iPod Classic 80GB is skipping

[troutman]

Some songs are skipping or hiccuping during playback. This seems to happen mainly when the display light goes out, or if I ever flip through Cover Flow. Some songs never skip at all. All software is up to date.

Anyone know how I can fix this? - iPod message board questions seem to go unanswered.

[Cliche]

Repeating or advancing to a different section?

[troutman]

Originally Posted by Cliche

Repeating or advancing to a different section?

Like a record skipping - the song continues, but there are "pops" or short pauses.

[Cliche]

This is more a computer problem than a specific ipod problem. It could be that certain songs written to the ipods hdd are now fragmented or suffering from bad sectors. The skipping would occur because the system is coming up with a bad enough data stream it can't decode it anymore thus you get short pauses as the drive actuator flails around looking for something to read. (Kind of like the anti-skip in some portable cd players not working if you shake the player long enough)

The solution is to either delete those songs and try writing new ones on to it, or to reformat the ipod complete as this site promotes it. Or maybe you could try defragging it. YMMV, and since I don't have one of those overpriced lumps of ceramic and plastic, take any advice I give with a large grain of salt.

[SportsJunky]

Is it only when you have it docked in an ipod player or do you hear them with your earphones on too? When I heard yours doing that troutman I just thought it was the speakers.

[troutman]

Here is something else I figured out - the only songs that are choppy are songs where the song title is longer, and the title scrolls across the screen. Once the backlight goes out, the songs with longer titles skip. Those with short titles never skip. If I leave the backlight on, no songs skip.

Songs will also skip if I scroll through Cover Flow during playback.