Apple pulls iPod in France - because it's too noisy

Apple Computer has pulled its iPod music player from store shelves in France because the device is capable of producing noise levels that exceed government regulations.

The Mac maker confirmed yesterday that it has stopped shipments in that country for the next 15 days as it works on a fix that will keep the device from producing more than the 100 decibel maximum allowed under French law.

Although the iPod has been on the market for nearly a year, Apple said in a statement that it has only recently learned of the problem.

"Apple has recently been made aware of an issue with its iPod product line's compliance with French law as it applies to sound output," the company said. "This issue is correctable with a simple software update to any existing iPod, and we are taking a number of proactive steps to make that happen."

The company said it will exchange resellers inventory of iPods for updated models and that it expects a customer update for existing iPod users to be available from Apple's French website on 8 October

Apple introduced the original 5GB iPod in October 2001 and has since added 10GB and 20GB models to its lineup.

Ian Fried writes for News.com. ZDNet France's Christophe Guillemin contributed to this report from Paris