Ipod's breaking down

If have about 3 ipods over the years and every single one has eventually stopped working on me. The first, understandably, had the battery die. But my second two, same model the 30g ipod had to get one replaced, simply stopped working. I would try to turn it on and would simply hear a faint spinning and clicking sound and my computer would not recognize it. I was fairly gentle with them but could i simply have banged the hard drive inside around too much??

What Generation of iPods were these?

If the battery died, why didn't you just replace it? I've done several, it's not rocket science or anything...

I started with a 1st gen and when the battery died I went for a 3rd gen. instead of replacing the battery. I've gone through 2 30g 3rd generation Ipod's, both dying one me

The Gen 3 had lots of problems with the batteries and hard drives and have been considered the least reliable of all iPod models. If the HDDs died, you could have replaced them for less than the cost of a new one.

Are the new ipod videos worth the $300 price tag?

I've been happy with mine. Go take a gander at the iLounge Forums for more info.

are the 30g video ipod's 3rd gen?

No, the current crop of full sized iPods are Gen 5s....