Not enough confusion? It’s quite possible that iTunes on your Windows PC is going to complain too, though it’s an interesting error message because it suggests that the PC software can recognize a Mac formatted hard drive: There are a couple of other error message windows that could be popping up too (or instead) too, including: The only iPod with that feature, weirdly!) and here’s what you’re probably seeing: Let me step you through what you’re likely seeing and explain what’s going on, then show you how to proceed!įirst off, plug in your son’s iPod Nano (probably a 5th gen, my very favorite of all the iPods Apple ever released because it can record video and has a built-in FM receiver. Of course, it’s not completely symmetric because Macs are quite adept at reading Windows file system formats (generally “FAT” or “FAT32”) while Microsoft’s never really offered the same capability for its zillion Windows PC users: Plug a Mac drive into a PC and it just says “there ain’t nuthin’ on this. Most of the earlier generation of iPods also have the ability to serve as an external hard drive for your computer too, and it’s likely that’s related to the message you are seeing: when first set up, an Apple iPod is either formatted at the drive level to be Mac OS X or Windows compatible. While Apple has released many generations and styles of different iPod units they’re all still basically a hard drive with fancy software to make them seem like sleek, easy to use music and media players.

Change mac formatted disk to windows