A showcase for the best in iPod mods & hacks

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4G iPod Flash Conversion 
 

Instead of a hard drive, your new upgraded iPod will use flash memory with no moving parts for faster boot up & access times and lower power consumption.

You will also get enhanced shock-resistance! Thousands of iPods have died an early death because they were dropped and their hard drives were damaged as a result.

The original size of these units ranged from 10GB to 40GB, today you can come very close to matching the original maximum size with a 32GB CF card. I recommend a minimum size card of 2GB, the maximum size is limited by the size of your budget.
 
  Materials and Tools  

Ideally, you will need the following items:

Small Phillips Driver
Small Flat Screw Driver
Plastic iPod Opening Tool
Xacto Knife or Razor Blade
Compact Flash to 1.8" Female IDE adapter
Fully ATA compatible Compact Flash Card (2Gb min). I've had good luck with Transcend, Sandisk and Adata but others may work as well.
4th Generation iPod. If you use an iPod with a bad drive, just make sure that the unit is otherwise fully functional.
iPod Wall Charger

Opening Your iPod

There are literally hundreds of DIY guides and tutorials on how to properly open up your iPod, so I won't go into it here. I will assume that if you're actually willing to do this hack to your iPod you already know or can easily figure out how to open it up. Just use a plastic tool and take your time.

Be careful, when you finally pry it open, the two halves will be joined by the headphone jack's ribbon cable. Disconnect the ribbon cable and separate the two halves.

Replacing the Hard Drive

Be careful here, don't just yank out the old hard drive!

First, unplug the battery from the circuit board to prevent any accidental shorts.

Next, carefully remove the drive by slowly separating the drive from the connector. Use your fingernails or a small screwdriver to gradually separate the two. A little on one side and then the other until it is out.

Prep and Install the Flash Card

Once the drive is out, use it as a template to cut out a small piece of heavy paper or cardboard (a business card works well). This will prevent any shorts between the adapter and connector assembly.

Next, plug in your flash card into the card adapter and plug the adapter into the HD connector as shown. Note that you may have to trim a little plastic on the adapter connector to get it to mate just right.

Use some hot melt glue or foam tape to secure the adapter to the cardboard and the cardboard to the logic board.

Plug the battery back in and get ready to test it!

Test & Restore


Carefully put the iPod pieces back together but don't snap closed just yet.

Plug your iPod into the PC using the dock connector. If iTunes does not automatically open up, do so now.

At this time, iTunes should recognize your iPod and will give you the option to restore the iPod to its original settings. Click OK and wait for it to finish.

Once the restore process is complete, your iPod will display a message telling you that the unit needs to be plugged into its wall charger to complete the process. Plug in the iPod for a few minutes and check to see that your iPod works as it should.

Before and After


Some of the differences between the old HD unit and my new flash version:

iPod now weighs 22% less! 5.5 oz vs. 4.3 oz

iPod is now much more rugged and will no longer suffer from shock-induced hard drive failure.

Oh yeah, I'm still tallying up the battery gains but you can imagine how much less power the CF card will consume compared to the hard drive.

Now go and make yourself a Custom iPod Boombox!

 

 


  

 

 


5G Video iPod With Internal Bluetooth

 

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4G iPod Bluetooth Mod