Help! My iPod went Berserk! Anyone know how to fix this?

[Phlosphr]

Ok, I have an iPod nano that I use at home, and a shuffle that I use when biking or hiking...I have 70 songs on the nano and today I was in the car long enough to hear all 70 of them - I thought. Well, that didn't happen, I found that every 5th song or so I'd hear a repeat. I thought I wasn't supposed to hear any repeats until the shuffle had played them all. Am I missing something? My iPod-Fu is obviously not very good, but come on now...why would there be repeats in a shuffle when that is the one thing it's not supposed to do? Right?
I looked on iTunes and I can see some songs are ranked, and some have little checkmarks next to them...what's that?

Sorry for my incompetance - any help?

[Caractacus Pott]

Google up "iPod shuffle option not random." You'll get pages of links, including this one that explains how the randomization works. Cliff Notes version: iPod shuffling is random, not repeatfree. Maybe that'll be in the next gen iPod. There are hundreds, if not a thousand, tracks that my iPod won't play on its own.

[Phlosphr]

Originally Posted by Caractacus Pott

Google up "iPod shuffle option not random." You'll get pages of links, including this one that explains how the randomization works. Cliff Notes version: iPod shuffling is random, not repeatfree. Maybe that'll be in the next gen iPod. There are hundreds, if not a thousand, tracks that my iPod won't play on its own.

Thousand thanks! I appreciate it.

[Tool of the Conspiracy]

Originally Posted by Caractacus Pott

Google up "iPod shuffle option not random." You'll get pages of links, including this one that explains how the randomization works. Cliff Notes version: iPod shuffling is random, not repeatfree. Maybe that'll be in the next gen iPod. There are hundreds, if not a thousand, tracks that my iPod won't play on its own.

It's repeat-free on my iPod... That thread was from 2005, but the iPod I had back then didn't repeat either, as long as I didn't interrupt the sequence of songs.
I'm listening to mine on shuffle right now; it says "193 of 2798". Unless I manually choose a song or select "shuffle songs" from the main menu, it'll go through my whole collection. I've done that once, when my computer crashed so I couldn't sync it.

Phlosphr, my guess is that either you're accidentally re-shuffling the songs (maybe when unpausing it?), or you have duplicate songs in your library.
The best solution is to add a couple thousand more songs.