Help ! my G3 has gone kapput

andyfase · 01-14-2006, 11:39

Hi all,

I've had my G3 for just over a year, a couple of weeks ago i noticed it started playing up. It would "crash" when playing a song and start emitting a big beep ....

Anyway now it wont turn on ... in recovery mode (with battery taken out and on button pressed in) the computer will recognise it, the firmware program will realise theres a G3 there but then hang (when trying to read from it i imagine). Also it shows up as a drive in explorer but it you try to select it you just get 'I/O error'

Is there anything i else i can try ? I've completly taken it apart to see if something easy to fix was lose, and i cant find anything ... still the same.

I'm quite annoyed that this thing has given up after only just over a year ... i thorght flash players were meant to last longer than hard disk based players !!

Thanks for the help

Cheers

Andy

andyfase · 01-23-2006, 08:46

i guess the answer is no then

yezdi · 01-23-2006, 14:57

I too am in the same boat. My G3 conked a little after 12 months today. I was a happy bunny on 1.51 and suddenly it refused to start. It would start, show the iaudio logo and turn off. So I reinstalled 1.51 in recovery mode. Now it doesnt even show up in Windows Explorer as a removable disk. Earlier it used to show up as a removable disk but did not show any folders (I expected to see the MUSIC, SYSTEM and RECORD folders). Can anyone help ?

slolove · 02-07-2006, 11:34

Same thing happened to me. It would play for a couple of seconds and then turn off. I couldn't turn it back on, so I sent it back. Luckily it's still under warranty, but it broke down after 10 months!

darnellmark · 02-19-2006, 04:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by yezdi

I too am in the same boat. My G3 conked a little after 12 months today. I was a happy bunny on 1.51 and suddenly it refused to start. It would start, show the iaudio logo and turn off. So I reinstalled 1.51 in recovery mode. Now it doesnt even show up in Windows Explorer as a removable disk. Earlier it used to show up as a removable disk but did not show any folders (I expected to see the MUSIC, SYSTEM and RECORD folders). Can anyone help ?

Hello all. Any help would be much appreciated as i'm currently travelling in Thailand and if i have to hear another Thai ballard on a bus someone is gonna die! But yeah, same thing happened with mine. Went to turn it on (had my G3 for about 2 months now) and all it does is show the iAudio logo for about 5 seconds, then it goes, then apears again. Still shows as a Removable hard disk. Was going to try installing 1.51, but now not so sure. So like i said any help would be great! Also if its not too much hassle if anyone does have any sugestions could you send it to darnellmark@gmail.com as im traveling not sure how often i can check this site. Cheers!

Oh, and just tried to access it through the PC and it says 'device is not formated' so guess to access it it'll mean formating and loosing all my music. Great!

yezdi · 02-20-2006, 18:29

I returned mine and AMP3 has replaced it with another one for which I am grateful to them and also would recommend them to anyone.
Despite the problems with the G3, I would still recommend it as it is, IMHO, still the best MP3 player for my requirements. I have compared it with the Sonys and iPods and irivers with my colleagues and the G3 still comes up trumps.

jimpossible84 · 03-01-2006, 22:02

Mine boloed 9 days after getting it - turned it on & "no file". Radio presets gone too. Attached to my Linux machine & low & behold, no vfat partition anymore. QTParted could see the partition, but fsck-vfat couldn't restore it. It had a total case of amnesia! It had firmware 1.30e so I downloaded 1.55 onto my wife's Windows box & flashed it. This first failed. Trying again appeared to install everything, then it tried to mount as USB, it failed and could not be brought back up - it was now a brick. Just on a lark, I tried again the next day (after rebooting), This time system found & flashed it, It still took another reboot and retry to get it fully set up. After getting it back mounted as a USB drive, it would take files, but there were NO files or directories there. LUCKY FOR ME, I had BACKED UP the full filestructure when I FIRST got the thing and was able to restore my system files (The Flash Update did NOT create ANY direcories or files) After this I was back in business. I'm just wandering when this will happen again. For more details, see my weblog journal at http://jimpossible84.livejournal.com
:nutty:

yezdi · 03-02-2006, 15:03

jimpossible84,
Could you please enlighten us how you can "see the partition". What is fsck-vfat ? I cannot see any system files except for the couple of folders on my g3.
Please let us know so that we know what to do when this happens to us next time. I really love my G3 and would be heartbroken if it does this to me again.

