iPod shuffle restore utility

The latest, greatest, coolest Apple software is out. The iPod shuffle Reset Utility 1.0. There is a Windows version too. The utility fixes the following issues for the first generation of shuffle (aka, the stick):

• With the iPod shuffle switched on, pressing the Play button will cause amber and green LEDs to flash for a few seconds, and the unit will not play any music, nor can you sync music to it from iTunes.
• On a Windows PC, iPod shuffle will appear in My Computer as a “Removable Disk,” however the iPod shuffle volume will not mount correctly. The unit is listed in Device Manager under “Disk Drives” as “Apple iPod USB Device.”
• On a Mac, the unit will only be recognized in Apple System Profiler under Hardware -> USB and will not appear or mount in the Finder.
• When attempting to restore, the unit may not be recognized at all. However, if it is recognized, the restore may fail with an error dialog “Firmware update failure. Disk write error” or another error. It may take 3 restore attempts before the error appears. Note: iPod shuffle may take several minutes to be recognized.

It looks like it fixes most of the issues that cropped up back when iTunes 7 came out. It’s exciting. Really. Ok, maybe not, but it’s free and fixes problems.