Reviving the iPod in 2024!

Lately I’ve been on a nostalgia trip.

It’s not an uncommon feeling for me, and it doesn’t mean i’m lost in a world where I believe yesteryear to be better than what we have today.

In fact, I think it can be quite dangerous to live too much in the past. My motto has always been “If you insist on revisiting the past, just don’t spend too long there.”

For good and for bad, it’s probably best to look forwards in life as we can’t change what’s happened.

Sometimes when we’re struggling in this complicated modern world it can give a distorted view of how it was when we were younger. Was it REALLY that much better? Was it really that bad? I usually end up deciding that it was just……different.

That said, some things were undeniably awesome and that brings me onto the theme of this post.

One night a few weeks ago I had a very vivid dream about……wait for it……the iPod! I dreamt back to the day I held my first one, after years of lugging a portable CD player around in my puffa jacket. I think I was slightly late to the party as I got my first one in 2006, a few years after they had been on the market. The next morning I woke up with one question to answer -

Can I get an Ipod to work in 2024?

Now, to me it was a gamechanger. As a lover of music but not a lover of dragging around multiple Tim Westwood compilation CD’s in my jacket every time I went out you can imagine the joy the little gadget gave me. 1000s of hip hop songs on the go in one tiny device. What could be better?

This was the around the time LimeWire was peak “must have.” I spent hours torrenting the latest tunes and syncing them to my iPod. It was a very fulfilling process. It was manual, the files were physical, and the best part was it didn’t cost me a penny (hey, don’t blame me for the legends who invented peer to peer software)! Just type in “Eminem” and boom! All that glorious non-PC goodness ready for me to…..steal.

Despite my computer suffering multiple near death experiences because of the viruses LimeWire often gave it, for the most part it worked well.

One thing I’ve never enjoyed about Spotify and the like is the soulless experience of streaming. Don’t get me wrong, I have Spotify and it’s brilliant, convenient, fairly priced and efficient. But, i’ve always missed the old process of burning a CD to your computer and transferring the files to iPod. It was a bit of an effort, you know? (That said, I don’t want to fill my house up with CD’s from cash convertors!)

Plus most music lovers will say there’s nothing like actually owning the songs in their library as opposed to “borrowing it” from Spotify. That’s why there’s such a big market for Vinyl these days.

So, is there a way to resurrect the old process that gave me lots of joy back in the day?

I was also keen to see if I could get “the feeling” back and enjoy it like I did then. We are all so accustomed to speed now and patience no longer exists with most of us. Can I stop myself from launching it out the window if the poor thing wasn’t quite up to scratch after 18 years of service!

First things first.

Napster, LimeWire, the Pirate Bay are all long gone, buried in the technology graveyard amidst several multi-million pound infringement lawsuits. They will go down in history with legendary status but under a dark cloud. They are largely responsible for how media is consumed today. These programs made lots of poor teenagers extremely happy in their bedrooms, whilst destroying many careers in the music business.

Lets look for an iPod

Next step, straight to eBay to see If iPods still existed. I’ve often thought about them but not searched for them in over 15 years. To my delight I discovered they very much still existed, and amazingly there was a large “Modding” community who revamped and modernised them for present day use!

YouTube has several videos in 2024 of people like me explaining why they still use the iPod over anything else. I wanted the iPod that sparked the nostalgia flame for me personally, the classic - in Black. That’s the one I had as a youngster growing up. Sadly it got stolen and I never did get another one.

Purchased for £50. A few days later in arrived and happily it looked the same as I remembered. When I turned it on I was transported back to 2006. That screen with it’s simple menus and basic colours made me go a bit gooey inside. The sound of the click wheel was absolutely glorious, much like the happiness a new parent feels when hearing the first cries of their new-born.

What do I do with it?

OK, great. In theory I have a working iPod. Now what the sweet Jesus do I do now?

Download iTunes of course.

I haven’t had iTunes for about as long as I haven’t had my virginity. Between 2011-2023 I had android devices until my missus gave me her old iPhone 12 Pro Max. I was very reluctant to change back but I’m glad I did! Many forums online suggested the new iTunes wouldn’t support iPods anymore but I wanted to try it anyway.

Long story short, after a few goes at getting my modern laptop/new iTunes/Old iPod to talk to each other It finally showed me the message “WELCOME TO YOUR NEW IPOD”

Giddy much!

The next problem was I didn’t have Apple Music so I took out a free monthly subscription. At least then I’d be able to see if I could get this to work without it costing me much.

Done!

The last bit was working out HOW to actually get music onto it. With streaming software there isn’t a physical file on your hard drive to send to devices. Shit! And of course I don’t own any CD’s any more…….

After a bit of research I found a program called “TuneFab” which takes the music off your iTunes and converts it to MP3. You can then drag those into iTunes and send to the iPod. Winner!

Within about 2 hours I held a working iPod and was walking around the kitchen rapping along to LL Cool J like I did in ‘06!

The Conclusion

Was it worth the faff? 100 percent YES!

To hold an old piece of technology and see it still doing it’s job after nearly two decades is extremely satisfying. Age withers us all but this little device is as bright and capable as it was way back when.

I smiled when it did it’s first sync up with my laptop. I could hear the onboard mechanics of the mini hard drive clicking away as it took delivery of “Backstreets Back” in 2024.

Tapping through the tracks and seeing the track name and album cover is special, and reminds me of how awesomely simple but effective this invention really was.

What’s next?

I’m going to create a full music library in iTunes and fill the Pod with it. When I go running I’ll take it. No phone calls, no messages, no emails. NO INTERRUPTIONS. Just pure music to run too.

Also decided to delve into the world of modding. Now I know they work in todays world I’m upgrading the battery, buying a new out case and click wheel, replacing the chrome back as its quite scratched with a new colourful one. I’m also looking at changing the hard drive to flash drive storage, effectively making storage massively larger than the original 30gb.

All these parts exist because people have worked hard on keeping the dream alive.

And I thank them.

(I will post an update once I’ve upgraded)

Carl