iTunes 9 with app management, LPs, more, unveiled by Apple - Page 3

You can also add tracks AUTOMATICALLY to iTunes now as well! (Folder Watch).
(Tested on a Windows PC)

If you browse to your iTunes Music Folder (now hidden in v9) to \\iTunes\\iTunes Media (Music if you upgrade from v8)\\Automatically Add to iTunes\\

Add some tracks (note: adding folders gives an error about the file already in use)

and iTunes will automatically move them from this folder to their correct album locations in your music folder!

Finally, a folder watch function!

100% agreed. There was no reason to remove the shopping cart.

Streaming video from my iTunes server to a laptop, I love it. I used to have a web server for this.

they got rid of the browser option!!!
i hate you iTunes!

that perminent "Artists" window qas just one piece of a much larger, more useful aspect to finding music quickly...

iphone 3.1 and itunes 9 got rid of about 16 gigs of music off my phone so it's resynching now [all purchased legally] and about a dozen apps i purchased through the app store on the phone, which were backed up in 8 are now GONE. GONE. yeah. thanks for that, what do i do, email apple my receipts and say give me my apps back... yeah, they should be able to clear that up for me in what? a few months or so...

If you contact Apple by phone and talk to a representative and tell them your story, they will usually give you one free pass and "reset" things for you (details depending upon what you are trying to re-download post-purchase.)

The genius mixes is nice.

In browser mode:

Go to: View -> Grid View -> Show Header

So, with genius off, equaliser off, the main app window closed, and any other CPU draining things not enabled, iTunes 9 has jumped CPU use from ~3% to ~10% on average.

How do they manage to bloat iTunes with trivial features, still fail to allow broad format support, yet TRIPLE the CPU (and thus battery) load!!!???

If that's what they can do on Snow Leopard, I hate to think what the new iTunes does in Windows machines...

I guess Apple's working hard to keep the WINAMP people in business.

Yeah, I was wondering where it went.

The really bad thing about the "wish list" is that I only had albums in my cart, so these now show as wish list items, but only the whole album. I was used to going to my cart and clicking on the songs to hear the previews once in a while to sort of convince myself to buy them. Now I go to the wish list and there is just a picture of the album, period.

I'm not going to then click on the album, taking me to the store and then click on the tracks one by one. I just want a simple list of the albums and the tracks they contain and I don't want to "leave" my cart and go to the store and have to come back again.

I notice there are a lot of places in iTunes 9 where they have removed the list functionality in favour of simple pictures or icons. One doesn't have the flexibility of views in this version one had before in many areas.

Like where? It looks to me that everywhere it was available before its still available. There is a List, Grid, Coverflow set of buttons next to Search at the top.

I'd like to know this also. They implied we could buy ringtones from the store but I don't see any at all. Are they just talking that "make a ringtone from a song" junk?

I want real, actual ringtones, not that.

I remember noting this earlier, but I can't find an example now except for the one I mentioned in the shopping cart that is now the "wish list," so maybe I'm wrong on that.

I don't appear to have the ability to change the size of the tiles in icon-view when looking at my movies or TV shows though. I also can't sort them by genre. Was that removed completely? I don't see any options in views.

I don't see the same numbers.

Mine seems to jump back and forth between 1% and 40% like a ticking clock, once a second. But if I then close the main window like you did, the figures change to 0% and about 2%, with the same ticking effect.

Assuming the copy file thing works I'm liking it. Would really prefer it though if they could turn the Mac Mini into a home server. Its fair enough that they don't want to let you just copy files between any computer through iTunes, (although I think it may be more about getting people to sign up to the iTunes Store) but I'd really like them to just bring out a home server that could manage all the syncing between my iMac, iBook and iPhone.

Well now installed..

Likes
1. Now an option to make the store take up the whole window. Excellent for my iBook as it never fitted on the screen.
2. New top bar design. Sure it doesn't conform to Apples styling but nor has any other release, and Apple get to follow different rules remember.
3. Home Share. Haven't actually tried it yet but all sign's point to it being good.

Hate
1. The white! Really really hate the white. The black was stylish, the white though is just painful to look at. It's also looks like pure white which is just something you don't do in interface design as it gives people headaches!
2. The Store. It's not bad I think what is making it worse though is the white again. There's a few bits where you can still see what the old store looked like (iTunes U and Audiobooks) and in comparison I prefer the old style. The new one has so many songs/movies etc on the screen at once they all blend into each other. No separation by Genera on home pages, to much to look at it all and no specific bit to go to.
3. Separation of Genius from Playlists. Just why? Was their a need? It's just added clutter more than anything. Worse still I just dragged a Genius playlist into the playlist section and now I can't put it back, leaving a Genus heading with one thing under it?!? Seems very un-apple and more Real Player.
4. Again the white, nothing could have annoyed me more. Im actually starting to like the fact MS give you skins. This had just left me with the choice of home share (which I really wanted) but a hideous design or nice design and stick to transferring songs manually. Apples approach of are way or nothing when it comes to interfaces can be good, but in this case its failed.

thanks for the tip. I use the browser so often it was really annoying to see they changed it like this. It reminds me of Microsoft. "Lets just mess with the things that didn't need messing with, then people will think it's new and improved but it's really the same crap just f**'d with".

