Man says 'Apple never expected anyone to do this' after taking an old iPod and making it run an unsupported iOS

A tech enthusiast managed to do something that ‘shouldn’t be possible’ after taking an old Apple iPod and running it with an unsupported iOS.

Apple launched the iPod back in November 2001, and it was a piece of seriously ground-breaking tech at the time. 

Rather than having to lug around a CD player and a selection of disks, music-lovers could simply download hundreds of songs onto their iPod and off they went.

After the original was launched, Apple introduced other models, including the Nano and Touch, before discontinuing the product altogether in 2022. 

He was able to do something that ‘shouldn’t be possible’ with the old iPod Touch

During its two-decade-long run, more than 450 million iPods were sold across the world. 

Although original iPods can sell for a small fortune these days, newer models can be picked up pretty cheaply online. 

Which is what YouTuber and tech lover Hugh Jefferys recently did, and after buying the old device, he did something that ‘Apple never expected anyone to do’. 

In a clip uploaded to his channel, Hugh starts by showing off his 4th-generation iPod Touch before pointing out something unusual about it.

“It’s running iOS 7. This shouldn’t be possible. Yet, it is,” he said. 

“You see, the iPod Touch 4 only ever supported iOS 4 through 6.”

However, Hugh explained that the hardware in the old iPod was pretty similar to that in the iPhone 4, which could run iOS 7, so he decided to try and find out if Apple missed a trick by not allowing the updated operating system on the device. 

To do so, Hugh had to use a special tool that allowed him to install iPhone 4 firmware on the iPod. 

He then had to put it into DFU, which completely wiped the device. 

And, because the iOS wasn’t officially signed in, he needed a computer to boot it up. 

After all of that, he was able to turn the 4th-generation iPod Touch on and – ta dah – it was running iOS 7. 

But did he become so preoccupied with whether or not he could that he didn’t stop to think if he should?

The whole point of Hugh setting up iOS 7 on the vintage iPod Touch was to determine whether or not Apple should have allowed it when the device was originally released back in 2010. 

“Should the iPod 4 have received iOS 7, or did Apple make the right call?” he asked. 

But testing that out in reality, saw Hugh hit quite a few bumps in the road, namely the fact that the hack he got to run iOS 7 made the device think it was an iPhone, which meant it couldn’t use Apple servers, as it lacked an IMEI. 

It also had some issues with its WiFi connection, and the battery constantly displayed at 100 percent, even when it wasn’t. 

Oh, and it couldn’t connect to iTunes or the App Store, meaning he’d need to use jailbreak tools to download apps. 

Aside from those problems, iOS 7 did play reasonably well on the iPod Touch, at least for basic use, although it did slow down significantly when trying to multitask. 

Overall, did Hugh think Apple made the right decision?

“While in 2013, not getting the iOS 7 upgrade may have been a disappointment, I think it was the right call because iOS 7 was notably sluggish,” he said. 

“And once you updated, Apple doesn’t allow you to go back.”

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