It’s alive! (My 1G iPod)
April 25th, 2007 by ktula
When i bought my 1G(1st generation) iPod back in November of 2001, i used to take it on the road with me during my frequent business trips. Everywhere i went, i was the ONLY one carrying the iPod. Now, more than five years later, it’s impossible not to see an iPod everywhere i go.
My 1G iPod, aka iPod (scroll wheel), started to break apart a few years ago. At first, i was having difficulty getting it to synchronize with my Mac - i had to adjust the firewire connector at a certain angle to get it recognized. A few months later, i could not even get my Mac to see the iPod, no matter what i did. At the same time, i was having problem just charging the iPod.
After acquiring a free iPod mini (2G), i gave the 1G iPod to my sister. Recently, after reading some article on hacking a newer iPod to replace its hard disk drive with a compact flash memory, i had an urge to open up the 1G iPod to see what’s inside. After acquiring it back from my sis, i tried to charge the iPod since its battery was completely out of juice. I was out of luck. The damn thing won’t even charge.
There are a lot of websites with information on how to open up the iPod to replace either the battery or the hard disk drive. But i needed information on how to completely disassemble the iPod. Fortunately, a few patient searches on google led me to takeitapart.net’s page for taking apart the 1G iPod. It’s a good thing i found this site prior to proceeding to tear circuit board right out of the case. Using a Torx T05 screw driver, i removed the four Torx screws holding the board to the case.
It was very clear why i was not able to charge the iPod after lifting the circuit board off the case and peeling off a corner of black plastic covering the board (directly behind the LCD). The firewire connector had completely broken off from the board!!!
As clearly visible in the above picture, the four soldering points that used to hold the firewire connector to the circuit board were no longer attached to the firewire connector. The first thing i did was solder the four points back to the board. This was the easy part. The hardest part came next. I had to solder all six electrical connections, each one less than 1mm from the other, using my old soldering iron. Trying to use my soldering iron (it is about 5mm wide at the tip) on such a small circuit is like trying to use a sledge hammer to drive a picture frame nail into the wall, it was extremely difficult. It took me a long time to “solder” all six connections and even when i was done, i had absolutely no clue if i had fixed it or i had made it worse. Several times during the soldering process, i had to do some clean up because the solder was touching both pins.
When i plugged the firewire charger into the iPod, the familiar whine of the hard disk drive came back. It worked!!! My 1G iPod is alive again!
Unfortunately, my celebration was premature. My repair job was only partially successful. I still can’t get my Powerbook to see the iPod. Oh well, at least i can charge it 
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