Initializing an iPod ... Do or Don't?

[bigbadbill]

Can I erase my iPod and starting fresh? My iPod has been acting funky lately, taking a long time to switch between menus, and today I fired it up and it says I have no songs, yet there is still less then a gig of it's 20 gig capacity open. My contact info and calander info is still there, but my music has disappeared. I am going to a Xmas party tomorrow and will be playing Xmas tunes off my iPod and don't want it acting up. Can I wipe this baby clean and start fresh?

 

[ksv]

Yep, just format it with Apple's Disk Utility. Then you'll have to run the iPod firmware update 1.2.1 app to restore the iPod OS

 

[bigbadbill]

Thanks!

 

[bigbadbill]

Wow, my iPod won't even mount. It's doing some sort of disk search with a progress meter. this doesn't look good... :-(

 

[bigbadbill]

OK I got it. I had to reset into firewire mode (resetting normally, then holding down the forward and backward buttons) and then I was able to reformat the drive and load new iPod software. Thanks to kbs & thisbechuck for the help!