iPod broke PC?

[kaidomac]

Update: Problem solved. iPod fried the front ports. Removed the offending ports, life is great

Just a quick summary - built my inlaws a new PC, everything was peachy until they tried hooking up their 2g iPod Shuffle. Screwed everything up. USB ports don't work and monitor stops working after Windows XP boots up. Any ideas?

 

[Martin.]

buy a mac?

 

[dtravis7]

I hope you don't take this as some Mac FanBoy comment, but I have never ever heard of anything like that. How do you know for sure the iPod did that? I can not see any way it could unless it was shorted out in a way it would put a dead short across the USB Ports Voltage and fry something on the Motherboard.

I know you from Anandtech forums and you know I am no fanboy. I see crazy stuff on a weekly basis and never seen anything like this.

 

[Kilted1]

I think you should look elsewhere for the problems . Maybe the USB port on this Pc of yours

 

[bobtomay]

Also, don't think it has anything to do with the iPod. And I have never owned one, this MBP being my first anything Apple.

By your monitor not working "after" XP boots up, I presume you are saying that you not getting a video signal from the computer after XP boots and the monitor goes into power saving mode, which would imply that you are getting a video signal during the boot process and can get into the bios???
If you can't get into XP, how do you know the USB ports are not working???
Have you tried booting into safe mode???

 

[JeffreyLloyd]

buy a mac?

Haha, I always love when someone gives this as advice. It's always the best solution and yet so simple

 

[kaidomac]

Haha, I always love when someone gives this as advice. It's always the best solution and yet so simple

Yeah, but nearly all of their software is for PC, so it would be a waste. They would be using it nearly exclusively for Boot Camp or Parallels. We considered that but the PC was a better option for them.

 

[kaidomac]

I hope you don't take this as some Mac FanBoy comment, but I have never ever heard of anything like that. How do you know for sure the iPod did that? I can not see any way it could unless it was shorted out in a way it would put a dead short across the USB Ports Voltage and fry something on the Motherboard.

I know you from Anandtech forums and you know I am no fanboy. I see crazy stuff on a weekly basis and never seen anything like this.

Well you know me, and I AM a Mac fanboy At any rate, I have heard of this happening to 2 other people I know. One on a Dell desktop (2g Shuffle) and one on a 15" MacBook Pro (1g Shuffle). It seems that Apple is having major problems with it, because when you call tech support for iPods, the very first thing it has is a special menu for if you are having problems with the iPod Shuffle.

As far as whether we're sure that the iPod did this, we are sure that it caused the problem. Whether or not it was the entire cause of the problem, I don't know. They plugged the iPod in, it went to detect new hardware, then the monitor went blank and the USB ports stopped working. I built their new machine myself from scratch and extensively tested it to ensure that it would be perfect. Every USB port was tested multiple times, memory tests were run, etc. The machine was absolutely perfect before the iPod was plugged in.

I did some more research on the iPod and discovered that it had a similar problem before. On their previous machine (Windows 2000), it worked fine, but on their work machine (also Windows 2000), it caused the computer to completely shutdown whenever it was plugged in, so they simply used it on their home machine all the time. On their new machine running XP Pro, it caused the monitor to go out and the USB ports to stop working. Very odd...

 

[kaidomac]

Also, don't think it has anything to do with the iPod. And I have never owned one, this MBP being my first anything Apple.

By your monitor not working "after" XP boots up, I presume you are saying that you not getting a video signal from the computer after XP boots and the monitor goes into power saving mode, which would imply that you are getting a video signal during the boot process and can get into the bios???
If you can't get into XP, how do you know the USB ports are not working???
Have you tried booting into safe mode???

