How to Copy Music from an iPod to Your Computer

iPods are MP3 players from the tech giant Apple, and millions of consumers around the globe use one of these popular devices to listen to their favorite music on the go. Occasionally, a user may need to copy the music found on his or her device back to the computer system. This can occur when a computer becomes
damaged in some way that either destroys or corrupts the hard drive. As an iPod will generally sync with iTunes and erase music when plugged into a new computer, it is important to follow instructions very carefully to safeguard the music files found on one of the devices. The following steps outline the process of copying the data back to the computer system.

Connecting the iPod


An iPod connects to the computer using a USB cable. As iTunes will likely try to start a sync with the MP3 player immediately, the user will need to quickly stop this from proceeding. This can be done easily by clicking the small ‘X’ in iTunes, next to the search box. This will prevent iTunes from continuing with the sync and removing all of the files not also located on the computer system.


Navigate to the Device


Once iTunes has been told to stop syncing, the device can be navigated to through the Control Panel. Simply open the Control Panel and double-click Portable Media Devices. The iPod shoudl be visible in this screen. At this point, the user will need to click on the “Tools” prompt on the menu bar and navigate to “Options”. Hidden files and folders need to be made visible, in order to see the file structure of the content that has been stored on the device.


Find the Music Folder and Copy


Once all files have been made visible, the computer user can navigate to the music folder. Here, all of the songs on the iPod should be visible. These songs can then be copied onto the computer’s hard drive. If the user wishes to import them into iTunes, this can be done once the music has been successfully copied back to the machine.


It is important to note that this process is only valid for older iPods and new iPods that do not belong to the “Touch” family of devices. If a user possesses one of these devices and needs to copy music to their system, they will instead need to follow a different process to get the music back on their machine. Windows has several different programs available that can help to transfer the music seamlessly. One such example is Sharepod, a freeware program that can easily save music.


Mac and Linux users will need to seek out other software alternatives. One of the most popular such programs is Senuti, a file program that can easily transfer music back to the machine. This program is a paid program, although it can be used to transfer up to 1,000 songs without paying for the privilege to do so. Of course, those users with larger libraries will need to invest in the paid version of the software.


Restoring music to a computer system is often much more cost effective than attempting to purchase all of the music from the device on the machine once again. It is important for users to remember that because hard drive crashes can occur from time to time, backing up files is the best way to safeguard information and make certain it isn’t lost permanently. Of course, if no back up exists, using one of these software answers is a great way to restore the files in question.