Another "iPod not recognised" problem

[Tinpusher]

Plug the iPod into the Mac Pro (the one that I've been syncing the iPod with since the year dot), and nothing happens- that is, except for the iPod saying "Connected- eject before disconnecting".

Up until a few weeks ago (coincident with the latest release of the iTunes software), iTunes would start up automatically, and OSX would mount the iPod and it would show up on the desktop as "My iPod". But not any more.

Even if I start iTunes manually, it's still not showing up. Haven't tried to manually mount the iPod, because I wouldn't really know where to start.

I'm using OSX 10.5.8, iTunes 10.2.1 and the iPod is a 160GB (3rd gen?) classic.

Meanwhile, the iPod still works perfectly well when mounted on a (3rd party) dock or playing through headphones.

Puzzled.... any assistance gratefully received!

 

[jbarley]

the other day I had a similar issue when I plugged in my iPod, same with my iPad, neither would show at all in iTunes. So no way to sync or otherwise maintain this gizmos.
My solution was to download and install iTunes again, this fixed the problem for now but offers no answer as to why it occurred.
This problem might be the results of recent upgrades to OS X and or iTunes, I do tend to try to stay current with updates.

 

[Tinpusher]

Downloaded and installed latest version of iTunes, and this didn't work. The problem is that it's just not mounting properly, so I ran disk util. Got a few errors, and so I clicked "repair", but apparently the "disk cannot be repaired".

I'm beginning to think that I might have to reformat my iPod and then re-sync everything to it. Is there anything else I might try before I do that?