Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
iTunes 9 NOT 64-Bit!!!
- Thread starter jlpoore89
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
From someone who works with high-end servers all the time: can you explain how exactly 64-bit will make things snappier in iTunes?
People seem to notice the number 64 is larger than 32 and assume a speed boost. That's not the case. Unless your library is over 4 GB in size (the library file itself), which is unlikely, you're not going to see anything.
Itunes 64 bit for Windows runs much snappier on my Windows 7 machine. I have been running it in 64 bit since 8.0
This is not entirely true. The iTunes store exists mainly as a means to promote the sales of iPods/hardware. It's so successful because it operates at a relatively slim profit margin. The magic $.99 price point on a 70/30 split means that they make less money on the music than a traditional music retailer does (or did) per song, but the amount of money made on residual iPod sales more that makes up for the difference. That market remains massively profitable.
They're doing the same with video games on the iPod Touch/iPhone, and I imagine they'll come up with a hardware platform that will address movies and whatnot, in due time.
It's brilliant, really.
Oh yeah, I can totally see how they aren't making any money by charging a 42% surcharge on what the record company gets for a 7MB song! NOT!
I bet you believe in Sarbanes-Oxley too.
Gee, I wonder how Youtube.com & Hulu are going to make money giving people 200MB movies for NOTHING? Guess they must sell a lot of expensive HuluPods!
Well hopefully "iTunes X" will be a 64-bit Cocoa app.
I hope so! I bet iTunes X won't ship until OS X 10.7...
You could just check out their financials. They post them every quarter.
What does that mean?
http://www.law.uc.edu/CCL/SOact/soact.pdf
They don't give movies away for NOTHING.
I guess you never noticed the non-fast forward-able ads and overlays interspersed inside the content. Companies PAY Hulu and YouTube/Google for that placement which supports the operation. Hulu and YouTube/Google's business model is entirely different from Apple's. Literally an Apples and Oranges comparison.
Oh, that's right, they sell ads, on old, third run, played out shows and movies.
Apple has better margins on everything they sell on iTunes than a retailer does selling the same crap for real.
Yeah, I just read the 2008 annual report. I didn't see any breakdown for the iTunes store. So try again. How does one not make a ton of money by getting 30 cents for every 70 cents the record, movie, or developer company gets, for doing nothing more than sending a file?baldimac said:
Yeah, you're right. Apple makes a ton of money selling downloads, the other guys just play movies barely good enough so they can sell some ads on top.chupa said:
They do make some money, but its not as high as one would think. Most analysts believe Apples margin in the iTunes Store is around 10 percent after overhead costs (credit card processing, bandwidth, etc).
Ten percent is not a lot for a company thats used to making a 30 to 60 percent profit margin on all their other products. Thats why they dont consider it significant.
http://www.appleinsider.com/article...e_a_greater_cash_crop_than_apple_implies.html
Perhaps, just perhaps, there's more to it than just sending a file. Sounds crazy, no?
EDIT: Anyways, Daring Fireball has some thoughts on this topic:
iTunes and Cocoa
Well hopefully "iTunes X" will be a 64-bit Cocoa app.
And what exactly will a 64bit version of iTunes give you that you cannot do with the current version?
So a couple of big shots got into the 64-bit iTunes discussion.
Adobe’s John Nack made an interesting post about why a 64-bit iTunes is not necessary:
http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/2009/09/why_do_you_want_a_64-bit_itunes.html
And Gruber points out that it’s not exactly about the need for a 64-bit iTunes, but about the future of Mac development (and Apple has declared 64-bit Cocoa the future):
http://daringfireball.net/2009/09/itunes_and_cocoa
Adobe’s John Nack made an interesting post about why a 64-bit iTunes is not necessary:
http://blogs.adobe.com/jnack/2009/09/why_do_you_want_a_64-bit_itunes.html
And Gruber points out that it’s not exactly about the need for a 64-bit iTunes, but about the future of Mac development (and Apple has declared 64-bit Cocoa the future):
http://daringfireball.net/2009/09/itunes_and_cocoa
make everyone happy. a lot of people don't understand what 64-bit ACTUALLY is.
they paid 30$ for an upgrade, and it was an upgrade to 64 bit for them. so if a program they heavily use is 32 bit, psychologically - they didn't get their $$ worth.
The "iTunes for Windows Vista 64 bit" is actually a 32 bit application. However the service for the iPhone/iPods is 64 bit and the installer is 32 bit (normal iTunes for Windows uses a 16 bit installer)
What makes you think so?
Here is their Q3 2009 Unaudited Summary Data
http://images.apple.com/pr/pdf/q309data_sum.pdf
There is a line for "Other Music Related Products and Services" that "consists of iTunes Store sales, iPod services, and Apple-branded and third-party iPod accessories." Looks like they are averaging about $1 billion in revenue per quarter. Even if we attribute that entire amount to iTunes music, they are only making $300 million in gross profit per quarter (that assumes no other direct costs, which, of course, there is.) Net profit would be considerably less. Their company-wide ratio, of gross to net profit is about 3 to 1. That would leave about $100 million in net profit. But, of course, they are bringing in a significant amount of revenue from movies, apps, and licensing. So I would bet that they make $50-75 million per quarter on music sales. About 4% to 6% of their quarterly profits.
Right - they now have a 64-bit OS, so if all of their apps aren't 64-bit, alarms seem to go off in their brains, regardless of whether they'll ever see any difference between the 32-bit & 64-bit versions of the apps.
And I think that is low-ball to keep Hollywood from knowing how much they really make.
You wouldn't apply a hardware company's company-wide ratio to a downloading service. That leaves about $300 million in net profit. 30% is a fat margin, and it might be much higher.baldimac said:
Maybe you should look up gross vs net margins. Gross Profit is revenue minus cost of providing the service or product. It would not be comparable between hardware and software divisions. Net profit is gross profit minus overhead and taxes. The ratio would likely be similar across Apple's divisions. In fact, I would guess that the overhead costs for a service are higher then hardware.
Did you read my post at all and make any attempt to understand it? 30% isn't even Apple's gross margin. It is simply their cut before all of their other expenses are taken out. And 30% isn't even a large gross margin on software or services. Microsoft makes around 75%.
A 64 bits itunes implies no powerpc itunes....they are not going to code a different itunes version for each (32bits carbon and 64bits cocoa)..
So, in my opinion, there won't be a 64 bit itunes soon
So, in my opinion, there won't be a 64 bit itunes soon
The only 64-bit parts of that version of iTunes are the drivers necessary to interface with the hardware. The application itself is the same 32-bit version.
Why it runs snappier is probably both a result of Windows 7 and the advantages 64-bit bring to Windows performance in high-memory installations.
No, it does not imply that. The same Cocoa version of an app can be compiled for PPC, PPC64, X86, and AMD64.
They didn't have to rewrite iTunes for Intel, after all.
But I agree there won't be a 64-bit version soon. It has to be rewritten in Cocoa, and there is no pressing need.