seems my previous issue of the built in search causing crashes has finally evolved to just plain brain spasms. recently the ipod (3rd gen) started rebooting after doing app updates and sometimes after synching. been adding an app here and there over the last few week, until finally yesterday where after a sync (not even sure if it completed fully) it just went into endless reboots. the home/power combo shuts it down, but as soon as it starts, it goes into the loop again. connecting it to itunes doesn't help anything, itunes will see it for a brief period of time, while the ipod is still in reboot, but then it reboots itself anyway, ignoring the itunes connection. i tried doing a restore when it was connected, but it doesn't care that itunes wants to initiate one, it just keeps going around in a circle like an idiot. is there some sequency that will force it to STFU? or do i have to take it to an apple store this weekend... and no, no jailbreaking involved here. TIA.
yup, just found the article last night... http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1808 seems to be solid now. although i still haven't dared to try searching to see if it crashes with that. might just have to wait till folders come in a few months.
Restore and re-sync your stuff. If it happens again after that, I'd suggest you take it to an Apple store because this is now sounding like a hardware problem.
i still think it has something to do with the number of app search results i get when doing a search. if i have say 500 or so apps on the thing, all searches are fine, but like now where i have about 650, the more 'popular' letters will cause a search crash. it seems to also have something to do with how many of those search results are on the 'hidden' pages as I didn't have this problem when i had this many apps and had about 9 extra pages (with that force page cheat). anyway, hoping once folders come out this won't be an issue...
The search issue is one thing (although I'm still not sure about your theory, since searches for some letters give me almost 1000 results and I've had no problems), but I don't see the link between that problem and consistent failed syncs that dump you into a reboot loop. In fact, as far as I can see there's no way Spotlight could even run while you're syncing. What you're experiencing now suggests to me either a corrupt system file (which could result from a failed jailbreak or an interrupted firmware upgrade), in which case a restore would fix the problem, or it's a hardware issue.
I think the search has gotten better since 3.1.3, my ipod would start getting flaky at around 500 apps, and crash frequently around 530. Since then I've just glitched pages like crazy and don't search as much. I've had it get stuck in the reboot cycle a few times - sometimes it corrects itself after a number of reboots. The two times that it hasn't, I unplug it and let the battery drain, then plug into iTunes. One of these it came right back, the other time I had to restore it.
i know what you mean about the results, as it should be fairly easy to break that with music on the device as well, so it seems to be limited somehow to the app results themselves. there's a fairly long thread about this on the apple forums, but i can't seem to find the link at the moment. all i can say is that dropping the number of active apps on the thing make the problem go away. the more i install, the flakier it gets... i think if it was a hardware issue, it would be present all the time, indifferent to which letters i search for or how many apps i have. there's also the fact that the apps loaded have to stay in some memory index somehow too, but then again there's users out there that have many more apps than me, unless of course they don't have all of them synced to the device at the same time(?).
I've got the same problem except my ipod is a second gen. and jail-broken. it has to be jail-broken though because the sleep button hasn't worked for probably a year. so no fixing it this time, as far as i can tell
i eventually found a solution, on apple's site, have the link on a different computer, if you want i'll find it when i get the chance. i think it was a combo of key presses though, like turning the unit on while holding the home button down or something, to force it into some wipe mode. but yeah, if one of the buttons on the device is shot it might not be of any help.
