The 160GB Video iPod Classic I bought less than 3 months ago died yesterday while I was exercising on my [NordicTrack] Ski Machine, the very first time I used it while on the ski machine, in fact. Its screen froze about 20 minutes into the session and then displayed a red circle with an "X" in it. I knew I was in trouble, immediately jumping off the exercise machine to do hard resets and try bringing it up in Disk Mode as a solution described on the Apple Support site.
When I realized it wasn't coming back to life I was depressed and angry. It was ridiculous, really, to be that distraught over a stupid electronic device that died, but there it was. My new iPod was gone.
I didn't get extended coverage at Circuit City for the iPod, so I knew they couldn't help me when I went there with it this morning. I was out $369 bucks. The money didn't bother me, I was mourning the loss of my iPod.
Screw it. I'm buying a Zune!
Secretly this was the excuse I needed to go Zune. I'm still familiarizing myself with my new Zune 80, but it's very sweet! I'll blog about it more, I'm sure, but the story of my iPod is not over yet. I submitted an online Apple service request and have to say that I was very impressed. It required the entry of my Apple account info, my dead iPod's serial number, 2 or 3 dropdowns to identify the problem and a brief description of the problem. Within an hour I received what was obviously a human-proxied email informing me that a postage-paid shipping box would be sent to my home in which I was to place my iPod for return to Apple to be fixed or replaced at no cost to me.
I'll be sure to tell you how it plays out.