Apple Releases iTunes 5

[Fotek2001]

Personally, I have to confess that I really like the new look introduced in iTunes 5 - it seems much cleaner and sleeker than before. I always felt that the brushed metal interface was rather tacky so if this is a sign of what's to come, then I'd be happy.

Having said that, I do wish that buttons to do things like add new playlists were at the top of the window where other tool buttons are located. There seems to be a trend in new Apple applications (Safari bookmarks, Mail, iPhoto, iTunes) to include buttons at both the top and bottom of the window and I don't think this is either intuitive or easy to use.

My only other gripe with iTunes 5 is the lack of decent context menus in the sources panel and the inability to move multiple items into folders. I also had a problem moving a nested folder out of its parent folder. In the end I had to delete the nested folder and make a new one.

 

[seemiles]

GUI

If you like the iTunes 5 GUI, and want similar smooth effect for rest of OS then a easy answer is http://www.sagefire.org/C1827030151/E20050812201046/index.html
Works well, and doesnt need shapeshifter or equivalent.

Personally love the new UI. Feels nicer to use. I think it has evolved nicely, and looks smart, the brushed ally interface was starting to look clumsy.

Its all down to personal taste though, and it certainly seems to have split opinions. I am sure I remember similar discussions about OS X when that emerged...I do agree Apple should tie all their interfaces closer together though.

 

[dglsmhn]

designed for windows?

notice how the square corners make it work better as a maximized app. And when you open it, it fills the screen...

 

[ipedro]

Agreed on multiples. This is one thing I miss from Windows Media Player on my PC... it allowed you (or the online info grabbing service) to put more than one artist in the artist field, separated by semicolons. Then, when you're browsing your library, you can choose to view either by "Contributing Artist" or "Album Artist."

Somebody please send Steve Jobs a copy of Windows Media Player.

 

[zebs1972]

iTunes 5 UI is wrong because...

Like many of you I got a shock when first opening iTunes 5. I saw that big square plastic display sitting in the middle and thought urgh!!!

But actually the plastic display is nice, what is wrong is that the buttons next to it, they no longer match. The buttons looked great next to the previous smooth curved display. What Apple need to do is update the look of the buttons. and I think they should take a look at GarageBand for inspiration as that has a beautiful UI.

I really do think that would work well on a new iTunes and it would be nice if we had the option of seeing it in either Black plastic or White (to match the new iPods of course).

 

[gofast]

I've said this many times before, but it always bears repeating...

This is really starting tp p*** me off. I browsed the new iTunes pages at apple.com and still found no mention of gapless playback. Apple doesn't freaking care. It's pathetic. And before anyone replies, the following are not acceptable solutions:

• Cross-fading

• 
  
  Is there some reason that crossfade with 0 seconds is not acceptable to you? It's continuous.

 

[kretzy]

IT'S THE MOST UGLY THING I HAVE EVER SEEN!!!

IT IS JUST SOOOOO F*****G UGLY.

CHEAP PLASTIC FINISH.....WHY?? THE BRUSHED ALUMINIUM IS SOOOO SLEEK AND STYLISH!!!

SQUARED CORNERS....WHY?? THEY JUST LOOK SO WRONG

I WANT 4.9 BACK, I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE NEW FEATURES

COULD SOME COMPUTER GENIUS PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE CREATE A SKIN OR SOMETHING SO I DON'T HAVE TO LOOK AT THIS ABOMINATION ANY MORE!!!

I HAVE NEVER BEEN MORE DISAPPOINTED WITH APPLE

(I apologise for my over use of capitilised letters, but i'm just really annoyed about it)

PS: THE VOLUME CONTROL IS ALSO JUST WRONG, AS IS THE NEW GRAPHIC WHICH DISPLAYS THE TRACK'S PROGRESS

PPS: finished venting now

PPPS: the iPod nano is awesome, i want a black one

 

[mflat5]

Wow

This new version seems like a whole new app.

So sleek and less cluttered...

Love the new features, its faster and more streamlined...

 

[forumBuddy]

I donno, I still prefer old iTunes look - it looks very similar to Windows XP silver theme. I also didn't notice any difference between old and new intefrace either.

 

[dcv]

I just updated my iTunes and... hmmm, don't like it at all. Why did they change the UI? It looks all cluttered at the top. There's something VERY wrong about it... looks less mac-like and more windows-like without the brushed aluminium design.

 

[Sky Blue]

the best theme for iT5 i've found so far...

http://sagefire.org/images/iridium/smoothtunes-cr.png

 

[m-dogg]

Is there some reason that crossfade with 0 seconds is not acceptable to you? It's continuous.

it's continuous with a gap. try listening to a live album or something like pink floyd's dark side of the moon

 

[blybug]

Coverflow is nice eye candy, but not that usefull. If it's was a plug in for iTunes, it might be something. But I prefer Jewelcase. It's usefull and pretty.

Aside from being a separate app from iTunes (a plug-in would be AWESOME) how is it not useful? It displays your art as a row of "CDs" (though jewelcasing them would be even better), allows you to click through them one at a time, jump to any CD ordered by artist or title, and use the search field and/or the prefs to filter down to a specific subset. Double clicking the cover launches the album in iTunes.

Quite a bit more than eye candy, I'd say. If Apple would konfabulate this into iTunes it would be perfect. I'm surprised they didn't do more with album art in iTunes 5, such as a browse by cover function like this, or utilities to identify tracks with no art and a fetch it from the internet.

