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Is it possible to have 2 iPhones on 1 iTunes acct?

S

STC

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
May 14, 2008
537
6
I didnt think this was possible, but my coworker says it is. He and his wife both have 3G iPhones and use 1 iTunes acct. He says he bought Texas Hold'em and installed it on both phones.

When I asked him how he set up 2 phones w/ 1 acct, he said he just plugged in his 1st, set up the acct. Then he plugged in his wife's and a prompt popped up asking if this is a new phone. He clicked yes, then he has 2 phones on 1 acct. He said they have their own individual settings, podcasts, music, etc on the 1 acct.

Is this possible?

I tried doing this last yr when I got my iPod and tried to set it up w/ my wife's iTunes acct and it tried to overwrite all my stuff w/ hers.
 
M

meagain

macrumors 68030
Nov 18, 2006
2,570
26
I'm not figuring out how you can do that. just plug the 2nd phone and synch apps to the one account? Hmm... Wouldn't it know it's another phone registered to another person?
 
A

aristobrat

macrumors G5
Oct 14, 2005
12,292
1,403
meagain said:
I'm not figuring out how you can do that. just plug the 2nd phone and synch apps to the one account? Hmm... Wouldn't it know it's another phone registered to another person?
Click to expand...
It seems to treat the iPhone like an iPod. i.e. one iTunes account can be used on up to 5 computers at the same time and multiple iPods.
 
M

mrtune

macrumors 6502a
Jun 23, 2007
803
20
Absolutely it works. My sister has her own iPhone attached to her own computer with iTunes. I setup her iTunes with my account. We share apps as well as music that is purchased through my account. Apple's drm allows 5 registered computers so it was easy to get her on my account.

Not sure how many iPods/iPhones you are limited to though. I know it's at the least 4 as I have my 16gb iphone and a 30gb iPod and my sister has a 8gb nano and 8gb iPhone. All of them sync just fine.
 
S

STC

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
May 14, 2008
537
6
Can someone give me a detailed stsp by step on how to set up iTunes for 2 iPhones?

I'm assuming I have to manaually sync music, apps, contacts, pics, etc.
 
A

aristobrat

macrumors G5
Oct 14, 2005
12,292
1,403
STC said:
Can someone give me a detailed stsp by step on how to set up iTunes for 2 iPhones?

I'm assuming I have to manaually sync music, apps, contacts, pics, etc.
Click to expand...
iTunes remembers whatever sync settings you setup for each device.

The only manual work you may want to do is setup different groups of contacts in Address Book, a second calendar in iCal, and different playlists in iTunes.

When you plug in the first iPhone, you can tell iTunes to only sync one of the groups in the Address Book, whichever calendar, and whatever playlists for that phone.

You can set the second iPhone up to sync the other group in the Address Book, the other Calendar, and whichever playlists for that.

iTunes will still automatically sync, but only what you've told it sync for that phone.

IMO, it's easier to figure out by playing around than to explain. :)
 
T

txr0ckabilly

macrumors 6502
May 21, 2008
421
0
Southwest Louisiana
mrtune said:
Not sure how many iPods/iPhones you are limited to though. I know it's at the least 4 as I have my 16gb iphone and a 30gb iPod and my sister has a 8gb nano and 8gb iPhone. All of them sync just fine.
Click to expand...


not sure either as i have 3 iphones and 7 ipods all on the same account (wife and kids and old ipods).


kind of on the same subject-

i misspelled my wife's last name (i know how to spell my last name, it was just a wrong keystroke) when i registered her iphone on itunes so all her email comes with her named spelled wrong. is there anyway of me changing her name on her phone without re-registering/restoring it?
 
S

STC

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
May 14, 2008
537
6
aristobrat said:
iTunes remembers whatever sync settings you setup for each device.

The only manual work you may want to do is setup different groups of contacts in Address Book, a second calendar in iCal, and different playlists in iTunes.

When you plug in the first iPhone, you can tell iTunes to only sync one of the groups in the Address Book, whichever calendar, and whatever playlists for that phone.

You can set the second iPhone up to sync the other group in the Address Book, the other Calendar, and whichever playlists for that.

iTunes will still automatically sync, but only what you've told it sync for that phone.

IMO, it's easier to figure out by playing around than to explain. :)
Click to expand...

I just tried this. I plugged in my iPhone into my wife's iTunes. It recognized my iPhone. All the sync boxes were unchecked (as I have none of my data, music, etc) on this computer.

When I clicked tried to sync my iPhone it said something like all data on phone will be erased and replaced w/ whats on this computer. I got scared and clicked cancel.

Any ideas?
 
