IPod Photo refuses to sleep when hard drive is spinning

Question

I am own an iPod Photo 60GB running the iPod Software 1.2 (for iPod with color display).
I cannot turn my iPod Photo 60GB off/put it into sleep mode while the hard drive is being accessed or spinning. This normally means that some music is playing, but it also can happen when a track is paused. This issue occurs for both ways to put an iPod into sleep mode: 1)"Sleep" from the menu, or 2)holding the play/pause button for a few seconds. Attempting either of these methods of turning my iPod off/putting it to sleep while the hard drive is spinning results in the iPod NOT going to sleep. When I select the "Sleep" item from the menu, I can hear the "click" sound, so I know the selection of that menu item is being detected by my iPod.
Generally speaking, this issue happens when I have just removed my iPod from being docked with my computer, and it starts playing a track because I hit the play button accidentally while disconnecting the iPod. Usally the first thing I want to do is put the iPod to sleep, because I am going somewhere and don't want to use that battery when I'm not listening to it.
My workaround: If I select a track at the end of an album/playlist, and then fast forward to the end of that track so that NO music/sound is playing on my iPod Photo 60GB, and the hard drive is not spinning, then I am able to use the "Sleep" menu item or the hold the play/pause button for a few seconds method. Also, if I let the track play for anywhere from 30 seconds to a minute or two until the the hard drive is not spinning anymore, then I am able to put my iPod to sleep. But shouldn't the sleep feature work immediately? None of Apple's documentation or TIL articles suggest otherwise.
This problem is not related to the hold switch being in the "hold" position, as I am trying all of this with the hold switch NOT in the "hold" position. Also, it is not related to the battery power being low, as it happens with a full charge.
I have read threads with a similar issue to mine, however the clarification needs to be made that this "bug", as I'll call it, only occurs when the hard drive is spinning/being accessed. Many people have mentioned troubles with putting their iPod to sleep while listening to a Podcast. This makes sense because some Podcasts are too large to fit into the iPod's RAM cache, and so the hard drive is accessing the Podcast through it's entire length. None of these threads have any useful input from Apple Computer support other than the suggestion of resetting the iPod or restoring the iPod's software. In both cases, the suggested solution DOES NOT fix the problem permanently.
With the hopes that because ALL iPods that Apple sells currently will most likely have this problem, by starting a "new", more detailed thread on this issue, perhaps Apple will get this message to a higher level and actually do something about it.
I would highly suggest if you have an iPod Photo (any size) or one of the "new" color iPod's, that you try seeing if you can put your iPod to sleep when your hard drive is being accessed, and if not - Please Post on this Thread. The more posts that come up on a thread, the more likely that someone with Apple will notice.
Thanks for reading...

Answer 1

To elaborate more on what Rob said. Since the iPod is a hard drive based device(similar to your computer) the disc inside spins and there is a needle to read the data.
What you are suggusting would be like yanking the power cord out of your computer in mid install of something, the chance of data lose is there and if happened enough bad sectors can arise. Should you do that? No, Would you do it? In most cases not.
A bad sector would in most causes make the ipod freeze when accessing it or make it fail its disk check and requiring replacement.