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Why nobody talks about using old iPod hard drives for portable storage

I dug out my 2005 iPod Video last year and the hard drive died, so I spent $40 on a used 60GB ZIF drive from eBay to fix it, which ended up being cheaper than any modern external SSD for the same capacity. Has anyone else repurposed dead iPod parts for cheap backups or retro projects?
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2 Comments
laura_chen41
laura_chen418d agoMost Upvoted
The key is finding the right ZIF cable, my first iPod repair took forever because I grabbed the wrong one off eBay. Once you've got it working, those drives are actually decent for small file backups or retro gaming projects, just don't expect to edit video off them.
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the_thomas
Oh man, here we go again with the "dead iPod parts are an untapped goldmine" crowd. I mean, sure, you spent $40 on a drive, but how long did it take you to find a compatible one and install it? A modern $50 flash drive from Best Buy would have worked out of the box and been faster. Plus, those old iPod drives are slow as molasses by today's standards. It's a fun tinkering project, I get it, but let's not pretend this is some smart backup solution.
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