Where should I buy my iPod?

In My Humble Opinion
1

So I’ve finally decided to buy one of the new gigantic 160GB iPods. I walked by them at my local Wal-Mart yesterday and almost bought one right there, since it’s the only place I’ll find one locally, but I thought I’d check around the 'net first.

Of course, it’s the same price everywhere; the best I’d do on the price is to find a place where I wouldn’t have to pay sales tax.* But if I buy it directly from the Apple store, they laser-engrave it for free, which is pretty cool.

Anyplace else offering any cool accessories/deals/sweeteners that might steer me in their direction?

  • True, I’ll have to claim it on my taxes at the end of the year, but I have to claim a certain amount anyway.
2

Occasionally, the Apple store has reconditioned iPods. Decent guarantees, and somewhat reduced prices. That’s probably as good as you’re going to get.

3

I got the new 160 GBer. Mine might be just a fluke, but I’ve been having problems with it that I didn’t have with my 60GB iPod.

This one freezes up iTunes when I try to go into the iPod itself, editing songs that are already on the iPod is quite a time wasting ordeal. (Anyone have any ideas what this would happen? XP with 2GB of memory and a dual core processor 2.1mhz. I plugged in my 60GB and my iPhone and neither had this problem).
I also don’t like the fact that when the backlight goes out, it flips to only showing time. I have to turn the backlight back on to see what song is playing. Not the end of the world, but kind of irritating.

4

Do you even have 160 gigs of media? I just got the 80G a few weeks ago and, after years of buildiong my music collection and a feew movies and TV shows, have yet to crack 18G.

Unless you have pillaged vast catalogues of intellectual property, go to a pawn shop and buy something in the approximate neighborhood of your actual needs.

5

[QUOTE=Krokodil]
Do you even have 160 gigs of media? I just got the 80G a few weeks ago and, after years of buildiong my music collection and a feew movies and TV shows, have yet to crack 18G.

Unless you have pillaged vast catalogues of intellectual property, go to a pawn shop and buy something in the approximate neighborhood of your actual needs.
[/QUOTE]

I have almost exactly 160GB of music, which is why I saw the release of the 160GB iPod as some sort of kismet.

It’s currently all on an external hard drive. I have a bimonthly radio show, and I lug the HD to the station along with my laptop. (I certainly don’t need 66 days of music for a 3-hour show, but I pride myself on my crazy deep catalog.) The iPod will make this a lot easier, not to mention allowing me to have the whole catalog at the office, in the car, etc.

And anyway, since when has gadgetry been about what you need? :slight_smile:

6

Target’s not looking good today.

7

[QUOTE=Finagle]
Occasionally, the Apple store has reconditioned iPods. Decent guarantees, and somewhat reduced prices. That’s probably as good as you’re going to get.
[/QUOTE]
I’ve bought two refurbed iPods from Apple, and they’ve been great. The deals might not be as good on the newest ones, but mine were both about half retail price.

8

[QUOTE=SuperNelson]
Target’s not looking good today.
[/QUOTE]

Hee hee…rock music…hee hee hee…

9

[QUOTE=Krokodil]
Do you even have 160 gigs of media? I just got the 80G a few weeks ago and, after years of buildiong my music collection and a feew movies and TV shows, have yet to crack 18G.
[/QUOTE]

Not counting however much music someone might have, if they intend to put video on it it’s really easy to get to 160 gigs.

10

Does it have to be an iPod?

They kinda have The Suck*, as anyone working in the electronics retail field will tell you.

*iTunes, dodgy batteries, generally crapping out on people, etc

11

[QUOTE=Martini Enfield]
Does it have to be an iPod?

They kinda have The Suck*, as anyone working in the electronics retail field will tell you.

*iTunes, dodgy batteries, generally crapping out on people, etc
[/QUOTE]

I love my iPod :stuck_out_tongue:

It’s a three year old model (not a current one) but the batteries are still working fine, no problems with it “crapping out” so far, and I use iTunes even when I’m not using the iPod because I like the way it keeps my library organised.

And I work in electronics retail.

YMM, of course, V.

