iPod touch problems - DPChallenge Forums

Nikon AF Zoom-Nikkor 24-85mm f2.8-4.0D

12/29/2007 12:38:13 PM · #1

I bought an iPod touch (16GB), and I am very upset with it.
I love the actual gadget, music sounds great and photos look wonderful, but it has a bunch of things I hate about it.
Hopefully somebody can tell me Iâ��m doing it all wrong, and show me how to fix it. If not, it may at least be a warning to others.

Here are my problems:

1. The "optimizing" and/or the synchronizing process creates HUGE files!
It exploded my 26MB of resized test photos into 300 MB!!!
Major rip-off, since that means the ipod actually has less than 10% of its supposed (and already small) capacity.
2. It added the huge 300MB folder to my computer, too! If I could fill the 16GB, I would end up with nearly 20 extra GBs on my computer for nothing!
3. Seems to do the same with music files, as well.

Aside from the file size/capacity issue:

4. There are no games available for offline playing, only online stuff.
5. Canâ��t delete photos or songs off the iPod without the computer and the synch process.
6. It can only synchronize photos ONE layer deep, i.e. everything has to be put into ONE special folder just for the iPod. It is impossible to ADD from other locations, as it only replaces photos instead of adding albums!
7. Canâ��t synchronize calendar without Outlook.
8. iTunes is a disaster, my music is all in one big pile now, gone are my organized folders :-(

P.S. $400 (plus tax) and not even a soft case or a dock â�� very sad.

Nikolai1024

Nikon D300

12/29/2007 01:09:28 PM · #2

4. As far as I know you need to crack it to get good games
8. Your MP3s need to have tags embeded. iTunes uses those and disregards folder structure.

pjangel

Sony SAL-50F14 Normal 50mm f/1.4 Autofocus Lens for the Sony

12/29/2007 01:19:22 PM · #3

Wow, to bad you're so disappointed. I have all the ipod versions and have never had problems with any of them. Is this your first ipod? If so, read some of the itunes tutorials and it will show you how to set up your different playlists. You can really do a lot of organizing in itunes. Also, if you are using iphoto you can organize your photos into albums. As far as deleting goes, I know that you can delete tv shows directly from the ipod but since I sync mine every couple of days I've never tried to delete music or photos directly. I'm a mac person so I don't have the outlook problem, ipod is set up to snyc with ical. I hope you get it to work, it really is a great little gadget.

ladyhawk22

Sony DSLR-A700

12/29/2007 01:25:05 PM · #4

Sync to Outlook Did a quick google search and came up with this...don't know if you've seen it before, but it might be helpful!

GoldBerry

Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM

12/29/2007 01:32:17 PM · #5

P is right....sounds like you're not using a MAC which is probably where your issues are coming from. iTunes is excellent for organizing music/videos/podcasts, etc...if you use that then you'll come to appreciate the syncing process.

Maybe someone has some suggestions on how to improve the process on a PC?

12/29/2007 01:38:10 PM · #6

I have watched the demos and read every tutorial etc I could find.
I use a PC, so don't have "i....." anything.
I don't use Outlook or Outlook express (I use Incredimail), and without it I can't synchronize.

I could learn to live with problems 4-8, although they are a big disappointment.

But how on earth can anybody overlook 1,2 &3? That is downright criminal!!!
No matter what you buy, you always expect 100% of it, don't you?

Who would settle for only getting less than 10% of what they paid for (and even 16GB in today's terms is not much, and $400 for it is a huge amount of money).

I believe the term for this is FRAUD!

12/29/2007 01:40:34 PM · #7

Originally posted by GoldBerry:

....sounds like you're not using a MAC which is probably where your issues are coming from. iTunes is excellent for organizing music/videos/podcasts, etc...if you use that then you'll come to appreciate the syncing process.

Nowhere does it say that an iPod will only work with a Mac. I can see how iTunes will let me organize the music, it just means a huge amount of work, but I'd even be willing to do that.
The other points are the very serious problem.

12/29/2007 01:58:40 PM · #8

Okay chill, it ain't that bad. Some questions:

Are your MP3s tagged already? If so its just one tickbox and itunes will organise it all for you?

Can you explain points 1 to 3 a little better perhaps? I haven't got a touch, but I have a nano and I'm sure they aren't that different, and mine doesn't have that problem. How do you know it has exploded your test photos into 300MB, are you basing that on how much free space is on your ipod after you transfer those files?

And for number 5. Why is that an issue? You have no need to free up the space on your iPod by deleting stuff until you want to put something else on it. When you want to do that you will be at a pc anyway, where you can do it.

pjangel

Tamron SP AF 28-75mm f/2.8 XR Di for Canon

12/29/2007 02:03:30 PM · #9

I previously used a pc for my ipod and still didn't have the issues you are having. I wish I could be of more help. I have music, photos, movies and tv shows on my itouch, with no space issues. It sucks to get something new and not have it work like you expected.

SamDoe1

Canon EOS-350D Rebel XT

12/29/2007 02:07:40 PM · #10

Don't use iTunes, use winamp. You don't have to go through any of the synchronizing BS that iTunes has you do. It's also much faster, not a memory hog, and doesn't have any of the other unneeded frills that iTunes has. It also won't delete songs from the computer or the iPod unless you tell it to and each device is independent of the other.

iTunes sucks, Winamp is the way to go.

Message edited by author 2007-12-29 14:08:03.

12/29/2007 02:14:08 PM · #11

Originally posted by latentflip:

Are your MP3s tagged already? If so its just one tickbox and itunes will organise it all for you?

No, they are not, but let's not worry about them for now. The music just means lots and lots of time re-organizing everything. I can live with that.

