Now we're getting on to the rumours I want to here about 
iTunes 11, iOS 6... yeaah! I'm looking forward to these a lot!
iTunes 11, iOS 6... yeaah! I'm looking forward to these a lot!
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iTunes 11 to Include Improved iCloud Integration and iOS 6 Support
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Ah well don't own an Apple TV so no clue there. I haven't streamed any movies but I stream tv shows constantly and the only issues I have with them are related to my ****** router. So I get disconnects whether I'm streaming from iTunes or VLC or any other player.
My router is solid (Time Capsule, extended to back bedroom with an Airport Express), consistently have 5 bars on WiFi in all rooms of house. Apple TV dropouts are even happening when source computer + Apple TV connected via Ethernet, which is awful.
And everything worked perfectly (sharing to laptop / iOS devices / Apple TV all flawless) before the latest updates to iTunes, Airport Utility, Airport firmware, and Apple TV interface. Something in there broke it. A lot of speculation that it's actually a Bonjour issue, too. Arf. Just hope they fix it soon
My router is solid (Time Capsule, extended to back bedroom with an Airport Express), consistently have 5 bars on WiFi in all rooms of house. Apple TV dropouts are even happening when source computer + Apple TV connected via Ethernet, which is awful.
And everything worked perfectly (sharing to laptop / iOS devices / Apple TV all flawless) before the latest updates to iTunes, Airport Utility, Airport firmware, and Apple TV interface. Something in there broke it. A lot of speculation that it's actually a Bonjour issue, too. Arf. Just hope they fix it soon
Ah well, if I use ethernet I don't get dropouts or disconnects with anything. iTunes, VLC, Plex, all stream perfectly through ethernet. But with Wifi there are occasional issues with all of them.
Here are two major issues I have with iTunes:
1)
Apple sells 27" iMacs and can't use the screen real estate.
2) Video management in iTunes is terribly limited and confusing.
Considering Home sharing is the only option for video on Apple TV2 other than directly from iTunes Store (without jailbreaking), it really seems they don't want you supplying you own videos and want to force you to iTunes purchased only videos.
I have chucked everything I have at iTunes and its working great. I've converted all my AVI, MKV movies/TV Shows using Handbreak and then put them through "iDentify" which not only gives the file the correct meta data it also gives it movie art and if thats not enough it puts it into iTunes for me.
All I need now is for Apple to bring back Front Row or similar
because doing more things is what itunes needs to do.
edit: i re-read and noticed they primarily listed the music functions of icloud, so i guess those additions do make sense. i still wish they could move some of the more esoteric idevice functionality out of itunes though. like folding ios app management on your computer into the mac appstore software.
I completely agree. iTunes has become bloated and bogged down. It now takes so long to open on my MBP that if I want to hear music I usually get frustrated and just open Pandora. I would love to see Apple split iTunes into a few different programs. Personally I'd like to see them leave iTunes as music, make a separate app for app and iOS device management, and a separate app for video. iOS has a separate app for video and the separation works great. The movie management in iTunes is awful.
Anyone else feel this way? Does anyone think this wouldn't work?
I LOATHE APPLE VIDEO THINGS...
The iTunes video side is a tinkertoy program. Utter garbage.
The DVD player still can't do full screen on just ONE of 2+ screens.
It's crazy crap. Apple should try making their programs work well and have smooth function and simplicity before working on whatever fluff they want to pack in there for social whores.
Like I said, I personally have no issues with iTunes.
My parents however, are less than novices, they just don't understand technology. They use their iDevices just fine, but when it comes to adding content to them, I have to do it for them. I'm not sure if that method you suggested would work with them as they're not used to using iTunes. They've learned through decades of me teaching them that a file in a folder can be dragged to another folder. That's pretty much the only thing they know, so they just don't understand why iTunes needs to be there. My dad is at the point where he is beginning to hate Apple products just because of iTunes.
Again, I have no issues with iTunes and I use it each and every day. But there should be a simpler iTunes for people like my parents. I have a job and I'm also studying at a university, I don't have as much time as I used to teach them.