jimpossible84 · 03-04-2006, 11:20

Sure. I am running Linux, so I ran qtparted and it showed a device (usb) at /dev/sda with a single partition (/dev/sda1). However, when I attempted to mount it
(sudo mount -t vfat -oumask=0000 /dev/sda1 /mnt/iaudio), it said that it was not a valid block device (indicating no formatted vfat filesystem). fsck-vfat indicated same thing (fsck-vfat (http://www.die.net/doc/linux/man/man8/fsck.vfat.8.html) is essentially the linux equivalent of the Windows "scandisk" program that will check and attempt to repair a vfat (dos) filesystem, which is what the iAudio G3 uses. When working normally, I can mount the filesystem on my computer with the command I showed above and copy files to it. For the record, this did me no good since my filesystem wasn't corrupted, but rather destroyed (non-existant). This could possibly have been fixed by running mkdosfs (http://www.die.net/doc/linux/man/man8/mkfs.vfat.8.html) to rebuild a valid vfat filesystem followed by restoring a PREVIOUSLY BACKED UP factory-supplied filetree (w/system file). This may or may not, however be bootable since I have no idea what the iAudio uses for a bootloader, which may still require flashing). However, in my case, I instead decided to first take the opportunity to upgrade to 1.55 (since numerous posts on this forum say that is what I should do and since I had nothing else to lose; NOTE - requires Windows) which solved my problem. Now (lesson learned), I not only have the original factory-installed filetree backed up, but also keep an image of the current filetree (with all the songs) backed up as well.

If you do not run Linux, but wish to use these tools, you can use knoppix, a live-CD version of Linux which has among it's primary uses - rescuing Windows computers. (http://www.knoppix.org/)
JP :bigthumbs

yezdi · 03-05-2006, 04:30

:nutty: Whew ! Thanks jimpossible84. I will take a look at knoppix.

01-14-2006, 11:39	#1
andyfase Junior Member Join Date: Jan 2006 Posts: 2	Help ! my G3 has gone kapput Hi all, I've had my G3 for just over a year, a couple of weeks ago i noticed it started playing up. It would "crash" when playing a song and start emitting a big beep .... Anyway now it wont turn on ... in recovery mode (with battery taken out and on button pressed in) the computer will recognise it, the firmware program will realise theres a G3 there but then hang (when trying to read from it i imagine). Also it shows up as a drive in explorer but it you try to select it you just get 'I/O error' Is there anything i else i can try ? I've completly taken it apart to see if something easy to fix was lose, and i cant find anything ... still the same. I'm quite annoyed that this thing has given up after only just over a year ... i thorght flash players were meant to last longer than hard disk based players !! Thanks for the help Cheers Andy

