What program should I use to manage an iPod Shuffle (4G)?

Question

I have a nano which I barely ever download anything to and haven't done so recently. I use it mainly for music. I also have the 4G iPod shuffle and that is the thing I have trouble with.

I have tried to download music to it through Banshee and that works fine. However podcasts won't download through Banshee. When I download through Rhythmbox I can download the podcast, but it destroys the voice over kit. I have tried GTKPod and that works for nothing and always ruins the iPod voice over kit. So my question is what Media Player that will download Podcast is the most compatible with the iPod shuffle 4G? I am currently downloading and trying UMP.

Solution 1

You might want to try Floola. I haven't tried it on a shuffle, but I've had good success with a few different iPod models with it:

http://www.floola.com/home/

Solution 2

As another shuffle user I only recommend Banshee. But banshee from PPA.

you have the PPA here: https://launchpad.net/~banshee-team/+archive/ppa

Or here http://banshee.fm/download/

To add just: sudo add-apt-repository ppa:banshee-team/ppa

Then just update the repositories and download/upgrade Banshee.

Right now am uploading more music to it. There is NO PROBLEM WHATSOEVER.

If you want the Voice for the song titles you need to use Virtualbox with a guest Windows and install Itunes. You also need the extension for Virtualbox to enable usb support. Its as easy as connecting the shuffle, telling the usb device in virtualbox to load the Ipod and use itunes inside virtualbox to install the voice for the songs.

Same for podcast. Virtualbox for it until Banshee makes the support for it.

Solution 3

I've had good luck with gPodder, albeit on my classic.

http://gpodder.org/

It just downloads and syncs podcasts to a device. I've it used in conjunction with gtkpod handling my music and I've never had it screw up the music end of things.

I don't know how it will interact with the voice-over kit though, but I haven't seen any bug reports on the site for the 4G shuffle.

Solution 4

Try Banshee once more and update it if not latest, which can sync ipods of many types . I've tried it myself with a mini Try Pearlpod as an alternative

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Comments

[Jason Southwell]

You have tried GTK? GTK is a library, not a media player. Can you please clarify :D?

[John Lyon]

@Roland I assume he means GTKPod.

[Sam Mercier]

@jozzas That is right.

[Sam Mercier]

Okay I will try that.

[Sam Mercier]

This thing scares me. It keeps on telling me how it could destroy my iPod. I am sorry, but it is too scary.

[Rafał Cieślak]

Floola is the only one that manages my ipod correctly. It uses some different approach probably, but in my case it turned out to be the right one.

[neydroydrec]

Floola is quite good -- but not perfect. It's the only one that worked for my 3G anyway.