In sad news, my iPod appears to be dying slowly. I don't mean dying as in charge running out; I mean dying as in forever gone away. In the last two weeks, I'd say that I have had to reset my iPod an average of once a day. Some days, I don't have to reset it at all, and other days three times or more. The problems seem to be legion--not playing when I press play (no movement of the times), not turning off when I pause and lock it, thus running down the battery, no sound at all (coupled with movement of the times, so it appears to be playing), not lighting up or charging when I plug it into a dock--and vary from day to day. Some days it's one problem, some days it's multiple problems. The last week has been especially bad, requiring a reset any time I want to take it out and listen to it.
If you have an iPod, you understand that this is NOT normal behavior for one of them. Resets shouldn't be necessary except for every once in a while. Sam thinks re-installing the software might help, but I'm pretty fatalistic. This is, after all, a machine that's two years old. It gets heavy, heavy use. Some days it plays for 10 hours (2 commuting hours, 8 hours at my desk). It bangs around my purse all the time, and even though I've got it in a hard-shell plastic case, it's still getting banged around.
Obviously, I would rather not have to replace it. I will if I have to (there is no earthly way I could survive commuting and desk time without an iPod), and there is a little bit of excitement at the idea of having a fresh, new iPod Classic. At the same time, I think if you've got one, you can understand the dread that comes from the thought of having to rebuild your iPod. All my playlists are saved in iTunes, of course. Except they're from the last time I had to rebuild this iPod, which was....ages ago. At least a year and a half ago. Anything that was added to the iPod since that time isn't saved anywhere, which means I somehow have to remember it, and add it. It's not the worst thing in the world, because this time I'll add those things to the playlists and those will be updated again, but it's not the best, either. It's tedious, and it's kind of sad. There will also be some issues with figuring out if I have to deauthorize the last iPod so the bought music will play on the new one (Goddamn your DRM, Apple!). It's all rather icky to think about, so I'm trying not to right now. Writing the blog entry? Not helping, clearly.
Annnnywaaay, it's kind of sobering to realize how attached I am to that little sucker, because the thought of losing it does fill me with some sort of loss. Not just the loss of the make-up of the thing, but actual loss of that actual iPod, as it's served me so well, and bears an inscription that I'll never best. I think I might actually get the same inscription on the new one, though that feels kind of weird. We'll see. Maybe I won't need a new one (though Sam doesn't appear to be too hopeful about the survival of the current one, even with his software fix theory), and maybe this'll all be pushed back 6 months or 9 months or a year (because let's face it, it will eventually need to be replaced.). I'm still going to have to rebuild the thing, because when you wipe it off and restore the software, all the music goes too. Thank god I'm sort of in between audiobooks, because losing my place in one of those would be really bad. Anyway, I'll post an obit if it's really dead.
Comments