Nike iPod hacking

posted Jan 23rd 2007 6:57am by Will O'Brien
filed under: ipod hacks

Someone else’s apathy often becomes someones motivation. The guys at Gordian Labs got sick of trying to use Nike’s website so they dug into their iPods to find the data generated by the iPod+Nike running shoe add on. Then they put together a handy site for processing the data from the iPod. The site also accepts GPX data, so you can combine it with GPS data to track your runs and your routes. After they showed it to me, I prodded them and they put together a short How-To on getting the data under Mac, Windows and Linux.

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Comments [23]

Reader Comments

sweet, that could come in useful if i ever bring myself to get off the computer and go running.

Posted at 7:50 am on Jan 23rd, 2007 by Sonderling-Meister

I’ve always wondered, can the Nike iPod running thing work with the iPod Video? It seems like it should be able to…

Posted at 8:10 am on Jan 23rd, 2007 by ian

You probably could use an ipod video, but I wouldn’t recommend it.

They’re fatter and much more breakable.

Posted at 8:23 am on Jan 23rd, 2007 by Brandon

@#2
Doesn’t the ipod video use a hard drive rather than flash? If so, you shouldn’t go running with a hard disk in your pocket.

Posted at 11:53 am on Jan 23rd, 2007 by Alex

Cool! now only have something that gets you running

Posted at 12:15 pm on Jan 23rd, 2007 by Mark

ian: the nike+ thing does not work with the ipod video for the reason that alex mentioned. Apple says that running with a hard drive based player would dramatically shorten the life of it so they did not include support for the nike+ thing. Covering their ass kinda thing.

on the otherhand… is this really a hack? I mean the nike+ reciever just outputs xml files with all the info in them. This is basically just a program that interprets and does things with the data. I don’t think I’d really call it a hack to show hidden files and use them in a very similar way that nike already does. It’s cool, don’t get me wrong, you can do more in depth stuff with the data if you wanted or whatever (like adding the gpx stuff to it) and the nike+ website is kidna annoying sometimes.

They have however fixed a lot of the issues with their site (they said it was mostly a high traffic issue). Now during the peak hours you have to click on things twice, it’s very usable. I use the nike+ site, I’m new to running so it does everything that I want it to do.

Posted at 1:07 pm on Jan 23rd, 2007 by sinerasis

man, now I play the waiting game.. for midi clock output from stepping with those nike shoes. sigh.

Posted at 5:24 am on Jan 24th, 2007 by disasteradio

ok, lool at me coz i always thought this nike+pod thing in my nano was just some useless option so now im totally confused how do i use that option do i need to buy some extra accessorie.

Posted at 6:18 am on Jan 24th, 2007 by garryb

garryb: yes you need the nike+ sport kit. it consists of the reciever (the white thing that you plug into the ipod) and the sensor (a little pill looking thing that you put in your shoe).

It’s $29US on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Nike-iPod-Sport-MA365LL-B/dp/B000JVFKH8/sr=8-3/qid=1169701082/ref=pd_bbs_3/002-8739188-3235251?ie=UTF8&s=electronics

Posted at 10:59 pm on Jan 24th, 2007 by sinerasis

The guys over at SparkFun broke one down as well.

http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/present.php?p=Nike_iPod-Internals

Posted at 2:58 pm on Jan 26th, 2007 by thetable

just a little fyi, if you’ve got a nano already, and you’re even remotely interested in running, pick up the nike+ sport kit. for 30 dollars you can’t really go wrong, and you don’t need special nike+ shoes to use them. I sewed up a little cloth pocket that ties to my shoelaces on some nice Asics (nike makes lousy running shoes) and it works fine.

Posted at 8:16 pm on Jan 26th, 2007 by nick gordon

thetable: that is a sweet link, thanks for it. I find it pretty sweet that they say the hardware is there to do some short range ipod to ipod transmissions with those recievers. Could open up some strange things with the ipod linux people…

Posted at 12:45 am on Jan 27th, 2007 by sinerasis

I know this question was already asked, but has anyone tried to use the ipod video. I dont really wanna buy another ipod just so i can run with it, already have the shoes.

Posted at 11:22 am on Jan 29th, 2007 by ipod video

I have an ipod video and i run with it all the time just so i can listsin to music? it still works after about 100 miles of running.

Will the software part of the nike sensor work with the video, because it does didly squat , all you have to do if something happens is press menu and the middle button and everything is fixed if it gets shaken up to much.

Posted at 5:27 pm on Feb 5th, 2007 by Ben

@14: You will probably kill your iPod off early if it needs to be reset every so often. If it gets shaken up at all, you could cause permanent damage to the HDD and eventually, you will need to replace. Your running habits will probably shorten your iPod’s lifetime by a large amount.

Posted at 2:59 pm on Mar 10th, 2007 by 7031

I tried my wife’s Nike Do-hicky in my Video and got “The currently attached device is not supported by this IPod.”
So does anyone know a hack?

Posted at 2:00 pm on Mar 20th, 2007 by Beau

Can anyone make the nike + ipod work for a ipod video?

Posted at 2:27 pm on Jun 15th, 2007 by Zoe

Hi every one! First I want yall to know that I know almost nothing about computers… Im in the Army and I run with my Ipodvideo all the time!! From what I read above I guess that a stupid thing to do!!! Ive never thought that running with my ipodvideo would be bad for it… thats the only reason I bought one!! Anyway, now that I think about it and if I get the whole Hard drive thing right… Running with an ipod video is just like constantly shaking your note book as you use it!?? If thats the case maybe its not the brightest idea!!;-) Anyway!, I might buy and ibod nano now that I know that… Does anybody know how to make the ipod video work with the ipod nano running thing!!!??? Im kinda dissapointed with the whole ipodvideo thing!!! Darn ipods are always acting erratic anyway!!! I guess you are supposed to just sit and use the thing when you are waiting at an airport or something!!! Worthless!! Thanks (In advance!) for the help!!

Posted at 8:13 pm on Jul 18th, 2007 by HECTOR

why, if ipod videos are not meant to be used for running is equipment sold which is designed for you to use for running with your ipod video?
for example skins, with the armbands for running?

Posted at 6:27 am on Sep 9th, 2007 by Char

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Posted at 6:44 am on Apr 3rd, 2008 by john marks

Seriously, all you “hackers” out there that tell us its not a good idea to run with a hard drive quit making excuses of why you don’t have a solution. I have been running for years with mine. I have done everything imaginable to the thing and it works 100%. So my comment is simply this: quit telling me running with my ipod video is a bad idea and provide a solution or shut your mouth, because you really don’t have of anything of value to say to me, do you?!!!!!

Posted at 1:39 pm on May 20th, 2008 by Medwards

@Medwards
The only fix for running with harddrive is flasging your firmware with Rockbox and let the ipod load the first few songs into ram and shutdown the harddrive. So your harddrive will be spinning less often. still generally speaking running with an ipod with harddrive is a bad idea since harddrive + motion = bad. If your ipod isn’t broken it doesn’t mean it’s not taking damage.

Posted at 8:20 am on Oct 17th, 2008 by jpeg4

sneakers

Posted at 11:21 pm on Apr 10th, 2009 by tvaughan