Originally posted by latentflip:

Can you explain points 1 to 3 a little better perhaps? I haven't got a touch, but I have a nano and I'm sure they aren't that different, and mine doesn't have that problem. How do you know it has exploded your test photos into 300MB, are you basing that on how much free space is on your ipod after you transfer those files?

The only way to transfer anything and everything is via iTunes. The iPod doesn't show up as a drive, so there is no " drag and drop" capability. I assume that would still be true even if I had a Mac.

I resized a number of photos (in several folders/albums) to 640x480, and moved them to a special iPod folder (since it can only handle getting them from ONE location). Those folders came to 26.1MB

When the itouch is hooked up to the computer, iTunes lists the amount of space taken up for the various components (e.g. music, video, photos etc) as well as free space remaining.
Can't argue with that, I guess.

P.S. I am rather upset with this huge rip-off and I won't manage to "chill" until I have it either fixed or returned to the store, but I certainly do appreciate any and all efforts of help. Thank you.

Canon EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM

12/29/2007 02:18:43 PM · #12

Quoted from Wikipedia:

"All iPods except for the touch can function in "disk mode" as mass storage devices to store data files"

And therein lies my big problem - I am completely at the mercy of whatever Apple decides to do to me - including taking away over 90% of what I paid for.

Nothing I can do about it.

Anybody interested in buying a very VERY lightly used iPod Touch, 2 days old?

SteveJ

Canon EOS-7D

12/29/2007 02:19:04 PM · #13

I don't use Outlook or Outlook Express on my PC, but iTunes synchronises okay, it updates okay as well.

Canon EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM

12/29/2007 02:20:40 PM · #14

Originally posted by formerlee:

I don't use Outlook or Outlook Express on my PC, but iTunes synchronises okay, it updates okay as well.

Are you telling me you're synchronizing a calendar without Outlook?

SteveJ

Canon EOS-7D

12/29/2007 02:24:30 PM · #15

Originally posted by Beetle:

I don't use Outlook or Outlook express (I use Incredimail), and without it I can't synchronize.

I misunderstood you, you didn't state it was for a calendar.

Ignore me :)

scalvert

12/29/2007 02:28:09 PM · #16

Originally posted by Beetle:

Anybody interested in buying a very VERY lightly used iPod Touch, 2 days old?

Ya might want to wait a couple of weeks. Apple is rumored to be working on updates to the iPhone and Touch, said to include games, Outlook support, mass storage functionality and more.

12/29/2007 02:28:34 PM · #17

Originally posted by Beetle:

Disk mode would only be useful if you wanted to use your ipod as an external HardDrive to store things which are not music/videos/pictures.

As to this disk space problem I am sure we are missing something.

Okay, I am not being patronising here, but lets go back to basics. Create a new folder on your desktop which is empty. Go into photos in iTunes and choose the new, empty, folder as the place to sync photos from and hit sync.

How much space does itunes reckon photos are taking up now?

12/29/2007 02:28:37 PM · #18

Originally posted by formerlee:

...you didn't state it was for a calendar.

Look at #7 in my original post... it DOES say calendar ;-p

Originally posted by formerlee:

Ignore me :)

Don't wanna! You tried to help and I appreciate it!

12/29/2007 02:36:59 PM · #19

Shannon, I hope that means firmware updates, not just fixing future generation gizmos.

Originally posted by latentflip:

Create a new folder on your desktop which is empty. Go into photos in iTunes and choose the new, empty, folder as the place to sync photos from and hit sync.

How much space does itunes reckon photos are taking up now?

I don't want to wipe them all off right now, I'm still contemplating using my one and only allowed phonecall to support.

However, I can answer you anyway. Before I put on the current number of albums, my very first attempt was seven resized photos (total of roughly 250KB) which were turned into 5.6MB.
I replaced those with another 5 photos (even less KB) which were turned into something like 4.3 MB.
I have tried it several times, read the helpfiles and the manual... it is the process that makes them so huge, not what I am doing to it.
If I could drag and drop, then perhaps it would bypass that ridiculous explosion ( and don't forget that it also adds all that extra stuff to my computer's hard drive as well!).

12/29/2007 02:41:22 PM · #20

When you are in the sync dialog box, is there a tickbox which says 'Include full-resolution photos'?

12/29/2007 02:46:07 PM · #21

Originally posted by latentflip:

When you are in the sync dialog box, is there a tickbox which says 'Include full-resolution photos'?

That is a very good thought, but it doesn't apply.

I resized the photos to a very small file size each and placed them in the iTouch folder. So those photos (all 26MB worth) ARE the only "full resolution" photos that iTunes can sync with.
I could understand 26MB plus a little bit of house keeping stuff, but not more than 10x the original size.

scalvert

12/29/2007 02:56:06 PM · #22

Originally posted by Beetle:

Shannon, I hope that means firmware updates, not just fixing future generation gizmos.

Yes, they would be updates.

12/29/2007 03:09:45 PM · #23

Okay, I think I have found something.
According to this the optimisation process will result in a file size of 776kB per image, regardless of what size it was originally. This is because it is resized to suit the screen on the touch and allow you to zoom in and out relatively cleanly etc.

I agree, that's a bit of a blow. I guess you must have over 300 photos in that 26Mb, which are all resized fairly small, which is why the % increase in drive space is so huge. As to the solution I don't know. It would seem (at present) that you cannot turn optimization off. I guess you need to decide if you need that many photos on it. On the plus side, it shouldn't be doing the same with your music, so as long as you want to use it mainly for listening to your tunes, and have a selection of photos, you should be okay.

As to the disk mode issue, it would solve the problem, but only to some extent. Yes it would stop the files being 'optimised' so they wouldn't take up any more space; but they would only be stored on the touch as if it were an external hard drive, you couldn't access them from the touch itself, just from a computer. So would depend what you want to use the touch for in terms of photos.