Oh dear what have I started
My post was pure tongue-in-cheek, really I couldn't give a monkeys what brand (or model) of player anyone is aligned to. When I researched getting a harddrive mp3 player a few years ago I didn't include the iPod range in my research for one vital fact: no UMS.
The *only* real thing I envy of the iPods made now are the larger harddrives, back when I got my iHP-140, 40gb was the maximum any small-form factor mp3 player had. If I could buy a 200gb+ mp3 player with the same size/functionality of my H140 (especially the inclusion of a full function in-line remote) I'd jump at it, but sadly the market has been going more towards flash drives (not enough space!) and 'gimmicks' like video playback.
Horses for courses, which is why I bought an Archos AV500 a couple of years ago and is great, except my mate spilt water on it last weekend and screwed it up a bit, won't turn on without external power, the buttons don't work properly and sometimes it keeps thinking the X (stop/shutdown) button is always pressed - still works by remote though.