iPod video on Linux
 

I just bought an iPod video 30 GB. I am able to mount it in Linux as a USB mass storage device (as /dev/sda2) but GTKPod does not seem to recognize the device and crashes with an error (I don't know if this is a Debian package specific error or a GTKPod one though).

My question is very simple. Can I just copy files and folders from my system to the iPod directly as my brother does with his iRiver H340?

Or should I use the specific tools provided to do this?

No, you can't just copy files to iPod and expect it to recognize them. Sorry, but your brother got much better deal with his player.

Did you try to use your iPod with Amarok?

I would have preferred an iRiver, but the model which supports USB Mass Storage was just not available right now.

The iRiver H340 is just not available now... it's much more feature rich than the iPod video and I would have preferred it too.

So you suggest amarok? Thanks. I'll try one too...

I installed gtkpod-aac and now it works. Amarok had some problems reading the correct path on the iTunesDB and so I couldn't use it for copying files to the iPod.

Now it works! I'm currently ripping my favourite movies to view with the iPod using acidrip...

Nice to hear that...

To convert and upload ipod formatted video files, have a look at http://thinliquidfilm.org. It's a gui to batch encode and upload video files to an ipod. Very cool little app.