 

[m-dogg]

I donno, I still prefer old iTunes look - it looks very similar to Windows XP silver theme. I also didn't notice any difference between old and new intefrace either.

I agree - This looks very much like a windows app to me now. the brushed aluminum just felt like a step up compared to pretty much everything on windows. it made it stand out compared to other media players. feels like a step back to me...

 

[Poff]

ugly. really ugly. Looks like a windows-app!

 

[m-dogg]

the volume slider bothers me a little bit. I feel like it should be beefed up now that it is on it's own on between the controller and the player window. It seems too short/skinny height-wise compared to everything else.

That was fine (and made sense) when it was tucked under the controller. But now that it has moved out from under the controllers shadow, they should make it a little more, uh...substantial. I don't know, it just doesn't seem right to me...

 

[Yebot]

Lighten up Francis.

Most people couldn't care less about, and for the other 1%, fading works fine.

No need to get so upset because your specific needs put you in too small of a bucket for Apple to care about.

Fading is nowhere near fine for seamless track transitioning.

Ask the artists how they would prefer thier music to be presented.

 

[Poff]

All of you people bitching about gapless playback realize that true gapless on either MP3 or AAC is a hack, right? Both formats have fixed frame-lengths, whereas CDs do not. This means if a track doesn't completely fill up the last MP3 or AAC frame, silence is appended to fill it. The only way around this is either:

a) Take a bit of the next track and put in that blank spot (or kick part of that frame over to the next track, whichever makes sense based on how much of the frame is filled)
b) Note exactly where the actual audio data stops in some tag of some sort and pass that information on to the player

In the first case, you're re-arranging things, and in the second, you're doing something non-standard, so you can't guarantee that the same method is used in any other encoder. And there's several technical reasons, at least for MP3, why detecting "on the fly" is very difficult (which go right over my head, as I'm no audio compression engineer to say the least).

So even if you have a gapless player, unless your files have been ripped with an encoder that's doing either of the above (and in the second case, your player supports that method), you're going to get a bit of silence. The ONLY way to get around this is to use a format with no fixed frame length, like OGG, FLAC, ALAC, AIFF, or WAV (IIRC).

You're totally off. First, do this experiment:
Select a song, press command+I, edit the stop-time so it stops in the middle of the song.
Select the next song, edit the start-time so it starts in the middle of the song.
Listen. You'll still hear a small gap.

I know that mp3 and aac has these fixed framelengths. BUT. The program can analyze the songs and "remember" where the songs really should stop. So no information is stored in the file itself, but in the programs library-file. (After all, you can edit the start-and stoptimes manually in itunes. If it hadn't been for the gap that's still there, I'd just do it myself to improve my live-cd's.) WinAmp has had gapless for years AFAIK. This is just pure laziness on Apples behalf!

 

[plinden]

ugly. really ugly. Looks like a windows-app!

It looks nothing like the Windows apps I have running:
1. No title bar
2. No border around the window
3. The menu doesn't have the first letters underlined
4. There is no separator between the menu and the controls

I'm not sure if I like it, but it's certainly refreshingly different from the same-old same-old I see every day.

 

[shyataroo]

I was about to post how much iTunes didn't change than I look through all the new things that they don't mention... good job Apple R&D. I'll be joining you guys just as soon as I get my Apple Certified Desktop Repair Certificate.

 

[ScottB]

no way, itunes was cool, now it looks like utter bs. Now it looks like Mail... noooo!!! I want another cage fighter... why have they moved the sound drag to space hogging place, and the blue playlist bar... daym, the square, playlist titles got bold when clicked... this is not good... never used mail 2 , but def. dont want to. Any1 rekon they just updated the look of itunes 'cos tards dont understand that software can go to 4.10? I now deleting all my podcasts cos there in w/ my music, i was anoyed on my 3G ipod but this takes the biscuit.

 

[minimax]

CRAP UPDATE

WTF? why do I need to install QT7 when I only need this new Itunes?

I really have some issues with the new updates:
- the FORCED bundling of iTunes & QT (I know it happened with the earlier iT's as well but it STINKS)
- QT showing these annoying PRO buttons that clutter and pollute the menu's
- you need to deactivate iTMS if you are not interested, wheras in iT4 it was an option. A fundamental difference, and for me a principal one as I don't intend to make my music player a marketing tool for Apple.
-the awful GUI inconsistencies between QT and iT. If you force bundle them, at least make them consistent.

This is pushing it for me. Apple's marketing machine in full effect. They offer you a hand but take your arm instead.

 

[Stridder44]

PS: THE VOLUME CONTROL IS ALSO JUST WRONG, AS IS THE NEW GRAPHIC WHICH DISPLAYS THE TRACK'S PROGRESS

This is one change that made the most sense to me. The track progress meter is used in the iPods, so why not use it in iTunes also? It makes more sense to have this than to display the "Time Remaining", "Time Elapsed" etc that used to be below the song/artist title.

And all of you guys complain about the UI being ugly blah blah blah...well, lets see what you think would look better. If it's so bad lets see some pics of UI's that you made or think look nicer.

 

[MacNut]

And all of you guys complain about the UI being ugly blah blah blah...well, lets see what you think would look better. If it's so bad lets see some pics of UI's that you made or think look nicer.

I say go back to the 4.9 UI
The rounded corners were softer on the eyes, I think the squared look makes it harder to look at.

 

[MacNut]

My biggest gripe is the two tone display bar, just pick one color. Plus I would like to be able to sort my albums by artist and album in order. The ability to highlight more columns at a time. for example artist in order of album by year.