Apple releases redesigned iTunes 11 with iCloud integration for Mac, Windows
Apple on Thursday released the highly anticipated iTunes 11, a complete overhaul of the media playing and purchasing suite featuring tighter integration with its iCloud service.
iTunes 11 features new library views, a revamped miniature player, "Up Next" for queuing new songs in a playlist, and iCloud playback syncing of media. The update can be downloaded for OS X through the Mac App Store.
Apple has boasted that the new iTunes has a "dramatically simpler player, a redesigned store, and iCloud features you'll love." Features of the software, according to Apple, include:
iTunes 11 features new library views, a revamped miniature player, "Up Next" for queuing new songs in a playlist, and iCloud playback syncing of media. The update can be downloaded for OS X through the Mac App Store.
Apple has boasted that the new iTunes has a "dramatically simpler player, a redesigned store, and iCloud features you'll love." Features of the software, according to Apple, include:
- Completely Redesigned. iTunes makes it more fun to explore and enjoy your music, movies, and TV shows. You'll love the beautiful edge-to-edge design, custom designs for each album, movie or TV show in your library, and getting personal recommendations any time you click In the Store.
- A New Store. The iTunes Store has been completely redesigned and now features a clean look that makes it simpler than ever to see what's hot and discover new favorites.
- Play purchases from iCloud. Your music, movie and TV show purchases in iCloud now appear inside your library. Just sign-in with your Apple ID to see them. Double-click to play them directly from iCloud or download a copy you can sync to a device or play while offline.
- Up Next. It's now simple to see which songs are playing next, all from a single place. Just click the Up Next icon in the center display and they'll instantly appear. You can even reorder, add, or skip songs whenever you like.
- new MiniPlayer. You can now do a whole lot more with a lot less space. In addition to showing what's playing, MiniPlayer now includes album art, adds Up Next, and makes it easy to search for something new to play ? all from a smaller and more elegant design.
- Improved search. It's never been easier to find what you're looking for in iTunes. Just type in the search field and you'll instantly see results from across your entire library. Select any result and iTunes takes you right to it.
- Playback syncing iCloud now remembers your place in a movie or TV show for you. Whenever you play the same movie or episode from your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch or Apple TV, it will continue right where you left off.
Comments
Was hitting refresh at 10am on the app store and it showed up exactly at 10am. Downloaded and installed. So far I like what I see.
Pass. I'll upgrade when I have too. I have too many AppleScripts relying on the current version, and no time to update them.
I was hoping they might include an iBooks reader in this version, but, alas, no.
When I log into my account for instance my "purchased" list shows nothing (!) but clicking on my local library shows everything that's been purchased since it's actually showing a blended view of local and cloud based stuff.
When I click "videos" again it shows none of my cloud purchases, but shows a blended view of what's locally on my computer and the videos that happen to be loaded on my iPad which is connected to the computer. These videos (the ones on the iPad) are presented with an iCloud icon supposedly indicating they are in the cloud, when in fact they are not, they are just on my iPad.
Waaay confusing so far.
Reinstalling it fixes the problem for a few days, then it goes back to giving me error messages and saying that the device cannot be found.
The update is not showing up for me. I opened iTunes and then went to "Help" and "Check for Updates." It tells me that "This version of iTunes (10.7) is the current version." I also went to www.itunes.com and it is showing 10.7 as the latest version. I must be missing something?
Hmmmm, where is coverflow? I love that view.
This felt like a complete downgrade. The list of songs looks worse, as does every other bit of text. The whole app is just blurry.
This felt like a complete downgrade. The list of songs looks worse, as does every other bit of text. The whole app is just blurry.
Quote:
Originally Posted by CGJ
This felt like a complete downgrade. The list of songs looks worse, as does every other bit of text. The whole app is just blurry.
Are you using a retina MacBook? All looks fine on my 27" iMac
Does anyone else have retina Macbook pro and no retina icon in the Dock? What´s up with this?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rogifan
When I pull up the forums on my iPad I get a stupid mobile site and when I click on the desktop version link I get an error message. What the hell AI!?!
Simply click on the Apple (top left of your screen) and click on software updates....
Oh, unless you are a poor unfortunate soul who is stuck with a PC?
Quote:
Originally Posted by saarek
Are you using a retina MacBook? All looks fine on my 27" iMac
Nope, 13" MBA.
I can not see more than one playlist at once. This makes it very difficult to sort my library in a more ... sophisticated way. This is the first time I would like to change to another platform with more pro options. There no floating windows????
Certain aspects seem faster but getting too much beach balling with syncing and downloading of items.
edit: Added the Side Bar back via View in the Menu Bar.
That would be nice. At least an OS X update that allows it to be opened up by Preview the way PDFs stored in iTunes can.
I think this looks like a great improvement but I haven't played with it that long. I have no problem seeing my purchased items in my 'account view', though it would be nice to be able to select how many purchases to view at a time, and also be able to select what kind of purchases.
I find the new layout immediately more friendly and logical and much less cluttered. I like the new lighter shade of gray 'look' and wonder if this is a little piece of Ive that's snuck in. I'd like to think so.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gazoobee
Seems really confusing to me so far in terms of showing what's in the cloud, what's not etc. I think a lot of users will have trouble with this release.
When I log into my account for instance my "purchased" list shows nothing (!) but clicking on my local library shows everything that's been purchased since it's actually showing a blended view of local and cloud based stuff.
When I click "videos" again it shows none of my cloud purchases, but shows a blended view of what's locally on my computer and the videos that happen to be loaded on my iPad which is connected to the computer. These videos (the ones on the iPad) are presented with an iCloud icon supposedly indicating they are in the cloud, when in fact they are not, they are just on my iPad.
Waaay confusing so far.