03-04-2006, 11:20	#9
jimpossible84 Junior Member Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Texas Posts: 21	Linux rescue tools explained. Sure. I am running Linux, so I ran qtparted and it showed a device (usb) at /dev/sda with a single partition (/dev/sda1). However, when I attempted to mount it (sudo mount -t vfat -oumask=0000 /dev/sda1 /mnt/iaudio), it said that it was not a valid block device (indicating no formatted vfat filesystem). fsck-vfat indicated same thing (fsck-vfat (http://www.die.net/doc/linux/man/man8/fsck.vfat.8.html) is essentially the linux equivalent of the Windows "scandisk" program that will check and attempt to repair a vfat (dos) filesystem, which is what the iAudio G3 uses. When working normally, I can mount the filesystem on my computer with the command I showed above and copy files to it. For the record, this did me no good since my filesystem wasn't corrupted, but rather destroyed (non-existant). This could possibly have been fixed by running mkdosfs (http://www.die.net/doc/linux/man/man8/mkfs.vfat.8.html) to rebuild a valid vfat filesystem followed by restoring a PREVIOUSLY BACKED UP factory-supplied filetree (w/system file). This may or may not, however be bootable since I have no idea what the iAudio uses for a bootloader, which may still require flashing). However, in my case, I instead decided to first take the opportunity to upgrade to 1.55 (since numerous posts on this forum say that is what I should do and since I had nothing else to lose; NOTE - requires Windows) which solved my problem. Now (lesson learned), I not only have the original factory-installed filetree backed up, but also keep an image of the current filetree (with all the songs) backed up as well. If you do not run Linux, but wish to use these tools, you can use knoppix, a live-CD version of Linux which has among it's primary uses - rescuing Windows computers. (http://www.knoppix.org/) JP :bigthumbs Last edited by jimpossible84; 03-04-2006 at 11:24..

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01-23-2006, 08:46	#2
andyfase Junior Member Join Date: Jan 2006 Posts: 2	i guess the answer is no then

01-23-2006, 14:57	#3
yezdi Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: UK Posts: 72	I too am in the same boat. My G3 conked a little after 12 months today. I was a happy bunny on 1.51 and suddenly it refused to start. It would start, show the iaudio logo and turn off. So I reinstalled 1.51 in recovery mode. Now it doesnt even show up in Windows Explorer as a removable disk. Earlier it used to show up as a removable disk but did not show any folders (I expected to see the MUSIC, SYSTEM and RECORD folders). Can anyone help ?

02-07-2006, 11:34	#4
slolove Junior Member Join Date: Mar 2005 Posts: 10	Same thing happened to me. It would play for a couple of seconds and then turn off. I couldn't turn it back on, so I sent it back. Luckily it's still under warranty, but it broke down after 10 months!

02-20-2006, 18:29	#6
yezdi Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: UK Posts: 72	I returned mine and AMP3 has replaced it with another one for which I am grateful to them and also would recommend them to anyone. Despite the problems with the G3, I would still recommend it as it is, IMHO, still the best MP3 player for my requirements. I have compared it with the Sonys and iPods and irivers with my colleagues and the G3 still comes up trumps.

03-01-2006, 22:02	#7
jimpossible84 Junior Member Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Texas Posts: 21	Mine boloed 9 days after getting it - turned it on & "no file". Radio presets gone too. Attached to my Linux machine & low & behold, no vfat partition anymore. QTParted could see the partition, but fsck-vfat couldn't restore it. It had a total case of amnesia! It had firmware 1.30e so I downloaded 1.55 onto my wife's Windows box & flashed it. This first failed. Trying again appeared to install everything, then it tried to mount as USB, it failed and could not be brought back up - it was now a brick. Just on a lark, I tried again the next day (after rebooting), This time system found & flashed it, It still took another reboot and retry to get it fully set up. After getting it back mounted as a USB drive, it would take files, but there were NO files or directories there. LUCKY FOR ME, I had BACKED UP the full filestructure when I FIRST got the thing and was able to restore my system files (The Flash Update did NOT create ANY direcories or files) After this I was back in business. I'm just wandering when this will happen again. For more details, see my weblog journal at http://jimpossible84.livejournal.com :nutty:

03-02-2006, 15:03	#8
yezdi Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: UK Posts: 72	jimpossible84, Could you please enlighten us how you can "see the partition". What is fsck-vfat ? I cannot see any system files except for the couple of folders on my g3. Please let us know so that we know what to do when this happens to us next time. I really love my G3 and would be heartbroken if it does this to me again.

03-05-2006, 04:30	#10
yezdi Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: UK Posts: 72	:nutty: Whew ! Thanks jimpossible84. I will take a look at knoppix.