OWC's 3G iPod Replacement Battery

I just replaced the battery in my 3G 40gb iPod with a high-capacity version from OtherWorld Computing. The original battery in my iPod had deteriorated from about 6 hours of play at a full charge to barely two. Every once in a while, I could get four hours out of it, if I wasn't skipping around and playing one playlist straight through, but that only happened when I was making long trips, like Kansas City to Des Moines.

Anyway, I was planning to do a write-up of the process, and post it here, but the whole thing took about 5 minutes. It would have been even faster than that if I hadn't taken extra time to poke around inside my iPod, which I have always wanted to do.

OWC has a short instructional movie about how to do it yourself. I had figured that the person performing the demo in the clip had done it many times before, and was making it look easier than it is, but that's all there is.

The new battery is charging right now, so once it's fully charged, I'll run it through a battery of tests (zing!) to see how it stacks up against the OE battery.

The alternative to doing it yourself is shipping your iPod somewhere and paying at least $50 to have someone else do it, not including the cost of the battery, or shipping it to Apple and paying $99 for them to do it. With 2nd day UPS shipping, the battery from OWC cost me $30.

Once I've seen how the new battery works in my 3G iPod, I'll probably buy replacement batteries for my 1G and Sonja's 2G iPod as well. And now that I've seen how easy it is to open and upgrade the battery, it's only a matter of time, I suppose, before I try to upgrade the hard drive as well.

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In other news, the "Bloom" spot I did was purchased by three schools, and will soon be running in Minneapolis, Seattle, and Denver. Probably during Judge Judy or Cops.

Maybe So, Maybe Not

I think I've changed my mind about my next car. Instead of the good-looking Audi A3, I'm now leaning towards the MkV VW GTI.



This should make Sonja happy, since she wants an A3.

I started thinking about how fun it would be to have a sporty hatchback, and that I probably won't have a better opportunity than right now to own a car like that for my daily driver, since who knows what I'll need in a car in the future.

Anyway, this is all just pointless daydreaming, since the GTI doesn't come out for a few more months, and since I won't actually be looking for a new car anytime soon.

Of course, all this will change if I can find a good deal on a used Cadillac CTS-V.

News for Yous

Note: Never click "refresh" while previewing your post.

snarbles.com is back in action with a new look. This site got another redesign, and surefootage is about 90% online. Yes, they all share a similar look. I meant to do that.

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Sonja and I went to the KC Auto Show on Sunday, and now I can safely say I am almost pretty much 94% sure that my next car will be an Audi A3.



HEY WHAT HAPPENED TO MY PICTURE?

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Since my last post, both my parents got iBooks, and my mom also got an iPod. I'm sure that Andy loves seeing them come into his store. I am acting as long distance Apple Support for both of them, but they seem to be handling the transition to OS X rather well. This is my mom's first personal computer that doesn't belong to her work, and her first experience with Apple altogether. She loves her iPod and her iBook, though she can't quite figure out Apple nomenclature. Mom, the computer is an iBook, the little white thing is an iPod, and both of them are Apples.

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Sonja and I saw Umphrey's in Lawrence on February 28th (my 5th show, Sonja's 3rd). We got there early enough to eat at MoJo's, see a friend's movie premiere at Liberty Hall, and still get to the theater early enough to snag a spot right in front of the stage. Throughout the show, we were within arm's reach of lead singer Brendan Bayliss, whom we later met after the show. All in all, it was a lot of fun in Lawrence.