refurbed ipod?

[reban]

Hi im thinking about buying my 9 year old daughter an ipod for christmas but i think they are really expensive. Ive noticed that you can buy refurbed ones from apple directly from about £45 .. has anyone ever bought a refurbed piece of electrical equipment or even an ipod specifically and is it as good as new or just a waste of money cos it doesnt last??

thanks

bump .. anyone?

used to work for a company who refurbed PC's, most of them were catalogue returns that people had made an arse of setting up and were perfectly fine, dont know much about ipods but if its the same process they will be "as new" maybe with the odd scratch and usually any software has been updated to the latest version too, particulary if they are coming direct from apple.

got a link? i quite fancy one myself!

£45 for what kind? Nano?

here not as cheap as i'd like though!

Nope, far too expensive. I got my (second hand but perfectly good condition) 4gb Nano from eBay for £41.

the ones that i had seen earlier are all out of stock .. not sure if they were then and i just didnt notice but this is the link to the refurbished ipods page on the apple website
store.apple.com/uk/browse/home/specialdeals/ipod?mco=MTE2ODM

But Tidey - given you paid 41 pounds, for a 4 GB Nano, the 8 GB at 79 pounds would be comparable, pounds per GB. True, the 35 pounds for the 2 GB model is more costly, but if they get some 4 GB models at 45 pounds they would seem reasonable, as they'd have a year's warranty in case of needing a repair, compared with s/h from a newspaper or Ebay.

While I was wandering around the UK Apple Store I did see the mention of extending the warranty, and found (after online chat with someone to get the weblink) that it only adds an extra year (ie for 2 years from date of purchase, not an extra 2 years).

AppleCare for the iPod and Nano costs 24 Euro (20.87 at current exchange rate, and figure shown in my basket) +VAT. So the 8 GB would cost 79, and the AppleCare a further 24 pounds (today).

Given it only adds a year to the standard warranty, it's perhaps only worthwhile on the 8 GB and higher cost models where a replacement would be costly.

Good luck reban, hope you find a suitable model at a price you like. My 1 GB (non-Apple) player was about 10 pounds, but not trendy enough and 'in for a dig' for a teenager!

Sorry, says 24 pounds on the AppleCare page - don't know why I thought 24 Euro!

reban - they do stringent testing on any refurbed item (whether Apple or some PC maker) and comes with all manuals and so on, so should last just as long as full price.

I would not expect their quality control to let any models out with scratches or marks on, but the cases one can get in Maplin and elsewhere (for people who go jogging etc) would leave only the controls visible and protect Nano from harm.

Have seen jogging armband holder for under a fiver in Maplin (Apple charges something between 15 and 20 quid I think) but the Maplin one was in a clearance sale I think (it looked good but not having a Nano, didn't buy it!)

thanks for your responses . to be fair i think the 2gb would be plenty for a 9 year old but if i can get a 4gb for a resonal price i think i will go for that

In my experience the refurbed iPods from apple are just like new, with the cellophane wrapping and all accessories. They don't come in retail packaging though; just a brown cardboard box.