Apple is somewhat messing up iTunes on Windows

kraig911

ok I have a lot of friends on pc's and they all tell me they like iTunes but that it doesn't work and gives them wierd problems.



apple message board



and well I've heard 5 people now be quite vocal to me now about how apple's tech support sucks, and that they are never going to consider anything with them again. I wonder if someone on this board has a solution for this problem... other than the coin term used often "buy a mac" if we could make these people happy, they could see the light



*edit* can a mod please fix my thread title to say "apple is somewhat messing up iTunes on windows"

barto

Quote:

Originally posted by kraig911

and well I've heard 5 people now be quite vocal to me now about how apple's tech support sucks

Wow, you mean tech support for a free product with millions of copies downloaded sucks?

Quote:

Originally posted by kraig911

and that they are never going to consider anything with them again

Boohoo for them. Seriously, all applications have problems, iTunes probably less than most on Windows. These people must be fairly anti-Mac in the first place for them to make statements like that too, and were probably looking for an excuse to slam Apple.



Barto

placebo

When you release software to "the other 95%", you're bound to get tons of complaints because of the hardware diversity. The people who are posting that represent a small slice of the total number of iTunes Windows users, most of them satisfied.

kraig911

valid you can never have a perfect 100%, but just using that as an excuse for practicality is inexcusable. What's worth even having a product, when you don't strive to offer good customer service for everyone seeking to use your products/services. Its that mindset that causes failure. Unless its perfect, you should never stop striving to be the very best experience a customer has. See the problem with the lot of you (not everyone mind you) is that you don't ever have to sell to feed yourself.



I think they need to be working on this issue, maybe there isn't an easy fix, but no way is it excusable to me as a shareholder that these people receive bad tech support, and a bad experience. Whats it worth it to say politely that it just doesn't work with your equipment.



also there aren't that many technical issues with napster as there are iTMS, but thats my perception.



If you would have read the link, you'll see this is quite a problem. I've heard reports of this being in the 10's of thousands.

mac+

Quote:

Originally posted by kraig911

valid you can never have a perfect 100%, but just using that as an excuse for practicality is inexcusable. What's worth even having a product, when you don't strive to offer good customer service for everyone seeking to use your products/services. Its that mindset that causes failure. Unless its perfect, you should never stop striving to be the very best experience a customer has. [snip]



I think they need to be working on this issue, maybe there isn't an easy fix, but no way is it excusable to me as a shareholder that these people receive bad tech support, and a bad experience. Whats it worth it to say politely that it just doesn't work with your equipment. [snip]

Agreed - the Apple experience should be the whole package. Elegant software for starters and (hopefully) good tech support.

alcimedes

do me a favor.



go to the web forums for any major product. read through said forums.



see how many don't have complaints. the people at product message boards are there the majority of the time because they're having problems with the product.

chinney

Quote:

Originally posted by kraig911

valid you can never have a perfect 100%, but just using that as an excuse for practicality is inexcusable. What's worth even having a product, when you don't strive to offer good customer service for everyone seeking to use your products/services. Its that mindset that causes failure. Unless its perfect, you should never stop striving to be the very best experience a customer has. See the problem with the lot of you (not everyone mind you) is that you don't ever have to sell to feed yourself.



I think they need to be working on this issue, maybe there isn't an easy fix, but no way is it excusable to me as a shareholder that these people receive bad tech support, and a bad experience. Whats it worth it to say politely that it just doesn't work with your equipment.



also there aren't that many technical issues with napster as there are iTMS, but thats my perception.



If you would have read the link, you'll see this is quite a problem. I've heard reports of this being in the 10's of thousands.

Well yes...in part. But I have some sympathy for Apple here. I wonder how many of the complaints basically boil down to "My Wintel computer setup sucks...how are you going to help me?" Where I work even the numerous full-time paid MS certified techies can't seem to get our PCs to work properly much of the time.

kraig911

Quote:

Originally posted by Chinney

Well yes...in part. But I have some sympathy for Apple here. I wonder how many of the complaints basically boil down to "My Wintel computer setup sucks...how are you going to help me?" Where I work even the numerous full-time paid MS certified techies can't seem to get our PCs to work properly much of the time.

you make a really good point. I just don't like anyone getting a bad customer service experience from apple in the first place, word of mouth can destroy or empower they say.

chinney

Quote:

Originally posted by kraig911

you make a really good point. I just don't like anyone getting a bad customer service experience from apple in the first place, word of mouth can destroy or empower they say.

I guess that is the downside of Apple entering the PC software field. They will face standard PC problems and could have their reputation tarnished - i.e. their reputation for offering a better alternative (a reputation they have even among some who would never consider trying the alternative because they feel that Apple is too much of a niche).



In any case, I don't think that Apple had much of a choice.... Apple cannot fix the majority of PC problems ,but perhaps in the long run Apple can at least make better PC software than others who write for PCs.

hmurchison

No...only an idiot would complain about the Tech Support for a FREE product. In fact iTunes licenses CDDB and the Fraunhofer MP3 Encoder so it's COSTING Apple to give this away.



I'm sorry Kraig but your friends are exactly the people many of us DON'T want on the platform. Expecting something for nothing is boorish behavior.



BTW I have iTunes on both of my PC's and I've noticed that the only flakiness(CD not recognized) on the Windows 2000 computer. The XP system runs iTunes just fine. I haven't downloaded any tracks though so I don't know of any potential issues there.



