i have a first gen 5gb ipod that i converted into windows. i love this thing! i've taken it on many snowboarding/mountainbiking trips w/o any problems. just be sure to get a nice case for it that'll absorb some of the hits. if you jiggle it around enough, it'll skip, but for me it's quite rare. it'll only skip if i'm flying downhill over some serious terrain.

ive had this thing for about 3 years now and the battery life is still at around 4 hours. if it gets any worse, theres a site that'll show you how to replace your battery for $50.

as for scratches, get the case. it'll keep your ipod looking and performing tip top for years to come.

the downsides that i've come to notice on my ipod is that it doesnt have an FM radio tuner. I take a train into work every morning and i really enjoy listening to stern in the morning. also, my poor ears would hurt due to the size of the earbuds that apple includes with the ipod. i purchased sony's mdr-ex71sl headphones which sounds a lot better than the ipod buds and theyre 100x more comfortable. they also block out a lot of the outside noise because they fit snugly into your ear canal.

instead of buying a portable fm player, i spent a few extra dollars on the nexia w/ a 1GB microdrive. the nexia is a flash player w/ fm tuner. this is a decent choice if youre looking for something a little less expensive. the FM radio is a little bit on the flaky side, but it works. the headphones are junk, and i'd highly recommend swapping those out asap. with a 256 card (non microdrive) the nexia will play forever and it wont skip (no moving parts)! and since it's so inexpensive, i use this as my outdoor music source.

 

You can replace the battery for around $60-$100. The battery works the best if you just hit play and don't touch it again. When you are constantly changing songs and messing with the menu, it wears the battery down faster because it is having to spin up the hard drive more often. It also lasts longer if you encode your songs at a lower bitrate because then the files are smaller and the buffer lasts longer before having to spin up the hard drive. I bought a belkin car adapter for my 30 GB so I don't have to worry about battery life in the car. It also has a line out jack that I use to feed the signal to my stereo. It's great on long trips.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by cykogirl
regarding the battery life issue: there have been varying reports and experiences across the board with ipod owners.

 

anyone run into this?

http://www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,61242,00.html

 

nice!

 

You can't go wrong with an iPod. I have a 2nd Gen 10gig that I'll probably sell and a new 3rd Gen 20 gig. Both are awesome, solid and very well made. They are 2 of the most fun things I've ever purchased.

Here's a good article on Apple's attention to detail with a cool link to all 3 generation iPods and their unique packaging.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?...notes100103.DTL


Well put by pwr24l, that it's one of those items that makes you wonder what you did before it came out. I use mine all the time and even keep my phone #s and addresses up to date on it.

As long as you keep it in a decent case you should be fine. I too like the iSkin exo cases, here's the latest one that just came out:

http://www.iskin.com/press_releases/exo2_press.html

Get the iPod, you won't regret it!

 

I spent $500 on my 40gb ipod. On amazon the 1GB microdrive is $180. $180x40=$7200!!! even to match your old ipod's 5gb it's $900, and to match the current bottom line ipod (10GB@$300) you'd have to spend $1800 on CF cards. The cost per unit storage is 6-14 times higher..I'd say that's more than a few extra dollars. A quick search yielded far better results.

For those who want to give me shit about my cost analysis, what can I say I try to be thrifty

 

thanks for the analysis! i guess for those who don't have $500 up front have the option of other manufacturers. but the ipod is definitely worth considering if you have a ton of mp3s. i think apple says that you can put about 10,000 songs which is about 4 weeks worth of music played continuously 24/7 or one song a day for the next 27 years. i'm not lying, it's on their website:
http://www.apple.com/ipod/

so its definitely convenient if you dont want to constantly move files back and forth. you can just move it from your PC to the player.

 

wow, thanks for all the replies cykogirl almost had me completely turned off of the ipod, but at the same time i also have a hard time convincing myself that it's worth paying half the price (if not more in some cases) to get only 256/512mb of storage. wish it wasn't as much as it was then i could just buy it and not think about how many hamburgers im forgoing

 

if you're really on a budget, print this thread, grab a pair of scissors and some scotch tape then you can use this: