Chosen Solution
battery cable connector broke
@star75 if you have broken your battery connector off the board and are wondering if your iPod will work while the USB cable is plugged in, then the answer is: Depends. Your USB port on your computer will not work nor will the older iPhone power adapter. An iPad adapter may work. Personally, I use a Firewire power supply for those iPods and it will work without issues. Check the answers to this question SOLVED: The Brown connector broken. - iPod 5th Generation (Video) - iFixit Different model but identical problem and essentially the same board.
Try it, unless you try you won’t know. New batteries are cheap enough.
