Comments on: iPod 5th Generation SSD Upgrade with iFlash and Sandisk SD cards

By: Paul

Paul — Thu, 13 Aug 2026 23:48:48 +0000

Thank you for this post, I found it incredibly useful! I have a 5th gen iPod video and have swapped out the battery and hard drive for a dual micro sd board. I now have 400gb of space; wonderful!

By: Nic

Nic — Wed, 29 Sep 2021 21:48:17 +0000

iPod 5th gen can’t be used as a portable solution for your large movies library

I have 5.0 gen iPod, originally 30GB but iFlashed to 256gb with a single sd card. I only have around 8000 songs, including about 400 in lossless ALAC, and typically 30 or so podcasts on it. This leave around 200gb unused that I had planned to fill me my 250 ripped DVD movie files (converted to ~1GB “iPod or iPhone” format by iTunes). However, I found that transferring more than around 30 movies causes the iPod’s content to not show up – the iPod appears to be empty of all content even though iTunes says all the songs and movies are on it (and the iPod’s ‘About’ screen says most of the 256gb is used up). I replicated this issue every time I exceed 30 or so movies, on both MacOS Mojave and Catalina. I also get the issue if I turn on disk mode and use the iPod as a USB drive for the movies instead of syncing them via iTunes.

Thought I’d share just in case anyone else was thinking of using their old iPod od as a portable movie store.

By: Matthew Westlake

Matthew Westlake — Sat, 18 Sep 2021 21:45:36 +0000

High John I bought an iflash solo sd card board and a 256gb SD card but I keep getting the dead ipod logo and I have replaced the upgraded 3000 mah battery twice now is there something wrong with the hard drive cable I still have the original one installed what are your thoughts thanks?

By: John Large

John Large — Tue, 31 Aug 2021 16:21:38 +0000

In reply to Al Rogers. It will definitely be trial & error. I switched to two 64GB cards because I wanted a much more curated music collection for on the go. Definitely give it a go if you need so much space, if not, buy enough space for your needs.

By: Al Rogers

Al Rogers — Tue, 24 Aug 2021 20:07:24 +0000

John; I’m starting my first mod on my 5th gen, 30gb iPod. I have the parts ordered which includes a quad sd card holder. I want to use a 512 sd card micro, is this possible or will it be trial and error.

By: John Large

John Large — Thu, 28 Mar 2019 21:24:06 +0000

In reply to Tassy K. The problem I have with my iPod is that it is a bit of a Frankenstein. The original 5th gen logic board needs a reflow after one of the components desoldered with age. I've yet to do it, but I got a refurbed logic board from eBay. The refurbed board in there now is actually a 5.5 gen enhanced model (with search function & brightness controls), but I don't know if it came from a 30GB model or a larger HD model, so I'm not sure how much ram it has for sure. I currently have almost 30k tracks on there without issue, so it could be that it has 64MB. The 5.5 gen seems to be the ultimate logic board as it has more features, is less prone to desoldering (i believe they changed the soldering process) & still features the Wolfson DAC.

By: Tassy K

Tassy K — Thu, 28 Mar 2019 20:50:21 +0000

I have heard the 30gb 5th gen iPods have a 32mb ram chip while the 60gb and 80gb have 64mb. Apparently if your iTunes dB file exceeds the ram you have (32gb = approx 17k songs) your music may not show up.

By: John Large

John Large — Tue, 05 Feb 2019 15:36:26 +0000

In reply to Brandon da Costa. If it's a 5.5 I can confirm that it supports at least 256GB ( I have a mixture of 64GB and 128GB cards in at present & it reports the full 256GB in iTunes). So the 5.5 board definitely supports higher capacities.

By: John Large

John Large — Tue, 05 Feb 2019 15:35:09 +0000

In reply to Rick. Not sure of a maximum size? I'm using 4 x 128GB cards now without any issues. It will be trial & error situation I'm afraid.

By: Rick

Rick — Sat, 20 Oct 2018 15:23:45 +0000

Hi John, is there a maximum capacity on the cards I can use? I would like to add the max since I’m using all apple lossless files. Thanks

By: Brandon da Costa

Brandon da Costa — Tue, 18 Sep 2018 14:38:05 +0000

Hello John, I recently purchased a refurbished Ipod Classic 5.5 and will be doing this upgrade in the near future. Do you know what the max GB iTunes can handle? I have seen some people say iTunes limited the 5th Generation to 128GB. Don’t want to go overboard and try to push past 128-256 if the program by itself won’t read it.

By: John Large

John Large — Thu, 09 Aug 2018 17:57:31 +0000

In reply to Lars. You will need to restore with itunes for the ipod to work. As soon as you add another card, the ipod will fail to boot requiring an itunes restore.