[Dorian Gray]

Hello, all.

My beloved iPod touch (4th generation, 32 GB) suffered a serious indignity over the Christmas holidays. It was sitting on the arm of a sofa, and someone accidentally knocked it onto the floor. No problem: it's happened a dozen times. This time, though, it managed to hit an oddly placed corkscrew precisely at the edge of the display, where there's no "give" at all. (Did you know the easiest way to break a window is hit it at the edge with a chair? The chair just bounces if you whack the middle.) It cracked badly:



The LCD still works perfectly, and the touchscreen even works fine - though my finger picks up little bits of glass like sugar.

If this was an 8 GB iPod touch, I'd probably replace it with one of those lovely new white models for 188 euros on Amazon.fr. But since it's 32 GB, I guess it makes sense to replace the glass? Any idea whether this can be done by myself, or whether backstreet shops are any good at this job? Does Apple even fix these things?

[Yontsey]

Apple will replace the screen for $99 I believe. I think that's the rate for iPhones so they may do the same. Hell, they may just replace the Touch itself, I can't remember.

Also, there's DIY kits on Amazon that seem fairly easy to do. I would look at both of those options before buying a new one.

[Dorian Gray]

Thanks, Yontsey. It's interesting that you mention Apple might replace the iPod. According to this page, which also has US prices, Apple would charge 140.96 euros to repair my 32 GB iPod touch. To repair the otherwise identical 64 GB model costs 200.96 euros. This does suggest that Apple simply replaces the iPod, at something approximating their cost price.

Replacement rather than repair is a compelling argument to have Apple do the "repair" rather than a backstreet shop, unless the shop can do it for far less than 140 euros. I've used this iPod a lot, so I'm sure its battery isn't as fresh as it once was, and the display backlight may have lost its original brilliance, etc.

On the other hand, it's appalling how disposable everything is these days. To replace my iPod's battery would cost 75 euros!

[Dorian Gray]

Well, today I got my iPod repaired at the Apple Store, i.e. replaced. The "repair" cost 129 euros and took only a few minutes, as you might imagine. The replacement iPod is exactly the same as my broken one, even coming with iOS 4. It doesn't have the oleophobic coating that the new white iPod touch has. I saw the Genius unpack it, so I can state it shipped in a small brown box, without accessories such as headphones or documentation.

I've updated the software and now I'm doing the first sync: a slow process since much of my music has to be converted to 128 kbps to fit in the iPod's memory.

I'm glad to have my iPod back, but that was an expensive lesson.