iPhone Tips & Tricks: iPhone’s Recovery Mode, free space on your iPhone & more

BY Jason

Published 19 Aug 2007

iPhone

Apple’s iPhone is probably the most-hyped gadget ever created but it is not problem free.

Hopefully you don’t face this issue but if you know would like to know how to bail out of a situation where your iPhone is not restoring to resolve most of the documented errors on the iPhone or wondered how much free space should be kept on your iPhone, then read on.

Use "Recovery Mode" as the last option to rescue your iPhone

We all know that restoring the iPhone using iTunes is a troubleshooting lifesaver as it helps resolve most of the documented errors on the iPhone faced so far, especially important if you have tried one of those iPhone hacks which has caused your iPhone to behave abnormally. However, what does one do when restoring itself does not work, there is no reason to panic, as here is an iPhone tip to get you out of exactly that situation.

It is the iPhone’s "Recovery Mode", which is a mode in which you can force the iTunes to restore the iPhone to resolve any of the errors. You need to follow these steps to put the iPhone in recovery mode:

  • Disconnect your iPhone from your Mac or Windows computer.
  • Press and hold the sleep/wake and home buttons simultaneously for about 20-30 seconds, until you see a yellow triangle with an exclamation point in the middle accompanied by the text "Please Connect to iTunes."
  • Connect your iPhone to your computer and launch iTunes if it does not automatically launch.
  • You should see the below image

Advicable to keep some free space on the iPhone

You have got the spanking new iPhone and are planning to transfer you favorite music and videos to it and the following question crops up in your mind: "How much memory should I leave free on the iPhone?"

Here is an answer to your question (if at all), like you need free space in MAC OS X in a similar fashion iPhone’s OS X also needs free space for it to work properly. The desktop version of OS X requires at least 10 percent of the disk space to be free to avoid running into issues with the file system so it would be advicable that if you have filled up your iPhone without the 10 percent of breathing space and are facing problems of application crashing or freezing then you clear up at least 10 percent of free space to see if it helps.

Fix for not all tracks getting synced to the iPhone

It seems quite a few users are reporting an issue where iTunes fails to transfer all selected tracks to the iPhone. If you are one of them, then here is some of the options you have.

1. You simply re-create the iTunes library, as discussed in Apple Knowledge Base article #93313.
2. If that doesn’t work you will need to delete and then re-import the library using the following steps:

  • Quit iTunes
  • Backup your iTunes library (~/Music/iTunes under Mac OS X, Documents and SettingsusernameMy DocumentsMy Music under Windows XP and 2000 and UsersusernameMusic under Windows Vista) to a separate location (can be on the same volume)
  • Launch iTunes while holding down the option key under Mac OS X, or the Shift key under Windows and follow the steps to create a new library
  • In iTunes, choose Import from the File menu
  • Select the backed up iTunes music folder as a source folder
  • Restore any deleted preferences

Most of these iPhone tips and tricks has been courtesy of folks at iPhoneAtlas. Thanks guys you are doing a great job.

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