Can cold temperatures adversely affect electronic gadgets?

Thanks for the info. I noticed that you focused alot on temperature's effect on hard drives (i.e. ferromagnetic HDD's), which is due to temperature's effect upon magnetism.

I want to add that LCD screens are also affected, albeit temporarily in most cases. Cold tempatures cause LCD screens (like the one in my PSP) to ghost, create shadows and darken the screen more than usual until warmed up. This is also due to the nature of physics. Cold temperatures cause liquids (like the liquid crystal in LCD, duh!) to travel at lower speeds. The freezing point for liquid crystal is much lower than water, but I couldn't find any hard numbers.

Another thing to consider is condensation. Bringing anything from colder weather to warmer weather will cause anything not airtight to cause condensation at levels based upon the temperature differences. This will range from an annoyance (think of condensation between an lcd screen and its protective cover - condensation on UMD/DVD/CD laser lenses cause them to read/write incorrectly) to catastrophic (water in any piece of electronics is never good news).

I have left my iPod in the car 5 days a week 10 hours a day while at work---all year long. I live in Minneapolis. Temps below 32 degrees for 5 months a year. Frequent temps below zero degrees. Many times 20 below zero. I have NEVER had a problem with the unit and it is now about 8 years old. I get to the gym, strap it on my arm and it works.

I've had my Ipod for 4 months and left it in my car overnight (below freezing in MA). It won't turn on and appears to be corrupted.

Matthew, did you let it come up to temperature from freezing slowly, or bring it directly into a hot room? If the latter, I wonder if condensation inside the device is the culprit?