[mattcass]

When I come home at night I'll put my iPod on the dock to charge up. The dock is plugged into the wall and not into my computer so all it does is charge. When i wake up in the morning after it has had plenty of time to charge, it shows the "charged" message on the screen and a full battery when I turn the iPod on when it's still attached to the dock.

But as soon as I take it off the dock the battery gauge drops to about 1/4. Turning the iPod on and off does nothing to change the charge level. Putting the iPod back on the dock does solve the problem though. I put it back on once and it jumps to about 1/2, a second time and it's up to 3/4. A third or fourth time brings the charge up to full.

What's going on here? I have yet to try discharging the battery fully and then fully charging it (and dont really want to after reading what I did on ipodding.com) or seeing how it charges when connected through firewire to my Powerbook. I like having the dock plugged into my home stereo and it's just easier for music listening if it's not connected to my computer.

If anyone else has had this problem please speak up. I did a quick search but couldnt see any others with this issue (I didnt look hard though).

Thanks

[Krypton]

The iPod battery meter is renowned for being inaccurate (and jumping around a lot).

Try seeing how long the battery lasts even though the meter shows low charge.

[SupahCoolX]

Also try resetting the iPod (hold the Menu and Play buttons down together for about 5 seconds) and see if the meter resets itself.

[laseca]

I encounter the same behavior on my 20GB iPod. I just charge it with the wall charger until it reads "charged" and don't pay that much attention to the battery gauge. I still get about 10 hours of music from the battery. After it's been on for a while, the battery gauge may get you an accurate reading. My old 5GB iPod battery gauge was very accurate. My 20GB is just moving all around the place. Wonder why an older iPod would not had this problem and a newer improved version would.

[mattcass]

The battery life is what it would be if the battery was fully charged, because it is, so I'm not really concerned. Resetting the iPod when the charge read 1/4 brought the charge up to 3/4 and then two dock on/offs showed it fully charged. But resetting it at fully charged brought the charge back down to 3/4's! Really annoying stuff here. $600 for a quirky iPod with a battery that's only going to last a few years.