My ipod classic 160gb is stuck in restore mode. Ive tried restoring and re-formatting but it keeps telling me its in restore mode and that i have to restore it. How do i fix this?

My ipod classic 160gb is saying "Do Not Disconnect" and has a circle with a line through it and the circle is blinking. The screen is dim and has a white background. This is what it looks like when I connect it to my computer. When it connects to iTunes I get a message that says "itunes has detected that an ipod is in recovery mode. You must restore this iPod before it can be used with itunes". When I choose to restore it goes through all the motions to restore it. The first time I did this I got a message telling me I needed to format it so I did. I opted for the longer formatting process and it went through all the motions. When it was finished it told me I needed to restore it so I did that again. Now I keep getting both messages to restore and format at the same time. The screen doesn't change on the ipod. I let the battery die and then hooked it back up but I get the same stuff. How do I fix this?