Very poor battery life when charged - you've hit on a key reason I've never bought an I-Pod.

Maybe get a Sony MP3 player if you still haven't bought one (up to 40 hours battery life, enough to see you through any flight)? Probably plenty of the others out there have good battery life but I know more about Sony as that's the one I've got.

I'd make sure you have the better noise-reducing headphones too as the plane-noise can be quite significant.