A

aristobrat

macrumors G5
Oct 14, 2005
12,292
1,403
While you can sync multiple devices into one iTunes library, for the most part, you can't have one device that syncs with multiple libraries.

If you try to sync a device that's been setup with a different iTunes library (i.e. yours) on another iTunes library (i.e. your wives), you get the prompt that you got.

What in her library were you trying to sync? Some iPhone apps?
 
S

STC

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
May 14, 2008
537
6
aristobrat said:
While you can sync multiple devices into one iTunes library, for the most part, you can't have one device that syncs with multiple libraries.

If you try to sync a device that's been setup with a different iTunes library (i.e. yours) on another iTunes library (i.e. your wives), you get the prompt that you got.

What in her library were you trying to sync? Some iPhone apps?
Click to expand...

I was trying to see if I can set up my iPhone on her acct, but I'm not trying to sync yet as I havent updated to 2.0 yet (i'm still 1.1.4 jailbroken).

I do eventually want to use 1 itunes acct when I do upgrade to 2.0 though because of the apps that we bought already (dont want to buy the same app 2x).
 
B

burgerhunt

macrumors newbie
Jul 19, 2008
2
0
I have a wrinkle to this situation... I have my Itunes account on my Mac at home and all my exchange information (contacts, calendar, etc) on my PC laptop I use for work. Is it possible to sync just my exchange info from my laptop while using all the songs and videos on my Mac? I want to keep these two things seperate if possible because I do not want to big down my laptop with all my songs. Any help would be GREATLY appreciated.
 
redsoxunixgeek

redsoxunixgeek

macrumors regular
Dec 1, 2006
115
21
Salt Lake City YOOTah
My girlfriend and I both have iPhones (mine just hasnt shown up0 yet) but all of our iPods and iPod Touch are cross linked - and i am sure we will do the same - we just keep ours in disk mode and drag and drop stuff though
 
D

dranakin

macrumors 6502
Mar 6, 2005
455
47
txr0ckabilly said:
i misspelled my wife's last name (i know how to spell my last name, it was just a wrong keystroke) when i registered her iphone on itunes so all her email comes with her named spelled wrong. is there anyway of me changing her name on her phone without re-registering/restoring it?
Click to expand...

Yeah, I have the same problem. I changed the log-on for my iTunes account, but my phone is still configured for the old log-on. Does anyone know how to change it?
 
S

snook911

macrumors 6502a
Aug 13, 2007
889
0
Yorba Linda, CA
I have 2 iPhone's ( 1 1st gen, one 3g), one iPod nano 3G (kids) , 1 iPod shuffel (wives) and all sync to one itunes account. Here's how I do it. I have 3 seperate libraries. One named iphone one named nano and one named shuffle. I drag and drop music from the main music file On top down to the liabaries on the bottom. When you plug in the device it automaticly knows what is plugged in and syncs that device to the correct liabrary. Works great for me hop that this helps someone out.
 
M

meagain

macrumors 68030
Nov 18, 2006
2,570
26
Anyone know of any specific instructions on how to do this? Authorizing the computers doesn't show the apps on any of them. I don't even see the apps i my 'purchase history'.
 
S

shash12

macrumors newbie
Feb 1, 2010
2
0
2 iPhones on same acc

My wife and I have a 3GS each and are both synced to the same iTunes account with no problems. I plan to buy copilot for my phone, do you think it will work on both phones?
 
H

Hawke

macrumors regular
Dec 21, 2007
136
0
Dublin, Ireland
Basically it is the same as having an iPhone and iPod touch which are synced differently.. My iPhone doesn't have the same capacity as my touch, so i sync only few information to my iPhone as opposed to the Touch which gets all my songs, music, TV shows, movies, but no contacts
 
Rat-Boy

Rat-Boy

macrumors 65816
Jul 28, 2008
1,184
15
Georgia
Yes, this pretty easy to do.

It remembers settings and what is synced by the phone.

I currently have 2 3G phones and another 2 3GS phones (Total 4) synced with one single iTunes account.

No problems what so ever, other than four people fighting over the iTunes dollars. LOL..
 
P

pcorrado

macrumors 6502
May 21, 2008
421
162
Chicago, IL
My wife and I also share 1 iTunes account with two iPhones. I have it set up a bit different though.

Instead of using one account on our mac - we each have our own account (so contacts, calendars, bookmarks are separate). I have our iTunes library with music and apps in the shared directory (you have to make sure you set permisions for all users) and have iTunes set up on both user accounts to use the library in the shared directory. (option click to select).

When I get home later I can type a more detailed post if someone is interested - I am post from my iPhone.
 
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