Appleinsider claims that Apple has issued a message to its channel partners to replace any 5th Generation (iPod with Video) that exhibits "any type of hardware failure"... including those that would be classified as abuse... for a limited time.
According to the rumor site, Apple is attempting to preemptively avert any quality complaints for the new device. Apple has been under significant public criticism with screen-scratch complaints on the recent iPod nano. A class action suit emerged last week surrounding the iPod nano screen-scratch issue.
Meanwhile, Appleinsider also reports that Apple's iPod shuffle appears to be selling well despite the recent introductions of both the iPod nano and 5th generation iPod (with video).