It is unfortunate that the industry is so scared of any piracy that they feel the need to react in this way.

I'm very strongly of the belief that this sort of thing does nothing to stop any real, serious pirates and that casual copying isn't necessarily the evil that it is made out to be. (That's not to say that I am endorsing it. If you feel that I said that, you have misunderstood what I wrote.)


If they use my computer hardware and CPU to do the work, why should I pay beyond the cost of time and electricity to operate the computer? I'd be very reluctant to do that.

What I'm hoping is that someday movie studios "see the light" as it were and offer movie downloads without DRM. I'm not holding my breath, though, it took at least nine years for the music industry to realize this and they needed a not insignificant amount of prodding.

With Steve's involvement in Disney I can't see it happening any time soon. After all the music industry didn't exactly "see the light". The change all started after EMI questioned why there music has to have DRM on it to be on iTunes. As they put it "Apple never asked us about removing DRM" making it a bit like years of Apple saying they had to have it because of the music labels without ever asking if they could remove it.

Who really knows who's preventing it but I would say its likely a 50 50 thing. Studios want it to protect their art and Apple wants it to lock customers to their products.

i too am experiencing what Porsupah described in his point (2) -- no window of my iPod touch's applications.

my touch apps themselves show up in a list to the left side of the screen, but the right side of the screen (that should be devoted to the app management windows) is totally blank.

i've quit, re-sync-ed, re-started, etc... nada.

any ideas?

thanks!

Some important features missing from the latest iTunes Store:
- No movie keyword search. For example searching "FBI" for movies about the FBI gives no results. Even though there are clearly FBI movies there such as Silence of the Lambs and The Kingdom.

- No information about what year a movie came out. The "release date" field must be the date it went to DVD or something, because it's not the year the movie originally came out. This means, for example, if you like 80s movies you can't go to the browse area and sort by year.

- No way to simply view all new movies added to the store in e.g. the last week. The "New to Own" and "New to Rent" sections seem to mostly be about new movies and not cover back catalogue. I could be wrong here but I seem to find movies by browsing that got added without appearing in these lists.

- Lack of context sensitive search. If am am looking for movies, I want the search results screen to show as many movies as possible. Instead I only get 6 movie results and the rest of the screen taken up by iPhone apps, iTunes U, pop songs etc. I'm sure this kind of cross selling is a marketing guys dream, but to me it is just a poor search results window.

Some good changes:
- Add to wish list. I have wanted this for a while.

Some not so good changes:
- Slower loading
- The way the trailer plays in a popup. I think by now most people associate popups with error messages, so it always alarms me when things pop up.

i had to uninstall service pack 3 and then install itunes 9 + quicktime. otherwise itunes and quicktime will not start "encountered problems........." message.

test itunes under services pack 2 then reinstall service pack

while i was installing itune i did not find anything on apple support site.

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like the home network and app installation features . finally something things happening.

The new look (at least the PC version) is crappy... I really hate it...

Does anyone know why iTunes 9 isn't 64-bit yet?

I've heard it speculated that in the way QuickTime X has removed so many features thatwill likely come later due to the Cocoa rewrite, iTunes 64-bit, which means a Cocoa rewrite, will likely have the same issues, but iTunes can really has all these features removed the way the QuickTime player got stripped. I am thinking that we'll see some major testing of iTunes X at some point sent to developers to test. This is the kind of thing I'd think Apple would likely keep under wraps but I think it might be too extensive for them to only test in-house.

So would that suggest a 64-bit iTunes X would appear around the (now defunct) Macworld time frame, or would you think it might be as far away as next year's likely iPhone refresh?

Try Option+clicking the green button.

Have you updated your iPod Touch firmware to 3.1? It requires this to work.

Note, there is a bug in this area. I have posted a bug report to Apple.
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When I go to the application sorting page on my iPod Touch sync screeen, I have come across an issue.

When you double click an application on the left, it should (and does) highlight which screen and where on that screen it is currently located.

If I however search for a particular application, and then double click it, it finds and highlights the wrong app.

If I click on different sort methods, still with the list filtered by using search, I get different results.

I'll try and do a screen capture using Quicktime X to demostrate.

Gruber has written a little piece referencing another article on the lack of a 64-bit Cocoa iTunes.

If they waited until the iPod event next year and introduced it this amazing new thing they would get laughed at by the Windows enthusiasts. I can see it now.
Of course, all those statements would be ignorant, but they either won’t know better or won’t care and trying to explain it would be quite tough for Apple from a PR perspective.

It’s worth a read: http://daringfireball.net/2009/09/itunes_and_cocoa

Thanks for the link; it was an interesting read. I get the impression though that Gruber seems generally unimpressed with software improvements if they don't also deliver something "new" to the user experience. But, as I understand it, Apple's transition to Cocoa and 64-bit (indeed the crux of Snow Leopard), isn't about adding to the user experience, it's about refining the "behind-the-scenes" inner workings of that experience to make Mac OS X more streamlined, more efficient and more stable. To that end, extending that same Cocoa 64-bit rewrite to as many applications as possible would only serve this effort.