12

[QUOTE=Cazzle]
I love my iPod :stuck_out_tongue:

It’s a three year old model (not a current one) but the batteries are still working fine, no problems with it “crapping out” so far, and I use iTunes even when I’m not using the iPod because I like the way it keeps my library organised.

And I work in electronics retail.

YMM, of course, V.
[/QUOTE]

It does indeed. You must have the functioning iPod that accidentally got sold here in Australia. I figured someone had to have it. :smiley:

iPods do seem to be a lot- as in, spectacularly moreso- popular with women than with men, I’ve noticed. We sell a lot to women for taking to the Gym, out jogging, and because they’re generally very “cute” or “funky”, which appeals to the Female 16-35 With Lots Of Money bracket. :wink:

We get so many of the bloody things coming back for repair, people bollocking us because the battery died after 9 months, or complaining that iTunes won’t work properly.

The only reason I don’t have a picture of the Apple Logo on a dartboard in the office is because they have made our job spectacularly easy.

Here’s how it used to go:

Random Customer Who Doesn’t Know Any Better: “Hi, I want an iPod.”
Me: “Do you want an Apple iPod, or an MP3 player from another company?”
RCWDKAB: “What’s the difference?”
Me: “Well, an MP3 player stores and plays digital music on it. An iPod is a type of MP3 player, but there are other types as well. You also need to have an internet connection to download a programme called iTunes to make an iPod work”
RCWDKAB: “Why?”
Me: “Excellent question. Ask Steve Jobs; he’s the CEO of Apple.”
RCWDKAB: “So, if I get another type of iPod, I don’t need this programme?”
Me:“Erm… yes, all iPods need that programme to work.”
RCWDKAB: “But you said some of them didn’t need it”
Me: “I said other MP3 players didn’t need them. iPods- which are a specific type of MP3 player-do need them to work.”
RCWDKAB: “I don’t understand… I’m confused now.”
Me: Sigh “What colour do you want?”

Then we all got sick of explaining the differences between “iPods” and “MP3 players” (In NZ, I note, “iPod” is a synonym for any MP3 player- Apple’s lawyers must hate the place now), so the conversations generally go like this now:

Random Customer Who Doesn’t Know Any Better: “I want an iPod”
Me: “Do you have a computer with the internet?”
RCWDKAB: “Yes”
Me: “What colour do you want?”

For the last couple of weeks, however, the conversations were generally something like this:

Random Customer Who Doesn’t Know Any Better: “I want an i…”
Me: “We don’t have any. Nobody does. Don’t ask me where you can get one because the answer is “Nowhere”. They’re bringing out the new ones, which haven’t arrived yet, and everyone’s out of stock of the old ones.”

Then we got some stock in and now we sell them as fast as we can get them out of the shipping cartons. Sales on other brands are down 137000% because all anyone wants is iPods- because most of our customers are teenagers who are brand and fashion obsessed, and older people who’ve never heard of anything except “iPod” and have decided that’s what they’re buying…

13

All this is doing Martini is reinforcing my opinion of electronics retailers.

I can pretty much guarantee you that the batteries are NOT failing after 9 months. I’d submit that the iPod was a)cooked, b) older than that, c)has something else wrong with it (run-in with the toilet), or d) the user is clueless.

I have no doubt you get your fair share of idiots, and I don’t envy you that, but I doubt ‘most iPod buyers are women’ simply because it takes up 70% of the market.

I’ll not get into a religious debate over it as you have your opinions and I have mine, I’d just suggest you spend a little more time following the scientific method when forming your opinions.

And with the OP: I’ll second the refurb option on store.apple.com, I’ve purchased a number of items that way.

14

You do not need to use iTunes to use the iPod.

15

I actually ended up buying it at Wal-Mart. My thought was that if anything went wrong I’d be able to take advantage of their notoriously lax return policies*, but as I was checking out I noted that they’ve harshened those up considerably–15 days with receipt. I already had it at the counter at that point, though.