BTW i'm not slamming your friends personally it's just irksome to here people slam a company for providing something for free.

kraig911

well I'll be honest with you, one of these PC using bigots is a good friend of mine, and we've always had entertaining debates on platforms ourselves. I honestly think for him after seeing what I do with my computer compared to his, he's impressed. He told me himself its like they make great stuff, but he's not going to buy any apple product, if and when he needs help he gets blasted for asking. I mean from what he said, they were outright rude to him. and well I believe him and I doubt he would lie to me, Me and him have been trying to get this to work for a long time. we've tried everything.

mac+

Whilst I agree with Chimney's post about the difficulty of maintaining PCs and hmurchison's claim that complaining about a free product is boorish behaviour, I also maintain that Apple needs to be aware of the "total package" they present to consumers. This goes just as much for iTunes support as it does for the "allegedly" shoddy attempts at AppleStores down under.



It's the reputation and user experience, spread by word of mouth, that holds sway with so many consumers (in addition to pricing points, I realise). This is why I think it is important that Apple does not "cut off it's nose to spite it's face" if (and I stress "if") they are offering sub-standard tech support.



Unfortunately, though, I have no magical solution that would improve the Windows user experience when using iTunes on their PCs.

mac+

Quote:

Originally posted by alcimedes

do me a favor.



go to the web forums for any major product. read through said forums.



see how many don't have complaints. the people at product message boards are there the majority of the time because they're having problems with the product.

alcimedes - I understand this already. My point was more about offering decent (not rude) tech support to all users.

chinney

Quote:

Originally posted by kraig911

...I mean from what he said, they were outright rude to him. and well I believe him and I doubt he would lie to me,...

If it is rudeness, then I entirely agree...Apple is doing itself a disservice. There is no excuse for that. They should instead try to convey generous and dedicated sympathy for PC users.

hmurchison

Rudeness will happen but you have to take it in stride. Have you ever ordered food from Macdonalds or any oft frequented store and got rude service once? Perhaps but it doesn't always reflect the true nature of a company.



The PC market is a beast to maintain and Apple has done a decent job initially keeping things running. I remember my first use of Musicmatch and the hard lock/reboot sequence I had to put up with until a few updates later. I just feel like there are plenty of people who are willing to let one little issue dictacte how they feel about a platform.



As for support this is off topic a bit but it relates a little. I've noticed over the last decade that support in this country has just died. Companies have moved to a email based support system and litteraly got rid of their staff. There are millions of jobs gone...exported overseas or vanished alltogether. These jobs were that person on the other end of the phone helping you through an issue. Now we have "please send us an email" and people in the unemployment line.



Consumers must go back to supporting companies that provide FULL Service. It's easy to take a persons money, it shouldn't be unusually hard to give it back.

trick fall

My boss who is a pretty devout pc user bought an ipod over the summer and while he does love it he's had an annoying amount of problems using it with his pc. He's also had some problems with itunes itself. We were trying the other night to dl some tunes from the music store and it was no go. Now, both of us are pretty savy. I'm decent on the mac side and he's phenomenal on the pc side so if we're having problems I'm thinking apple could do a little better.

jwri004

I had fun d/l iTunes on machines at work. PC users were amazed at how friendly it was. Want to listen to music on somebody else's computer, search for music. Play radio, easy. For a new release iTunes for Windows is a good start.



Admitted never bought from the Apple store, but that has more to do with the border controls in place at the moment

cosmonut

Quote:

Originally posted by hmurchison

In fact iTunes licenses CDDB and the Fraunhofer MP3 Encoder so it's COSTING Apple to give this away.

I'm guessing they make a good portion of that back from sales at the Music Store. They ain't hurtin'.

ghost_user_name

Quote:

Originally posted by CosmoNut

I'm guessing they make a good portion of that back from sales at the Music Store. They ain't hurtin'.

For the thousandth time, yes, they are "hurtin" from the store.



From Phil Schiller (http://news.com.com/2100-1041_3-5092559.html):

Quote:

Schiller said the music store is close to profitability but is still losing money. Apple doesn't see the business as having much long-term profit potential either.

Steve Jobs said the same thing in the last conference call.

scavanger

I installed iTunes on my PC to try it out for the hell of it. First off the CD Burning is completely broken in the program.. it complains about drivers not being installed.



I have a Lite On buner... possiblely the best optical cd-rw drive manufacturer.



I can burn CDs in Nero, 120%, even my DOS CD Record program. I've also noticed that my iTunes isn't handling some of the ID3 Tags right, and it's crashed a few times.



I'm an expert Windows user and have setup up 1000's of windows setups. There is nothing wrong with my other programs and XP hasn't crashed in months if not a year.



Now that I've pointed out my problems with iTunes, this does not mean I'm saying its a crappy player, just pointing out my expereince.



I will say this.. after reading some of the Tech Support woes and how Apple redirects people all over for tech support I'm rather concearned. I'm considering getting a used iBook or a brand new PB, however I don't really want to deal with bad tech support like I've read. I had enough problems with Comcast Internet and I don't want any major issues. The problems I've read are enough to turn me off from apple products just for the horrible tech support people talk about.



I've delt with both Gateway and Dell when working with my clients, and both are great. If I need a part thats faulty, its shipped out that day and arrives several days later.... Never had a problem with them. I just worry I may with apple, and downtime on my computer is a serious issue to me...



Lastly....



"No...only an idiot would complain about the Tech Support for a FREE product. In fact iTunes licenses CDDB and the Fraunhofer MP3 Encoder so it's COSTING Apple to give this away. "



Thats Apple's own fault. FreeDB and Lame are both excellent and are better then those services apple is licensing. I only use FreeDB and Lame when I rip cds on EAC on my Windows box. Apple should learn to save money, and thats not a vaild arguement at all since their are better free alternatives.

hmurchison

Scavenger- Great to see that's settled. Goodbye.