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iTunes is gone, Music.app is no bueno, what else is available?

S

Sill

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Nov 14, 2014
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I had time to play around with Music, which I haven't used very much since Catalina (Big Sur installed now). I see Apple has taken away all of the useful features like the column browser which allowed me to sort songs by title, genre, etc. The window even when fully opened is taken up mostly by album art so I only get a few titles per page.

If this was 1999, I'd be on OS 9.x and I'd simply open up Audion or SoundJam. What is available now? Kodi is overkill, and please don't mention Plex... just... no.
 
In music if you click library and then songs you can add columns, sort them by whatever you want etc.
 
Well, this is scary. I went through the app before and none of that was available. Now it is. I'm starting to wonder if I haven't woken up yet, or perhaps this is the dream now.
 
Sill said:
I had time to play around with Music, which I haven't used very much since Catalina (Big Sur installed now). I see Apple has taken away all of the useful features like the column browser which allowed me to sort songs by title, genre, etc. The window even when fully opened is taken up mostly by album art so I only get a few titles per page.

If this was 1999, I'd be on OS 9.x and I'd simply open up Audion or SoundJam. What is available now? Kodi is overkill, and please don't mention Plex... just... no.
Click to expand...

Column Browser is still there. Choose Songs in Library, then either hit Command+B OR go to View in menu, Column Browser > Show Column Browser
 
Nevertheless Music.app is really bad and I'm also considering alternatives (that obviously imply losing an Apple Music subscriber).
Loved iTunes some years ago, now Music often does not start playing, get stuck in some obscure network operation. And search is simply ridiculous, no autocorrection of any sort, forces to go back to initial search state to select Apple Music / Your Library. It's a buggy client for a decent streaming service and simply a second class player for local music.
 
I haven't used the Music streaming features. When iTunes had the "roll your own" radio stations about 5 years ago I picked a classic rock channel, and found that after an hour or so it would start to get repetitive, and the "dislike and skip" button just made things worse. Then when Music was introduced they hobbled those further, and finally they didn't work. I have more enjoyment playing the TunedIn service over my Sonos system, and its free. If there was some way to have it work without Sonos tracking what I listen to that would be even better.
 
There's currently a hole in the market. I'm switching to Volumio on a Raspberry Pi with a DAC hat. Pita setup, but I think I'm nearing an acceptable solution.
Volumio
 
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Definitely post up your results with that. After what TV.app did to my media library I'm looking at ways to replace the stock Apple programs.
 
Seuck said:
Nevertheless Music.app is really bad and I'm also considering alternatives (that obviously imply losing an Apple Music subscriber).
Loved iTunes some years ago, now Music often does not start playing, get stuck in some obscure network operation. And search is simply ridiculous, no autocorrection of any sort, forces to go back to initial search state to select Apple Music / Your Library. It's a buggy client for a decent streaming service and simply a second class player for local music.
Click to expand...
iTunes was not broken so Apple Geeks in Cupertino decided to fix it....everyone needs to justify their existence on the payroll.....this is why I sent back (among other reasons) the New Mac Mini....went back to 10.13.6 OS back to my older Mini.....
 
Its probably more than just job preservation. Apple has turned to services as a way to lock people in to their ecosystem, because of all the service-centric companies that have risen up as their competition. I wouldn't have a problem with that; as long as Apple makes quality hardware I'm not going anywhere, and I suspect all but the most devout platform-agnostics and biggest complainers would stick around too. But when Apple starts reorganizing their hardware and OS around pushing people to those services, I'm going to start looking elsewhere, starting with software.

Right now I can still lock out the Music store and banish it from my Music app, but that'll change, eventually. The information that can be gathered from customer usage is too valuable to Apple, internally, for them to allow that to keep happening. I'm already considering Linux phones now because of Apple's iCloud shenanigans, and that will unfortunately render my Watch useless for anything but telling time. I don't need a $300 piece for that, a $50 Casio works just as well and I can wear it diving.

I never thought I'd get to that point, but between these moves and Apple's activism now, I'm really rethinking my support for the company.
 
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Sill said:
........But when Apple starts reorganizing their hardware and OS around pushing people to those services, I'm going to start looking elsewhere, starting with software.


I never thought I'd get to that point, but between these moves and Apple's activism now, I'm really rethinking my support for the company.
Click to expand...

And unfortunately, Microsoft is also pushing ever forward with integrating clouded functionality into the basic menu operations within the OS and the Office programs... Noticed the other day too that they they are calling programs by the name "Apps" more and more often. Even setting up Windows 10 for the first time on a PC, you get barraged with suggestions that you should log into or create a Microsoft account.

Back to Apple: Like Sill said, I'm leaning towards minimizing my support a bit for Apple, Microsoft, and the lot of them.

Regarding iTunes: I just want to browse new music and buy an 'effing song or "album" now and then. I actually increased music purchases 10 or 15 years ago at both at traditional "record stores" and through iTunes for quite a while. I found iTunes to be the perfect tool for vetting and sampling what I might like to buy. But now, I'm finding it really hard to get physical CDs at all anymore other than top-40 and picked-over old mainstream artists. So, does that mean that Apple iTunes is like the Walmart of the music store world. Kill all the chain store and local competition and then themselves abandon the market.
 
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I second Retroactive. Works great on Big Sur.

I tried the new Apple Music and TV app but they just made a mess of my local library. Between this and the dumpster fire that is HomeShare, Apple knows what they're doing. They don't want customers to rip their own music/movies and store it local. They can't make money that way.

I'm really close to switching to an iTunes alternative. The only thing that has stopped me, is having multiple ATV3's that I use for music/movies from my local library. Most of the alternative music/movie apps aren't compatible with Apple TVs.

Also, most that I have researched don't use play counts or smart playlists which are important to me.
 
I pretty much just Music.app as a way to get things into my iTunes Match library, then listen on iPad and iPhone. It was the same with iTunes, though, so not much changed for me. Is there anything specific that would improve the app for you? I always wonder why someone chooses one app over another.
 
jtrenthacker said:
I second Retroactive. Works great on Big Sur.

I tried the new Apple Music and TV app but they just made a mess of my local library. Between this and the dumpster fire that is HomeShare, Apple knows what they're doing. They don't want customers to rip their own music/movies and store it local. They can't make money that way.

I'm really close to switching to an iTunes alternative. The only thing that has stopped me, is having multiple ATV3's that I use for music/movies from my local library. Most of the alternative music/movie apps aren't compatible with Apple TVs.

Also, most that I have researched don't use play counts or smart playlists which are important to me.
Click to expand...


Something actually works on Big Slow? I'm surprised. Apple will end up "fixing" that, of course.

I'm sorry to hear you had library issues. I'm presuming you're talking about using the TV app? I had a great time with that one. TV was the one thing in Catalina that I would like to burn out of the computer with fire.


- all container folders stripped, leaving only the files
- all movie art stripped from the files
- all subtitles stripped from the files
- all movies renamed, stripping the year from the filename and adding "1080HD"
- no ability to search the local library, only the Apple library

I spent years building up that poster art for my movies. I needed the year in the filename so Infuse could look up the metadata. That library was shared amongst all the devices in my home - multiple aTVs, two iMacs, several iDevices. All wrecked, so Apple could take control of my experience and steer me towards streaming and away from local ownership.
 
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