I'm not sure who Gruber is referencing by citing "complaints," or the lack thereof, that iTunes isn't 64-bit yet. For me, I thought Apple would convert it for the same size, speed, stability and compatibility benefits the app would receive like the others which have been rewritten. Frankly, based on what I'd read about the benefits of SL, I'd assumed that once SL was released, Apple would introduce a 64-bit version of all Apple software updated thereafter, much like they gradually transitioned their entire product line to Intel. Also, if 64-bit versions would only be compatible with SL, it still doesn't mean that everyone would necessarily have to upgrade. It may not be installed in SL by default, but Rosetta can still be installed as an option to insure legacy software still functions on OS X Snow Leopard, right? Clearly Apple plans to continue supporting 32-bit software.

For the record, I have a large iTunes library and a relatively low-powered C2D and I do occasionally contend with some latency in iTunes; I'd hoped a 64-bit version would alleviate the occasional sluggishness. SL and iTunes 9 have certainly helped a bit, but I still suspect a Cocoa 64-bit iTunes would be more solid, efficient and deliver a smoother user experience.

So when will the reviewers mention that all video downloads from the store in 8.2.1 are no longer allowed without a 9 upgrade? While Video Podcasts continue to work in 8.2.1, none of the free or paid video downloads in the Store work without a nag dialog box saying you MUST Upgrade to 9 to get this video.

Moreover, the iTunes Store interface has essentially been DESTROYED from the point of view of anyone who actually shops in the store and uses the RETURN and UP DOWN ARROWS to sample hundreds of tracks a week.

Where's the outrage? I can't believe Apple is getting a pass on these outrageous changes that make it particularly hard for elderly to shop and buy music and videos on the Store.

I for 1 REFUSE TO UPGRADE to 9 no matter how much Apple threatens me by KILLING all Video Downloads in 8.2.1. I will be going to corporate to physically complain with a protest sign if they do not relent after a week of feedback memos.

I am aghast that no threads have been implemented by any of the major sites on this subject. From my point of view iTunes 9 is an abomination that should be rejected by the general public.

Im happy for the change. I absolutely hated the iTS before. It was a visual clusterfrak that looked like it was designed by Yahoo!. I would rather make perhaps on my iPhone than on my Mac just so I didnt have to use the iTune ITS interface. The only real drawback is the lack of a shopping cart.

They've just changed the name to Wish List. But no longer are you allowed to make it a separate window. If you sample a lot of tracks and want to see the entire playlist of an album with 40-50 tracks all at once like I do you would feel differently.

Apparently you think having to double click on each track to play each 30-second sample is easier than highlighting the track and pressing the RETURN key followed by the down arrow so the next track is in the queue to be played with the return key at the end of the 30 second sample.

I feel just the opposite way you do about the change.

That sounds like a complex way to do it. When I mouseover a track there the track number changes to a blue circle with a play button. I click that once and it plays. I click another once and it plays the next one. This is more like the iPhone OS iTS version. Im actually using this preview for once!

In the first place you can't see the whole playlist of any album with more than 15 tracks in it which for me are 99% of the albums I buy. In the second place you telling me click on tracks one at a time instead of hitting return + the down arrow to put the next one in the queue so when it ends you simply hit return to play the next one is harder than having to click on the next one with the mouse?

The 8.2.1 interface was perfect. The 9 interface is a complete total disaster.

Im not telling you to do anything, I stated quite clearly that I happen to like the change and hated the way it worked before. Am I not entitled to my opinion? Can my preference not be different from yours?

We clearly dont use the store in the same way. I suggest you do submit that missing feature. You are likely in the minority since I dont know many people that like to sample 500 tracks a week, but a petition may help here. Id ever post it on Apples forum.

iTunes 9 has fixed a longstanding problem I've had with the old phatty Nano - unless there was about 30% free space, the calendar, notes and address-book didn't work properly (only a hundred addresses, only one calendar maybe, only a few notes..) Now ALL is working just fine.

Love the changes in iTunes 9 .. everything seems faster, smoother, smarter and cleaner.

Thanks Apple!

So this comment makes it clear to me that few users do their shopping in the Store the way I've grown accustom to doing. I don't want to be a whiner so I'm glad the majority of you who don't play hundreds of 30-second samples each week are enjoying the upgrade.

I just wish Apple wouldn't shove iTunes 9 down the throats of a minority who can't live with the new interface by disabling all video downloads in 8.2.1 except Video Podcasts in order to FORCE Upgrades - not because it's technically necessary.

I believe this is the first time Apple has done something like this to force iTunes upgrades on users. It makes me an unhappy customer to know Apple won't let users choose between the old interface and the new one. When it comes to shopping the iTunes Store - and I buy a lot of albums from them - I can't stomach the new interface at all. It's far harder to shop on the new interface for me than it is on the old one.

Have you tried having both versions installed at the same time under different names so that you can use v9 for videos and v8 for music sampling? How about doing this in a VM or switching accounts? Its not ideal, but it may be a workaround for the time being.