Considering the market share Apple has captured for all three of it's iOS brands, I really doubt that iTunes is being much of a deterrent. In fact, iTunes was largely responsible for the initial popularity of the iPod. It was the fist MP3 player that had a well constructed, simple to use software package that would organize, play, and sell music. iTunes and the iTunes music store were essential to its success.
Now over the years, yes, iTunes has become very bloated and more confusing, but I feel that you're exaggerating a bit. It could use a makeover and it could certainly stand to lose a few pounds, but the worst thing Apple has ever done? Hardly. It's one of the smartest moves they've ever made.
This. I'll be watching a movie from my iTunes library on Apple TV with the family and after about 5 or 10 minutes it cuts out to the home screen. I then have to run to the computer, restart iTunes and continue where we left off. Oh, did I mention this happens about every 5 minutes or so? The kids then lose interest and the wife rolls her eyes. Wonderful. It really ruins the whole movie watching experience. Extremely frustrating. This also happens if your streaming movies on an iPhone or iPad, yet movie rentals from iTunes or Netflix runs fine. This issue starting happening with the latest version of iTunes (10.6.1), so I'm assuming there's a bug in iTunes itself. The Apple Support forums are full of users experiencing the same issue. I've already provided feedback to Apple and others should too.
Apple, if you are reading this, please fix it!!!! It worked fine before!! I've invested a lot in your ecosystem - I expect things to work.
Otherwise, I'm quite happy with iTunes.
Is anyone else concerned that Apple might make the use of iCloud mandatory in the future? As in, you have no choice but to sync your iPhone/iPad/etc. using iCloud, instead of being able to use USB?
This idea concerns me because I don't like "the cloud" and prefer to manage and back up my own data. The idea of depending completely on a third party to keep my data safe is offensive to me.
This idea concerns me because I don't like "the cloud" and prefer to manage and back up my own data. The idea of depending completely on a third party to keep my data safe is offensive to me.
That's fully understandable except for one thing. There is absolutely no reason why you can't have both. I have all of my music in the cloud, nicely backed up. I also have it all on an external hard drive, nicely backed up. I still manage to back up my own data. If you put music into the cloud and decide to nuke your mp3 library, that's your own decision. But putting your music in the cloud doesn't do it automatically.
The bigger issue with what you're proposing is simply the creepiness that comes with being forced to use the cloud. What if someone doesn't want Apple to have digital copies of all of their music? It may sound paranoid, but it would be a real issue for some people. If you're a musician and you organize your own copyrighted work in iTunes, this is a legitimate concern.
Another example: What if we're forced someday to back up movies to the cloud? I'm a filmmaker and I put my films into iTunes so that I can load them onto my iOS devices to share with friends as well as potential investors. Having an iPad loaded with my work is unbelievably helpful when I can just hand it to an investor or colleague and let them watch. One of those short films got distribution last year, and is airing on TV. The contract gives that company exclusive online distribution rights for three years. If putting that film into iTunes automatically loaded it onto Apple's cloud servers, I believe it would technically be a breach of contract on my part. (Hmm, now I'm curious. I wonder if it would count as such.) Musicians can run into similar problems.
So yeah, lets hope that doesn't happen.
One of my biggest complaints about iCloud is that I don't really know what is backed up, or how it's all managed. It lacks a central hub. But, for god's sake, why are they putting that in iTunes?! It's going to be so bloated or is it already? ;-)
I get that they don't want another app to push to Windows users. But why would I launch iTunes to handle my iCloud integration? Sure, I'd think to go there if I'm dealing with my MUSIC or perhaps VIDEO syncing ...
I feel like iTunes needs a rename. It's more like my iHub every day.
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This is REALLY thought provoking. Hmmmm.
I can't imagine this is their intent. Although perhaps artists need to get clarification from Apple about their TOS.
I find the auto-backup-to-the-cloud issue most troublesome for my photos. It's so awesome to have them automatically posted for my wife to see on her phone, or for us to share on our iPad. But there are times when I want to pull a couple ones that aren't great shots, for example. No way to do it. You have to purge your whole photostream, disable syncing, delete the photos you don't want, then re-enable steaming to re-sync. Asinine.
