easier when I could use just iTunes. Never understood the vitriol for iTunes.
  4. I don't know if this is necessary Catalina-related, but...this same thing was not an issue under Mojave. I just got the 50th anniversary editions of Abbey Road (the full "super deluxe" edition) and Chicago Transit Authority. I ripped both with XLD, latest version, in Apple Lossless. The Abbey Road stuff transfers with no problem, but I had problems with Chicago Transit Authority. First, every song except "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?" would transfer to the iPod -- and without the artwork. I reformatted the iPod, and then suddenly NONE of the CTA tracks would transfer. (Again, all of the super-deluxe edition of Abbey Road, ripped the exact same way with the exact same software in the exact same session, went over with no trouble.) I used iTunes Apple Music to convert the CTA tracks to MP3 (256kbps), and those also wouldn't transfer over. They play fine on the computer, but they will NOT be copied to the computer. They won't drag-and-drop, and if you try the "Add to device" option, the iPod doesn't show up when any of the tracks are selected. Every single track copied over fine under Mojave though.
  5. There is no support for modifying playlists on the device itself.
  6. No "Column Browser," either in the app or on the device.
  7. You can't delete stuff by hitting the Delete key or cmd/Delete combination.
  8. Apple Music has a nice feature that, if you hit shift/cmd/F, you get a filter prompt. Type what you want, and whatever songs has what you type will show up. Very handy. Except you can't do that on the device!
  9. I cannot eject my iPod. Ever. It always tells me that there's another app using it. If I want to safely eject my iPod, I actually have to shut down my Mac.
  10. No progress indicator when adding stuff to the iPod. It just says "Syncing..." (And it makes me cringe seeing that spelling! Listen, Apple...it's "Synching...", not "Syncing..." "Syncing" is pronounced like the prison in Ossining, NY!) So you have zero idea how far your transfer is unless you actually open up the iPod in the Finder and drill down into the file system and watch the cryptically named files and folders generate.
During the 30 years I spent in IT work, this was known as regression.
I have seen more than enough in these forums to ignore Catalina.
It's an insult to the term "upgrade".
 
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