As to iTunes, I'm really not sure what Steve is going on about. I've used it for years and nit works fine for me. Perhaps he's trying to run it on windows?

Yes I am trying to run it on Windows, and it's a real shame that the excellent engineering and interface of the iPod itself is let down by the host software. This article from 2008 summed the situation up pretty well, and they've done damn all to fix any of the issues since. And yes I appreciate that they're under no obligation to even support the iPod on Windows, so I guess I should be grateful that iTunes runs on Windows at all ... but I'm not :)