I get that they don't want another app to push to Windows users. But why would I launch iTunes to handle my iCloud integration? Sure, I'd think to go there if I'm dealing with my MUSIC or perhaps VIDEO syncing ...
I feel like iTunes needs a rename. It's more like my iHub every day.
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This is REALLY thought provoking. Hmmmm.
I can't imagine this is their intent. Although perhaps artists need to get clarification from Apple about their TOS.
I find the auto-backup-to-the-cloud issue most troublesome for my photos. It's so awesome to have them automatically posted for my wife to see on her phone, or for us to share on our iPad. But there are times when I want to pull a couple ones that aren't great shots, for example. No way to do it. You have to purge your whole photostream, disable syncing, delete the photos you don't want, then re-enable steaming to re-sync. Asinine.
If I'm not mistaken, you can now directly delete from your photostream -- is this not the case?
Whats wrong with the video side? Genuine question as I have my movies and tv shows stored and viewed in it without issue?
And a top of the line mac doesn't even help, performance is still bad because the app doesn't use more than one core.
What makes you think that? Maybe there's some of that going on under the hood, but the app certainly locks out user input very often, doing a number of different things. And if you really want to see how the app only uses one core, try encoding video and look at Activity Monitor (and compare that to something like Handbrake).
Just because you haven't seen the problems personally doesn't mean they don't exist. Match in particular has a number of problems, many of them very common if not universal to all users, just look at apple's support board.
What's really scary is the knowledge that all the internals of iTunes are written in C - no, not Objective C or even C++ - and there's ****loads of crufty old code leftover from the original port of SoundJam into iTunes (1.0) back in 2000. (Actually one of the architectural aspects that made the port to Windows feasible.)
I thought this house of cards would have collapsed years ago, and one of my big expectations for Lion was that they were going to do a complete iTunes slimdown and extract all the device control and syncing into a dedicated app. But no - the bloatification of Mac OS continues unabated...
I guess I'm the only one who thinks iTunes is a good piece of software. Granted, Apple has some "scoping" problems with it... but I've never run into stability issues with it. Always has done a great job at keeping my iOS devices in Sync and backed up.
I loathed iTunes when it first came out for Windows... but back then, computers weren't fast enough to handle playing music in iTunes and playing Diablo 2 (well, maybe they were, but mine wasn't). Winamp was the obvious choice. The performance of todays computers makes the differences between iTunes and other music applications (dare I say, even Foobar 2000) so damn negligible that I'm not sure why people still get their panties in a twist over it. It is good software.
I loathed iTunes when it first came out for Windows... but back then, computers weren't fast enough to handle playing music in iTunes and playing Diablo 2 (well, maybe they were, but mine wasn't). Winamp was the obvious choice. The performance of todays computers makes the differences between iTunes and other music applications (dare I say, even Foobar 2000) so damn negligible that I'm not sure why people still get their panties in a twist over it. It is good software.
I was hoping they would separate the App store from iTunes, like what they did with the Mac App store. Just keep iTunes for media and have your apps in a separate application that is dedicated to nothing but apps. Better search, easier to manage onscreen controls that are not so laggy.
I try to avoid updating when I can unfortunately new devices require newer itunes, so eventually I have to upgrade.
What they need to fix is the itunes match service it is horribly messy with its integration and the clean vs explicit bug still exists.
What they need to fix is the itunes match service it is horribly messy with its integration and the clean vs explicit bug still exists.
Yes, I'm sure it isn't their intention, but I do hope that they're aware. Now the new Final Cut even incorporates your iPhoto and iTunes libraries into it, as it does with iMovie. There is a panel right in FCPX for accessing those libraries. So Apple is basically suggesting that professionals store their production music, sound fx, production photos, etc right into their iLife suite. I also know a few who do. Not many people would feel comfortable with all of that being in the cloud.
And I agree that not being able to delete individual photos from your photostream is a HUGE problem. What a needless annoyance. They really need to add that feature.
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Then I would love to see them just completely reinvent iTunes, as they did with FCPX. I'd still love to see it split into separate specialized programs.
With the iOS 5.1 update, can't you delete individual photos from the photo stream? When I delete individual photos from photostream, it syncs and they disappear from the photostream of all of my devices.