The device was out of warranty, and Apple would not fix it free. So he left it in a drawer until he happened to read a blog posting on CrunchGear.com that described how he might fix it - with a small, folded piece of paper. Mr. Ironside celebrated by posting thanks on the blog: "I've been on CDs for months. You saved my life (and my iPod)."

Still, while other digital audio-player manufacturers have slowly begun to add Bluetooth to their devices, Apple, which is far and away the dominant player in MP3 players, has so far shunned the feature. As Matt Durgin, Senior Product Marketing Manager at Samsung (which integrates Bluetooth into a number of its MP3 players), puts it: "We are just beginning to tap into the potential of Bluetooth with wireless listening, wireless file transfers and cellphone integration." Yet even Apple's iPhone, which, like most new phones, has Bluetooth, holds over the nonstereo standard, rendering it useless for wireless listening.

At New York's Carnegie Hall, he challenged a recital audience by programming 46 short pieces and excerpts from longer ones, making connections that ran the gamut from Beethoven and Scarlatti to modernists John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen.

"There are a lot of users out there for whom there is never enough memory," said Greg Joswiak, Apple's head of global marketing for iPod and iPhone.

JVC on Sunday unveiled an LCD TV less than 3 inches thick, calling it the world's thinnest flat-screen television, as the Consumer Electronics Show began in Las Vegas.

Monster's iFreePlay headphones are among a small number of models taking advantage of the size of the iPod Shuffle, and incorporating a dock for the diminutive music player into the headphones.

You love your Apple iPod and for good reason: It's easy to navigate through your extensive music collection; subscribing to free podcasts is a breeze thanks to Apple's intuitive iTunes Store; and there are thousands of fun accessories designed to give your iPod additional functionality.

And don't forget that despite the hype over the iPhone, Apple is still vulnerable to moves by the wireless carriers and rivals such as Google and Microsoft. All these fears have taken hold of the stock and explain why Apple shares have lost about a third of their value since peaking at almost $203 in late December.

Arriva, a small start-up in Telluride, Colo., is trying to make a name for itself by developing uniquely designed "sport" headphones. The company's first product, simply called Arriva Sport Headphones, featured a springy, squiggly shaped coil that wrapped around the back of your head to create a secure fit. At the time those headphones came out, Arriva told us that it was in the process of developing its real killer product, a set of headphones that offered a similar design but incorporated an iPod Shuffle dock. Obviously, the advantage to having the iPod connected directly to your headphones is that it cuts the headphone cord out the equation, effectively making them cordless--pretty cool if you can do it right.

Bachman went on to say that the Mac will begin to take on more importance because the iPhone is not likely to experience growth on the scale of what the company has projected for this year. He also pointed out that the iPod is starting to show signs of market saturation, leading to slower growth rates for the device. Despite the somewhat gloomy predictions, Bachman maintained his outperform rating on Apple's stock, noting that "more carriers and lower handset [prices]" could improve the iPhone's prospects. Bachman reduced his forecast for iPhone sales in fiscal 2008 from 9.3 million to 7.7 million units, and also reduced his iPod sales forecast for the same period, from 54.6 million to 51.1 million units.