iPod Mini Weirdness

I recently bought an iPod mini and had the weirdest thing happen this morning… I was listening to it and saw that the battery was low. I had my laptop next to me and decided to charge it. Took out the firewire cable and plugged it into my laptop. Took the other end and plugged it into the Mini – while music was playing. Music on the iPod Mini stopped, iTunes came up on my laptop… For some reason all the music I had on the Mini got wiped. There was nothing in it. I tried to copy tracks across and it came up with a message saying unknown error (-51). Had to go and restore factory settings in the end to get it to take tunes again. Anyone know what the **** this is all about? I also think that the battery life is awful. Forget 8 hours. I’m lucky to get 4.5 hours.

Maybe you should refrain from charging it while it is playing music. That was a dumb idea in the first place if you ask me .

Yeah battery life sucks, that's why I haven't bought an iPod yet. Too many battery issues, and frankly 8hrs just doesn't cut it for me.