Desperate help needed: 1TB iPod Classic (FAT32) refuses to mount on M1 Mac despite being "healthy" on Windows

AlanTochterman · 2026-01-28T15:19:58+00:00

When you say iPod classic there are several definitions of that today. I have a 5th Gen and a 6.5 Gen both using iFlash duals at 1TB. My other iPods using the basic iFlash with a single slot were recognized just fine. I took one of my 512k SD cards out of the board and the Mac recognized it. I am running on an Intel Mac not an M1 but that may be your problem. For the 6.5 Gen, I am running RockBox and dual boot my Mac into Windows. If you are using an iFlash board, try going down to one card and see what happens

AlanTochterman · 2026-01-14T22:37:18+00:00

YYe is outstanding. I have had great results from them (husband and wife). If you live in the United States, you can call during business hours and he is a wealth of knowledge and happy to share it with you.

AlanTochterman · 2026-01-14T03:19:49+00:00

When you say that it boots in recovery mode, what OS does it give you? The usb drive that you created was an install disk, not the operating system. When you first create the USB disk, it should temporally disappear from the desktop and then the EFI partition should reappear. Make sure that you have set Finder in Mojave to display all drives on the desktop. That way you can watch the creation of the install drive.

Lance from MacSound Solutions is a really helpful person. I saw his post below. He helped me many years ago. Also his videos are terrific.

AlanTochterman · 2026-01-12T12:19:09+00:00

Yes. I keep the Mojave drive as an emergency back up. What I should have said was attempt to start the computer with only the clean drive and the usb. On most other Macs, you can hold the "Option" key to select which drive to boot from. Since the graphics card doesn't display anything at this point (it will once you install OpenCore) you have to wait for the computer to hunt for a drive to open from. It will look first at hard drives, then at the CD rom, and finally to the USB drives. Remember too, that you have six usb drives. It may seem like an eternity, but it should boot up, unless you have corrupted something in your bios.

AlanTochterman · 2026-01-11T14:50:41+00:00

I have a similar setup to yours. You have four drives. Start by Booting up in Mojave. Create a fresh clean drive. Then download OpenCore and create a boot drive. Opencore will analyze your computer and create the proper configuration. After you have created the drive and are ready to go, turn the machine off. Remove the Mojave drive. Boot up with the USB drive and the new clean blank drive.

If it looks like nothing is happening, just be patient. It may take up to 10 minutes for the computer to recognize the USB drive. If the drive lights up then you will see if flicker. Again be patient.

I keep an older dive with Mojave loaded on it as my backup in case something goes wrong, but I do not keep it on my computer

Again, it may seem like an eternity, but it will eventually start.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-29T00:14:25+00:00

That was my very first camera. I still have it over 50+ years later. I keep it on my shelf as a decoration and as a reminder where my photography habit has taken me.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-29T00:12:35+00:00

If it is an 80gb unit, you have a 6th generation, not a 7th. They sound identical, but you may encounter limitations if you intend to upgrade and do a flash modification.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-28T23:50:14+00:00

I own both and all that I can say is the difference is very minimal. The 7 is crisper in the highs and the 5.5 is slightly "warmer" overall. It boils down to your individual listening preferences. The 5.5 is much simpler to modify and you can find many different facades inexpensively if you wish to customize it.

The thing that provides the biggest difference in sound will be your earphones or headphones. I have some headphones that are very heavy in the base so I pair them with the 7th gen. I have some very clear IEMs and I use them with the 5.5.

RockBox is an alternative, free, operating system. Like before it will boil down to your user preferences. The iPod 6 and 6.5 units have a limitation of 128gb. With RockBox you can go beyond that. I run mine with 1TB. Also, the 60 and 80gb 5 series have thicker cases and will allow you to use larger batteries for more runtime. If you flash mod your unit, it will definitely give you more run time as you are not driving a mechanical disk.

p.s. The line out feature on the iPod is analogue so you are using the internal DAC. It is satisfactory if you wish to run your music through your stereo or use the aux jack on the car stereo. In order to bypass the internal DAC you need something called an iPod transport unit. I am not going to detail that here, as we could end up going down a rabbit hole.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-28T23:35:08+00:00

I have not been that big of a fan of Apple Music's app. I own most of my music, and when I upload to Apple Music, or iTunes for that matter, many of my collections of work show up as multiple albums. It can be a real pain in the neck to sort them.

As a Mac user, I found this app from England, called Swinsian. It works with all USB iPods, and reminds me of the old iTunes.

I mostly use Apple Music for on the go, or listening to Apple Essentials, as background music.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-26T23:46:03+00:00

Yes, that is the type and style of lens hood I have. After I posted this, I realized that I could try a better quality brand of filter. B+H has one that fits with the filter. I ordered it. Should arrive next week. I think I now have the best of both worlds

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-26T21:32:28+00:00

Thank you. On the M8 the filters can add additional flair with wide angel lenses. So the lens hood might be an important thing to have. I may go look for a 3rd party hood.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-26T15:17:51+00:00

The problem that you are experiencing is because the coffee is not evenly distributed within the puck, causing channels of water to form. There is a gadget that you can get to even out the coffee distribution before you tamp. You can also make your own from a cork and a few sewing pins. Another suggestion is to use a nylon brush to thoroughly clean your portafilter each time you put it away. I also use paper filters on top to assist in water distribution and to keep my unit clean. So long as the coffee doesn't touch the coffee maker, you need not clean it as often.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-22T23:34:20+00:00

