I was digging through an box of old cords today and came across my six year old 20 GB iPod. I remembered that there was something wrong with it, but I wasn't sure what, so I poked at it a bit and realized that the middle button didn't work. It felt like the button was stuck down (it wouldn't click) so I tried jiggling it, but that didn't help. So I decided to open it up and see if I could fix it (if I broke it, oh well, it was already garbage...)
When I got the case cracked open, the button started working again! I had unjammed the button, so I closed the case back up... and then the button was jammed again. I did this a few times before I realized that the button wasn't stuck down, it was stuck up! When the case was closed, something was pushing up against the inside of the button keeping it from being pressed in.
That something was the battery... Apparently it had expanded beyond it's housing as it aged! The battery no longer held a charge (the other reason I stopped using it) so I decided to perform surgery on the iPod. I grabbed a screwdriver and pried the battery out and tossed it in the garbage. When I got the iPod back together, I could push the button! I plugged it in and confirmed my suspicion that it'd still work without the battery. So now my broken iPod works again... as long as it's plugged in. Which is fine because I have a dock with speakers where I can keep it. Yay!
