Well, back to your feature presentation...
I have had the same problem and have since discovered it to be a failing hard drive. My iPod would crash my Macs and my PC so the OS is irrelevant. If you want to try some fixes before taking it in to an Apple repairer, reset it, don't touch it for about 6 hours and then plug it into the PC, open up the iPod Software Updater and try to do a Restore. Hopefully it won't crash on you.
By the way, is it still playing music fine? 🙂