So I pull out my replacement iPod, turn it on and -voila!- sad face icon

Sad face icon, right out of the box, right in front of Genius's face

A cute little failure icon appeared and that was the end of the story

Mine worked fine for 7 months then the hard drive kept spinning up, over and over, but would never engage and the screen displayed a sad face icon

I bought it from Apple's Refurb site, and when it arrived, it showed the sad iPod icon

Sad face icon

but when you get that sad face icon it basically needs service

Always the same "Sad Face" icon that will not respond to any of the simple procedures that Apple or HP propose to remedy the problem

I LOVE MY NEW I POD