DIY savings!

In the midst of the paper waste and multiple gifts of the Christmas celebration, my sister revived her iPod mini. Like me, the younger of my two sisters listens to her MP3s old style. Instead of the flash drives present in the cute little iPod nano or iPod shuffle, the iPod mini, the nano's precursor, used a hard drive. Unfortunately, my sister noticed she would get about 15 minutes of battery life before the iPod shut down stating it was out of juice. Knowing about her predicament (an older PowerBook G4 that did not work with the newer generation iPods), I found replacement batteries on eBay for her iPod model, so she asked me to buy it for her as she did not want to sign up for an eBay account.

A few days later, I received the battery I purchased and drove it to our parent's house over the Christmas holiday. With some instructions on the web and the provided screwdrivers and battery, my sister proceeded to swap out the old battery for the new one in less than 15 minutes. By paying $6.50 for a new battery and a small time investment, my sister was able to revive her iPod mini. This meant she did not have to buy a replacement iPod (equivalent model is $150) nor did she trash an item that just needed one component replaced. While I may envy those beautiful iPod Touches, I will follow my sister's path and replace the battery before I trash my cute pink iPod mini.

I am proud of my sister for being frugal and keeping e-waste out of the garbage stream. Spending under 5% of the cost of new to get her well-loved iPod mini into working condition was a great investment of her time. Have you kept an electronic item out of the landfill?