First off, let me assure you a dead iPod is not fun. At all. I have the bad habit of going to sleep with my iPod playing in my bed, and Thursday night was fatal. After suffering a two-feet fall onto a wooden floor, my iPod Photo’s 30GB hard drive clicked and whined, with the screen coolly informing me to visit apple.com/support/ipod to learn what a sad iPod icon meant. As if I didn’t know.
I was now considering a new iPod or a hard drive replacement, but thankfully, I remembered about a CrunchGear article that Kate wrote about a while ago, How To Fix an iPod that Won't Boot. The article describes, among other things, how seemingly fatal problems such as my own can often be fixed by simply opening up the iPod and placing a folded piece of paper between the hard drive and the casing.
It works.
At least it did for me (and many others) after two case openings, paper insertion, and an full Restore. The hardest part is, by far, opening the case. You’ll want to check out the article for instructions. Remember: if your full-size iPod dies one day, it may only be teasing you.
It was only *mostly* dead!
Glad I could be of some help, in an oblique way. It's a good thing your iPod wasn't "all dead," Thomas; otherwise, your only option is to go through its pockets and look for loose change.
I had a 20gb iPod fail on me, also to discover that the "business-card" trick works like a charm.
Just make sure to either place a very thick piece of paper or replace it every couple of weeks, since it'll flatten out and lose it's effectiveness of holding the HD in place.