Need help please! Sansa 1GB won't "boot" up anymore...

MP3 players Sansa Clip | Clip+
1

Hey all… I’m hoping you can help me here…

Last night, I plugged my Sansa 1GB Clip into my iMac. It mounted correctly and everything was ok. Then, I opened Parallels (Windows XP Emulator for Mac) and when Windows was installing the drivers for the Sansa, it locked up and the screen on the Sansa froze… I let it sit like that for quite awhile (over 30 mins) and nothing happened so I decided to unplug it from the data cable… what a mistake that was!!!

Now, the Sansa won’t fully “boot” up - It turns on and flashes the logo and then freezes up and won’t go any further… Also, when I connect it to my PC (not my Mac, an actual XP box), it is not recognized by windows. Instead, I get a message that a USB device attached to this computer has failed…

During the course of troubleshooting the device, I was successful in getting it to boot up in MSC mode. My system now recognizes the Clip and I am able to get into it via My Computer. I can see the system files and folders, etc. (even though all my music appears to be gone) but that’s about as far as I can get with it.

I have downloaded the firmware updater and installed it. When I boot the device in MSC mode, the updater recognizes it, downloads the new firmware (01.01.20), and installs it. It then prompts me to unplug the device to finish the update but when I do, the screen on the Sansa switches over to “Firmware update in progress” and sits there eternally…

I have also manually downloaded the firmware update from this website and copied the file to the root of the device as instructed, however the same thing happens as soon as I unplug it…

I have let it sit at the firmware updating screen for a very long time just to be sure it’s not just a slow process. In fact. I let it sit at that screen overnight and when I got up this morning, it was still at the screen…

I just don’t know what else to do or try. Is my Clip shot? Is there a way to restore it at all?

Any advise would be most appreciated!!

Thanks in advance…

2

If you can connect in MSC mode on a Windows box, first make sure you can view all files and folders in Windows Exploder, then try deleting all the Mac housekeeping files and folders you can find (.Trashes, .DS_Store etc.) on the Clip. Then download the m300a.bin file from hereunzip it to a temporary location, copy it into the root folder of the Clip, and disconnect.

I suspect that the interrupted transfer resulted in some file fragments and/or Mac filesystem overhead being left in an incomplete state and the Clip can’t deal with it. Hopefully deleting them will allow the Clip to get past the initial part of it’s boot sequence and rad in the firmware file…

3

Thanks for the fast response…

I am able to connect in MSC mode on a Windows box and can see all the files/folders on the Clip, however there don’t appear to be any Mac housekeeping files on it from what I can see… Yes, I have all files and folders turned on btw.

Here’s a list of the files/folders presently on the Clip:
.Spotlight-V100 (is this a Mac file?)
MTABLE.SYS
RES_INFO.SYS
SYS_CONF.SYS
version.sdk
AUDIBLE <DIR>
MUSIC <DIR>
RECORD <DIR>

That’s it right now…

I have tried moving .Spotlight-V100 out of the Clip directory, I have removed the MTABLE.SYS file (although it just recreated it again with the same playlist for the songs that are no longer present in the Clip - could that be the cause? Is it trying to load these mp3’s and is getting stuck because they’re no longer there?)

Am I missing any files?

When I copy the m300a.bin over to the root and disconnect the Clip, it gets hung up again trying to update the firmware… even after removing the above mentioned files…

Any other suggestions?
Is there a place I can obtain new system files for the Clip and just replace the ones that are there?
Last, can you format the Clip via Windows Explorer? I guess what I mean is, is it “safe” to do?

Thanks again for your help!!

4

since you get to recognized from windows, did you try to format from windows > unplug > reattach, install firmware > unplug??

5

You can actually delete everything in the Clip’s folder structure and it will rebuild it when powered up. Of course if it’s bricked, it might not get that far…

What you might try next, if amkoas’ suggestion doesn’t help, is connecting in MTP mode  (Win XP, WMP 11) and check again for any Mac filesystem stuff. MSC and MTP modes maintain seperate filesystems (sort of) on the Clip and it’s possible that something is corrupted in the MTP region (not necessarily Mac files, but something else) and you haven’t looked in there yet - if you format the Clip via Windows in MSC mode, the MSC region is cleared, but anything in the MTP area will remain…

Since you don’t use MTP mode, and don’t have anything to lose, I would go ahead and clean out (delete) all the MTP area contents and see if that helps…

If it does come back, use the Clip’s format menu option to make sure it’s “clean” from the Clip’s perspective.

6

Hello

I have the same problem as AthieN had a year ago. I also did more or less the same things he did in more or less the same order - the problem appeared when I deleted files off the Clip player (emptied the trash) and disconnected the player from my Mac - it froze and all I could do is turn it off and on, in the process of which it only got to the welcome screen. It was not recognizable after resetting it (holding the power on button for 20s) not on mac nor on XP. It got recognized after I forced it to use MSC mode so I updated it to .32 version after which I also got that “firmware upgrade in progress” screen staying there for ever. After that I once again got it recognized so I tried updating it again (both times I used the sandisk software), because I thought I shouldn’t have disconnected the cable before pressing the finalze button. But the “firmware upgrade in progress” did not want to go away.

But now I can not get it recognized anymore - I always get the “One of the USB devices attached to this computer has malfunctioned, and Windows does not recognize it. For assistance in solving this problem, click this message.” message on Windows and nothing happens if I plug it in my Mac.

If I turn the player on now, first I get the welcome screen for about 10s and then the “Firmware upgrade in progress screen”.

What can I do?

Would it help if I could somehow delete whatever Windows installed when the device was first pluged in and how would I do that? I’m thinking about that because when I first pluged it in not forcing it to use MSC, I got the malfunctioned device message, and then the first time forcing it to use MSC, I did not install all the drivers that Windows wanted me to, only the mass storage device one, but the second and last time it got recognized, I installed all drivers that I got offered to install (first was mass storage device, second was “disk drive”, can’t remember the third).