iTunes 5 breaks my iPod….or does it?

Having used the Macintosh since 1984 (and the Lisa before that) as well as more PC’s than I’d care to count, I pride myself on being a power user and someone friends and family turn to when they run in to a roadblock with their personal confuser (to use Leo Laporte’s term from the TV show “Call for Help”). It turns out *I* was a bonehead vs. having it be Apple’s problem.

I’ve been merrily using the iPod and having zero issues so was quite chagrined when I downloaded the new iTunes 5.0 and began having issues. Issues I couldn’t fix.

I’m on the message boards reading about other Mac users (there was an acknowledged Windows version of iTunes 5 problem) and many were having exactly the same problem as I was experiencing (when I’d plug in my iPod, I’d get an error that it couldn’t copy to that disk). Stopped at the Apple store and a “genius” was able to copy tons of music to my iPod (should’ve been my first clue) and I guessed it was my operating system, one or more of my music files or something. Upon getting home, I ran the iPod updater, trashed preferences files, rebuilt this-n-that, ran Onyx (GUI for unix commands that clean up stuff) to clean up my system, rebuilt my entire iTunes library for over an hour, and none of this works.

So tonight I’m sitting here trying to fix it. I think, “Hmmm….could it be the Firewire cable?”. I plug in my iPod with the Apple supplied extra USB cable. It works. I let out a moan like a wounded bear.

Makes me think about all the people posting on Apple’s and other sites I visit. How many others’ problems could be a simple fix? Or is this stuff way too complicated? Even smart guys like Russell Beattie get frustrated (he’s threatening to be a “reverse switcher” going from Mac to Windows) which is more about the level of complexity in information systems than it is the lack of knowledge or capability of the user.