iPod Utilities – Track and Playlist Duplication (Copying) & Music Back Up

A lot of people have been in the situation where they have lost their music library one way or another, but thankfully they have it all on their iPods. Now the issue is getting it back to the PC and acting all normal again, so how exactly do you go about it without erasing the damn thing. Another situation is when you want to just duplicate your friend’s iPod, some people just aren’t good at making decent playlists when they have thousands of songs. I know I forget a few songs, and making playlists gets annoying with that many songs, but worth it in the long wrong. So are are a few useful software that you can use “expand” the usage of your iPod.

Disk Aid (Freeware)

This is a really useful software, some people have the very large 80 – 160 GB iPods which they haven’t completely filled. Disk Aid turns your iPod into an external hard drive that you are able to drop items into without having any affect on your current files, unless you delete something. Works really well and its free.

Tune Aid ($25)

This one of the first applications which I think is a must for anyone with an iPod and its worth the $25. You can copy your whole iPod to your iTunes including Playlists, Album Art, Number of times played, and all the other details. You can keep adding your iTunes library by doing this to multiple iPods and copying it to your PC. Also it doesn’t matter if the iPod was Mac or PC formated, Tune Aid can read it. Also you can be specific about certain songs or videos, and you can leave out the rest. Its an amazing piece of software which is worth the $25, it works with all types of iPods. It is also able to recover songs from a corrupted database/iPod.

iPod 2 iPod ($39)

Copying between two iPods is a hassle, especially playlists and all the other items. Specifically if you don’t want to copy the items to your iTunes library. The usually problem anyone faces is that iTunes will format an iPod which isn’t connected to it previously, so you have to make sure you set it so that you Manage the Library and switch off Auto Sync. You can plug both iPods to the PC and it will recognize it, the best part about the software is that its very simple to use. You select the tracks you can to copy and copy it over to the other iPod, and you can do that with the Playlists as well. The freeware version can only do 100 songs, but the main one can do many, I tested it already with about 7000+ songs. Its an extremely useful software if you do this a lot, I do this because I take friend’s iPods and copy them back and forth, but is it worth $40 I don’t think so, I think its worth about $15 max. But it is a very clean piece of software that doesn’t involve any complications.

Review: BMW iPod Interface

I have been using my iPod Touch for some time now, and thought to use it with my car. After some search I found a few units, but it turns out there is an OEM unit from BMW meant to integrate with the system.

This is the break of audio controls from the BMW Audio Interface, it replaces the CD Changer menu:

  • CD1 – Playlists
  • CD2 – Artist Names
  • CD3 – Album Title
  • CD4 – Music Genre
  • CD5 – Pod Cast
  • CD6 – Displays a certain amount of songs from the music library

Pros:

  • Excellent Sound Quality – Fiber Optic Connection
  • Easily installed – Took about 50 mins
  • Works with all iPods
  • Relatively cheaper then other iPod integration units
  • Uses BMW audio control to interface with the iPod
  • Loads items relatively quickly

Cons:

  • Replaces CD Changer but can easily be returned without any issues. Personally it has no affect on me since I still have 2 slots in the center console, one for DVD/Navigation and one for CD.

These aren’t the best pictures in the world, it was probably because we were cramped and it was humid outside so we just kept on snapping away and wanted to finish it as fast as possible. Now after getting it all done, I wanted to take step by step shots but we wanted to finish up and go somewhere cool.

Overall I think this is an excellent unit, easily installed and it requires no changes to your OEM system. The only real issue I have is the BMW Audio interface itself, so doesn’t matter which unit you install this is the drawback of them all, I wish it would be a little quicker or easier to go through. I do recommend this unit to anyone who wants to use their iPod with their BMW, it works perfectly.

Price: 125 KD from Dealership – $300 Online

Rating:

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