  • A friend of mine in med school bought an XBox on eBay, but he didn’t want to wait on it and he was concerned that it would be damaged. So he bought a new one at Wal-Mart, figuring that he’d take it back when the eBay one came in and if that one was busted he’d put it in the box and return it instead. When we loaded up the ostensibly brand new XBox, it already had tons of saved Halo games on it, so someone beat us to that punch.
16

[QUOTE=Martini Enfield]
We get so many of the bloody things coming back for repair, people bollocking us because the battery died after 9 months, or complaining that iTunes won’t work properly.
[/QUOTE]

You are falling into the auto dealership technician trap. Every car they see is broken. Every customer they talk to is pissed off. If they are not careful they begin to believe that the brand they work for only produces defective cars. none of their customer ever stop in to say, hey I have not having any problems.

The only iPods you see coming back are the ones that are broken*. The vast majority of the iPods you sold do not have any problems, and therefore the customers have no reason to come back. By your own admission you sell a metric buttload more iPods than any other MP3 player, so it stands to reason you will get more of them back.
*Or have a problem that is located between the keyboard and chair.

17

My ex got a first gen iPod Shuffle and the battery failed after something like six months. He ranted and raved a little, then logged into Apple’s site and registered the fault on a Thursday or Friday. Over the weekend, he suddenly realised that he’d been plugging the iPod into an unpowered USB port and that there was nothing wrong with the battery, it was simply not charged (duh!). He charged it and was happy again. On the Monday, a new Shuffle arrived in the mail from Apple with a return envelope instructing him to send back the “faulty” Shuffle and informing him that there would be no charge unless it turned out the “faulty” unit wasn’t faulty. He panicked a bit, then ran the battery down on the “faulty” Shuffle and returned it to them. He never saw a bill for it.

I was really happy with that service. Aside from Apple’s service centre apparently being unable to detect that a Shuffle with a flat battery isn’t faulty, I thought every step of that process was well-handled by them.

18

I bought my 80Gb one at Apple.com. I could have bought it at Costco for $10-20 cheaper, but Apple.com offered free engraving and free shipping.

It’s soooo cute to have my name on it.

BTW, Costco also sells $50 iTunes gift cards for $40.

19

[QUOTE=PunditLisa]
BTW, Costco also sells $50 iTunes gift cards for $40.
[/QUOTE]
Dang! We don’t have a Costco near here. I wonder if Sam’s Club has a similar deal.

20

[QUOTE=Rick]
You are falling into the auto dealership technician trap. Every car they see is broken. Every customer they talk to is pissed off. If they are not careful they begin to believe that the brand they work for only produces defective cars. none of their customer ever stop in to say, hey I have not having any problems.

The only iPods you see coming back are the ones that are broken*. The vast majority of the iPods you sold do not have any problems, and therefore the customers have no reason to come back. By your own admission you sell a metric buttload more iPods than any other MP3 player, so it stands to reason you will get more of them back.
*Or have a problem that is located between the keyboard and chair.
[/QUOTE]

Even so, there’s still proportionately more iPods coming back for repair

To give you an example: I’ve sold 5 iPods this week, and 2 have already come back in for repair. I’ve sold 4 of the Creative Zen units this week, and none have come back.

Granted, our store’s customer base has a disturbingly high n00b factor (Even our Area Manager has commented on it!), but if people can’t work the product, that’s still a “Fault”, in that we have to refund the product because people bring it back and say “I can’t work iTunes!” or “iTunes messed up my computer!” or “I don’t have the internet!”. Because of our 7 day no questions asked refund policy, we have to refund the customers money- and get stuck with a now used unit, which we have to sell at a loss, all because Apple insist on A) not providing a driver CD with their products and B) incorporating a whole host of DRM stuff into their products which causes problems for the end user (such as wiping all the songs off your iPod unless you tell it not to synch with iTunes each time you plug it in- which is too hard for most of our customers).

They are, in my professional opinion, a lot more trouble than they’re worth, and most of the other managers and sales staff in our region agree. Hey, if you want to give us money for the shiny Apple product, fine. But there are better brands which offer better value for less money out there, and if you ask our opinion that’s exactly what we’ll tell you to buy, because in the long run, it works out a lot better for everyone.

I can’t speak for iPod sales across the entire country, but at our store, over 75% of iPod sales are to women. We do sell a few to guys (about 1 in 4 iPod sales are to a guy), but for our store, iPods are very much a “female” product. YRMV.