Yes, the computer can boot to Safe Mode. Currently none of the USB devices work in Safe Mode. I had them remove iTunes, the Apple Updater software, and then delete all of the USB devices/hubs in the Device Manager under Safe Mode and restart. The computer booted up normally, but after a few seconds of seeing the desktop, the screen went blank. Normally if the monitor is not receiving a signal, it says so, but the screen remains blank as if it were in power saving mode (which it's not...it goes blank after a few seconds and the keyboard/mouse inputs won't wake it up). We are currently using a PS/2 keyboard & mouse (in Safe Mode) since we can't use the USB models. It's really a very strange problem. I do IT work professionally and haven't encountered a problem like this before. The problem seems two-fold: (1) the iPod seems to have shorted out the entire USB system, and (2) the iPod seems to have created some kind of conflict with the video card so that the monitor apparently goes to sleep after loading up the Windows desktop. I've gone over the System and Applications log files and haven't encountered anything especially strange. Aside from doing a complete reinstall, I'm really scratching my head as to what to do.

 

[kaidomac]

Also, a number of iPods were recently shipped infected with a virus, but they were only the Video models. That rules out the Shuffles.

 

[dtravis7]

That is the strangest thing I have ever seen! I know that you know your stuff too! But WOW. AMAZING problem. From all you said, there must be a serious problem with that shuffle and it's shorting out the port. Amazing. If you ever figure out what is going on be sure to post it here!!!

It's the Video problem that really has me going.

 

[Amen-Moses]

Yes, the computer can boot to Safe Mode. Currently none of the USB devices work in Safe Mode. I had them remove iTunes, the Apple Updater software, and then delete all of the USB devices/hubs in the Device Manager under Safe Mode and restart. The computer booted up normally, but after a few seconds of seeing the desktop, the screen went blank. Normally if the monitor is not receiving a signal, it says so, but the screen remains blank as if it were in power saving mode (which it's not...it goes blank after a few seconds and the keyboard/mouse inputs won't wake it up). We are currently using a PS/2 keyboard & mouse (in Safe Mode) since we can't use the USB models. It's really a very strange problem. I do IT work professionally and haven't encountered a problem like this before. The problem seems two-fold: (1) the iPod seems to have shorted out the entire USB system, and (2) the iPod seems to have created some kind of conflict with the video card so that the monitor apparently goes to sleep after loading up the Windows desktop. I've gone over the System and Applications log files and haven't encountered anything especially strange. Aside from doing a complete reinstall, I'm really scratching my head as to what to do.

Have you tried re-installing the USB drivers? Possibly XP has tried to install a driver which conflicts with the USB system on your PC, if that conflict occurs during boot up before the display driver has been loaded then that would explain the symptoms.

When this sort of thing has happened to me before I've only ever found a re-install of XP followed by installing the correct BIOS drivers to fix it.

(if you don't have the drivers for you mobo anymore you can normally find them online)

Additionally you could try updating the BIOS itself, maybe it has become crrupted somehow.

Amen-Moses

 

[kaidomac]

Have you tried re-installing the USB drivers? Possibly XP has tried to install a driver which conflicts with the USB system on your PC, if that conflict occurs during boot up before the display driver has been loaded then that would explain the symptoms.

When this sort of thing has happened to me before I've only ever found a re-install of XP followed by installing the correct BIOS drivers to fix it.

(if you don't have the drivers for you mobo anymore you can normally find them online)

Additionally you could try updating the BIOS itself, maybe it has become crrupted somehow.

Amen-Moses

Yes, we tried re-installing the USB drivers. We deleted ALL of the USB devices/hubs in Device Manager as well. They had a PC friend come over and discovered that the monitor was going into sleep mode immediately after booting up, so they simply disabled that and it works fine now. When they get home from work, I am going to have them try disconnecting the front USB ports, uninstalling all of the USB devices in Safe Mode again, then rebooting to see if maybe the rears will work. If not, it should be a simple fix of buying a PCI card with 4 or 5 USB ports.

I spent a good amount of time with Apple Support, but they didn't have a clue. They did say that had a ridiculous amount of problems with iPod Shuffles and Windows, but that updating to the very latest version of iTunes usually solved the problem. The version they had on their machine was probably the release before the newest one since I built their computer before 7.0.2 or whatever is the current patch came out.