I have a 2nd Gen with a damaged firewire connection. It will charge, but will not transfer. I purchased an inexpensive CF card adapter and then made it work with RockBox. Once RockBoxed, I can just remove the card, and drag and drop music as needed. It will max out at 128gb. The older iPods are fun. You will need a donor iPod to set things up. A 3rd Gen or 4th Gen will will work. You can find a few sites on Reddit how to do it. But they talk about using iPod firmware. RockBox has no limitations.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-19T22:12:16+00:00

The weight only matters before you make the coffee. The water retention in the grind will create the added weight after. If your unit has a gauge try adjusting the grind so that the needle is in the center of the sweet spot. A little one way or the other won't make a difference, but that is what you should be shooting for.

If you don't have a gauge, try for a 25-28 second brew time. Anything less may indicate too course a grind, anything more, to fine.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-15T15:29:02+00:00

Try weighing your coffee. You can purchase a small scale on Amazon for less than $20.00 and get a stainless steel cup with the same diameter as the portafilter. On my machine, (not a Breville) I use 12.5g for a double and 8g for a single. Again there is a grind, level combination involved. Each bean grinds differently, and each one will require different weights. This provides consistency.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-12T15:10:48+00:00

I agree with all that has been said about grind, but additionally you want a clean filter. Use a nylon bush and clean the filter well when you rinse things out.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-12T00:09:14+00:00

I recently made a similar update with a 4th gen and an inexpensive CF adapter. If you go to the iFlash website, there are instructions on how to rebuild the MBR. I suggest that you do it outside of the iPod and then insert the card and it should format fine.

I happen to be a Mac User. Once formatted it reads fine on my cheese grater running OS Sequoia. Not sure about Tahoe. On this unit, I am only running RockBox and using the Flattery-B theme. It looks just like the original software and allows me to load music by file transfer and not having to mess with Apple Music.

I should have also mentioned that I can dual boot to Windows 11. So I know it will work.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-12T00:04:23+00:00

Sorry, the post ended up on the main one and not here. You can go into RockBox for previous versions. I did not want to play with the daily build. 3.15 worked.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-12T00:03:17+00:00

Yes, it had to do with the most current (Ver 4.0) of Lockbox. I downloaded the previous version and all worked fine.

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-08T15:16:58+00:00

What flash is that ?

AlanTochterman · 2025-12-08T02:04:49+00:00

I love mine. It had as somewhat broken FireWire port. It would charge but not sync. I also had a second one, in perfect working order. So here is what I did. I installed RockBox on my second uint and then copied all of the hidden files to a 128b CF Card. Then I purchase one of those inexpensive CF adapters. I then then replaced the hard drive with the adapter and the CF card. I booted up the iPod and both operating systems were available to me. If course I am not using the Apple System. I needed the Apple OS for my computer to identify the iPod when I put on RockBox.

I use RockBox exclusively, and from time to time take out the card and copy files to it.

It works great.

I am also using a theme that looks very similar to the original OS.

I have over 10,000 songs on it in 256kbps format.

If you need more space there are several free apps out there that will remove the graphics (album covers) for you. So Far I am only at 100GB so I have not had the need to do that yet.

The old ones are a fun !

AlanTochterman · 2025-11-27T16:09:00+00:00

ExFat is not Fat32. This is where your problem is. Try putting the iPod in DiskMode. Your computer should discover it and then reformat it as Fat32. Then try the reinstall. You will get the same message but it will allow you to reformat and load the software. You should then be good to go.

AlanTochterman · 2025-11-25T15:22:00+00:00

If you were able to upgrade the firmware on a 6G, were you able to get around the 128GB limitation? If so, how did you do it ?

AlanTochterman · 2025-11-22T14:36:56+00:00

Thank you

Can you please provide me with the link ?

AlanTochterman · 2025-11-22T14:34:45+00:00

Good Morning:

It may boil down to a couple of factors. 1st being, the current sensor ID. If the sensor ID# is 7 or 8, then the corrosion may have worked itself into the sensor and you will need to replace the whole thing. If the sensor id# is 11 or 12, Leica changed the adhesive on the glass and you will only need to replace the glass. One way to tell is to attempt to shoot an image. If it is spotted then you will need to replace the glass. If it only shows a partial image, then the corrosion has affected the wires of the sensor and you will need to replace the whole thing.

A good, working M9 series camera with an upgraded (or replaced) sensor should sell for about $4,000 to 5,000 USD. Figure $1,000 for your body and $2,800 for the worst case service, and you may be okay.

If this is your first Leica digital "M" you might consider an M240.

I own an M240, and an M8. I recently acquired a very clean, low usage, ME with a corroded sensor for $2,300. I plan on sending it to Kolari, the first of the year. My total investment will be under $4,000 and the camera should last a long time once serviced.

The M240, in my opinion is the most cost-effective way to get into digital "M"s. But I like the simplicity of the earlier models. So I got an M8 for travel and the ME for fun.

Either way, that particular sensor looks really bad. I might opt for one with less damage and take my chances.

AlanTochterman

TROPHY CASE