Friday, March 30, 2007

The Frowny Face of Doom

It was bound to happen sooner or later. I went to sync up my iPod last night to add the new Thelonious Monk/John Coltrane reissue and got an error message from iTunes that the device might be corrupt. All attempts to restart/reset/restore the iPod failed.

This was actually my second iPod. I got my first in July 2004. It served me well for two years till I had it replaced literally two days before the extended warranty expired for "battery issues." I got the replacement not long after that and it worked well for nine months. Which is kind of a ripoff, if you ask me.

Now I'm kind of stuck. I know the iPhone is coming in June... and a new generation iPod is probably right behind it. So it doesn't make any sense to buy a new iPod now since it will be outmoded in three our four months. But what to do until then? Carry cds around again?

UPDATE: It's an Easter Miracle. I was trying to show my co-worker and fellow iPod owner Pam what the "You're Screwed" Sad iPod Face looked like when, instead of frowning at me, the unit actually booted up. Attempts to play it, however, were fruitless as it appears to no longer have any music on it. Capacity = 37.1 GB. Available = 544 MB. Songs = 0. And the lock button indicator seems to turn on and off for no apparent reason. Maybe I'm less screwed than I was before. But it's still looking like I'm in the market for a new iPod.

UPDATED UPDATE: I tried to sync the iPod to iTunes again over lunch. Got the prompt to try and restore it again which iTunes couldn't do. Also still couldn't restart or restore the device. And now it makes this "whir-click" noise repeatedly until it cycles through its unsuccesful attempt to boot up. Fortunately, AppleInsider is reporting analysis today from Citigroup claiming new iPods are on the way. Unfortunately, they won't arrive until probably August or September. Has anybody upgraded to a new iPod and have an old unit just lying around I could borrow in the meantime?

Wednesday, March 07, 2007

Super Sweet

For the first time in ages, my minimum monthly credit card payment is less than it was last month. The new job with the higher pay is beginning to show dividends. And, after this next payment, my balance will be less than half of my total line of credit.

Of course, this would be better news if I hadn't run up $500 on my Best Buy account to get a Wii and a new external hard drive (one of those items, however, was an absolute neccesity. I'll leave it to you to decide which it was).