I rolled the dice and got lucky getting my 30GB off eBay from a really wonderful seller. However, in the course of my searching, I would see a "sealed, 30GB iPod" come up at a clip of about one a day for $399 with the Buy It Now option. I would look and they were all being sold by the same guy who had about 150 positive feedback reponses but had only been a registered account since March. I was really tempted but thought (like lots of really good eBay deals) that it was a little too good to be true...especially when they were popping up in such quantity. So I did a search on auctions that had ended and found about 20 sold by the same guy for the same price over about a two week span. So I looked a little more in depth to his feedback and looked at what he'd sold in his most recent auctions and it was almost always something called nixies (looked like a radio part or something) and they always went for like one or two dollars. So while he had lots of positive feedback, it was all for items that were only a few bucks. There was no reason to believe he had come into twenty (it later became twenty-four) iPods that he was willing to sell at $100 less than retail. So I went back to the list of his iPod auctions and mailed the first eight or so people to have won his auctions (all won with Buy It Now) and asked if they had received their iPod yet. Those that replied all said they hadn't and they were starting to get worried even though they had gotten an email from the seller saying it was going to ship that week. I told them that none of the others I had talked to had received theirs either and I would keep in touch with them if someone did get theirs. It may have been coincidence, but after I wrote those emails, the subsequent auctions I saw come up from the seller were all private auctions so you couldn't see who the high bidder was or who won it.
Well, even after I received my iPod, I kept watching the seller's feedback to see if any of the people who won his auctions ever posted any feedback, positive or negative. One guy who had been waiting for about 20 days posted a negative about his and the seller posted some negative back on the buyer saying he didn't read the auction correctly. But when I glanced over the item page, there was nothing wrong with what the buyer claimed. Then just the other day, I went to look at that seller's feedback again and found that another negative complaint had been filed against him but alas, I couldn't read it because the seller has set his feedback as private now. I can tell you though that there still have been no new positive feedback notices for him. So just a word of warning to go along with the thread about how risky eBay can be. I just thank my lucky stars I found a good seller. (Yes, I know watching this process should've made me even more wary of doing exactly what I did, but I really wanted a 30GB that I couldn't afford retail haha).
-John
PS. The bad seller's username is cubbonroad.
PPS. I think it's total BS that a seller can make his feedback profile private. Oh well.