I’ve been having a problem with my iPod where it would not load the proper drivers in my Windows7 64-bit desktop.
It worked for a long time, then suddenly it didn’t. I found links at apple.com and other places of things to try but nothing did – until a thumbs drive also would not load drivers and while fixing that I fixed the iPod driver.
This is could happen with any USB storage device (iPhone, iPad, thumbdrive, external USB drive) – which also happens to be one of the functions of the iPod.
My initial problem was the iPod showing up under “Other Devices” with a yellow exclamation:
For the basic fix, right click the device and choose “Update driver software”
Choose “Browse my computer for driver software”
And point the directory to “C:WindowsSystem32DriverStoreFileRepository” and enable “Include subfolders” in the Browse window.
If this doesn’t find the right drivers (it didn’t for me) try this:
Go to C:Windowsinf and verify usbstor.inf and usbstor.pnf files exist. If they do, rename them to usbstor.inf.old and usbstor.pnf.old before proceding
Locate the latest usbstor.inf and usbstor.pnf files from C:WindowsSystem32DriverStoreFileRepositoryusbstor.inf
(note the directory name only starts with usbstore.inf – the whole name will be like usbstor.inf_amd64_neutral_26b33263a639795d)
If there are multiple usbstor.inf* directories or the most recent usbstor.inf* directory has multiple usbstor.inf/.pnf files use the most recent files (and directory)
Copy the usbstor.inf and usbstor.pnf files to C:Windowsinf.
Delete the usb device that won’t load the drivers (left-click to select and hit the delete key) and then right-click the host name in device manager and choose Scan for Hardware Changes
With any luck your device will then appear.