I kind of suspect that the front port didn't have enough power to give the iPod the juice it needed, which resulted in a short of some kind. It doesn't make sense that the rear USB ports would be affected, but whatever. Apple Support said that they had a huge number of problems with Windows laptop USB ports not being powerful enough and causing problems; I've also heard that many front USB ports on desktops don't provide the full amount of juice (5V or whatever) like the rear USB ports do. At any rate, I'll keep you guys updated and hopefully we can get this fixed pretty quickly.

 

[bobtomay]

Seems as if you've got the troubleshooting under control and headed in the right direction.

This problem is so unusual it sounds like the type of issue often caused by some cheaper power supplies not being able to maintain voltage across all the rails. Use to do a fair amount of support with Abit boards, and these unusual problems were solved better than 80% of the time by switching power supplies. Would not suggest you buying another one, but if you have another one around you could try, might be worth a shot. About all I can add with where you're at right now.

 

[kaidomac]

Seems as if you've got the troubleshooting under control and headed in the right direction.

This problem is so unusual it sounds like the type of issue often caused by some cheaper power supplies not being able to maintain voltage across all the rails. Use to do a fair amount of support with Abit boards, and these unusual problems were solved better than 80% of the time by switching power supplies. Would not suggest you buying another one, but if you have another one around you could try, might be worth a shot. About all I can add with where you're at right now.

Update, problem solved. The monitor problem was solved earlier (see one of my earlier posts). We did a bunch of testing and it turns out that the front USB port system was completely fried. The iPod apparently overloaded it. Apple Support said that some systems don't have enough juice to power the iPod from the front ports. For reference, the case is an Antec Sonata II with a 450w power supply (not junk by any means!). I will request a new front panel from Antec and just have them use their USB memory stick in the front and not their iPod Shuffle.

It's funny, the front port worked fine with their 2-gigabyte USB memory stick, but not with their 1-gigabyte 2nd-gen iPod Shuffle. Oh well. I had them unplug the front USB panel system and everything is just peachy now (we also tried plugging it into another header, but that caused problems as well, which says that the front USB system is bad). All of the rear USB ports work just fine with the front USB system disconnected, thankfully.

 

[dtravis7]

Cool! So glad you were able to figure it all out for them. Interesting find and will have to remember that in the future!

 

[bobtomay]

Cool! So glad you were able to figure it all out for them. Interesting find and will have to remember that in the future!

Yeah, me too. The Sonata is a fine case and their power supplies are not slouches either (while not top tier in the cases that come with one).

I am aware that not all USB ports are created equal. Have the same situation on my MBP where the USB on the right side does not supply the power of the port on the left side due to it sharing a part of the bus with the firewire ports. But, a device should just not funcion if it doesn't get enough juice, not fry another piece of hardware in the system. If this is the response Apple gave you, they have a definite issue with these devices. For me, there is no excuse for making a device that would fry any part of your existing hardware when connecting as you're suppose to. Not working due to not getting enough juice is one thing, but this is something else again. Apple is playing with the big boys, this is the type of thing that cries out for a recall.

 

[Amen-Moses]

For me, there is no excuse for making a device that would fry any part of your existing hardware when connecting as you're suppose to. Not working due to not getting enough juice is one thing, but this is something else again. Apple is playing with the big boys, this is the type of thing that cries out for a recall.

All the device can do is draw the current the specification says should be there, it can't know that the computer has any problem in supplying it!

PC manufacturers should ensure that either the front ports can supply the current to specification.

Amen-Moses

 

[bobtomay]

All the device can do is draw the current the specification says should be there, it can't know that the computer has any problem in supplying it!

PC manufacturers should ensure that either the front ports can supply the current to specification.

Amen-Moses

Can't limit this to PC manufacturers as much as you may like since Apple has done the same thing with the right side USB port of at least the MacBook Pro that I am aware of.

 

[Kilted1]

I'm glad to hear that it's working again