How to Fix a Frozen iPod

I LOVE my iPod. I take it with me wherever I go. I received it as a gift from my parents last year when I graduated college. It's black, and it has video, and it holds 30 GB. I even named it iPete. I'd never experienced any problems with it. I used to use a Sony Discman to listen to my music, and was thrilled to finally get an iPod which doesn't need batteries, and which doesn't waste CD-Rs.

One freezing evening a few nights ago as I was trudging across my college campus through the cold wind to get to my class, with Luxurious by Gwen Stefani blaring gorgeously in my ears, I endeavored to reach up to adjust my scarf, when...it happened. The music stopped. I assumed the plug from my earbuds had escaped from their hole. Nope. I turned the "hold" function off so that I could freely press the buttons, but the little icon of a lock wouldn't disappear, and none of the buttons would work. "Luxurious" seemed perpetually frozen at 2 minutes and 52 seconds. The time was eternally 4:11.

I tried everything I could think of. I took it out of its red Emily the Strange iPod case. I banged it. I shook it. I thought maybe it got too cold so I blew hot breath on it. I called friends. No one answered. I didn't know what to do. I wound up being late to class because of it. I checked it several times throughout the class to see if it unfroze on its own. It didn't. I couldn't wait until class was over, so I could go home. I was sure that all I had to do was plug the charger into my laptop and it would spring to life again. At 6:30, class ended, and my parents picked me up. I rode home in silence, which I HATE.

When I got home I rushed upstairs to my bedroom and turned on my laptop and charged up the iPod. No little icon in the taskbar, no "do not turn off" symbol on the iPod screen. What the hell? I yelled out loud to no one. I didn't know what to do. I couldn't remember if I still had the original box, or if it had even come with an instruction booklet. Was there a phone number to call? Who makes iPods anyway? And then it came to me: Apple!

Every time I go to the Quicktime webpage over at www.apple.com to look at movie trailers, there's that iTunes/iPod tab. I went there immediately, searching for a "help" tab, or a "customer service tab". I found nothing. Then I saw it. A "support" tab stared back at me, so close to where I was looking that I didn't see it at first. I clicked on it. Almost at the top of the list was "how to reset a frozen iPod." My hopes had risen. Here is what it said:

-First, switch the "hold" button from on, to off.

-Then press the MENU and the CENTER (select) buttons down simultaneously until the Apple logo appears; this should take about 6 to 10 seconds. You might need to repeat this step.

-If you have finished these steps and are still having problems with the iPod, try setting it down on a flat surface. Make sure that the finger you use to press the SELECT button isn't touching any part of the click wheel. Also make sure that you are pressing the MENU button toward the outside of the click wheel, and not near the center.

I didn't need to do any of the secondary steps. The first two steps reset my iPod and it was back to normal immediately. I wish I had know that easy simple trick earlier so that I could have fixed it while I was at school and then I could have listened to it on the walk back to the car, and on the ride home. Oh well. At least I know now.