Why iTunes 9 Sucks...

[chevycamarolvr]

Didn't iTunes used to tell you if you already had a song in your library when adding it to your shopping cart?

I added a couple songs to the wish list (since I now have to use that as my "cart") that apparently had already been downloaded to this computer (which is shared with another, who must've purchased them), it didn't warn me, and now I paid for songs that were already on here....

 

[trip1ex]

Actually, they're not. They're /passive/ ports, not /active/ ports.

If they were active, you'd have an AC adapter for your keyboard.

From Apple: "Both the Apple Keyboard and the Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad include two USB 2.0 ports that allow you to connect a mouse, iPod, iPhone, digital camera, or printer. "

It used to specifically say this "The Apple Keyboard page says: "Devices that draw high power from the USB connection, such as iPods, hard drives and some flash drives, can only be used with the new keyboard when it is attached to the aluminum iMac."

Also Endgadget review:

•....... three USB ports (and two on the keyboard, which are powered enough to charge an iPhone and iPod),

which was the feature the 24" white imac received first and then all the aluminum imacs got it as well when they came out.

Something has changed. SL has new power management. iTunes 9.0 is playing tricks on me. Or since my new 2009 iMac with small aluminum keyboard no longer provides this feature. I'm pretty sure I've used my keyboard port a few times for my iPod since May when I got the new iMac, but ...

Oh ...... I bet I know what the problem is now.

Doh!

I recently added a usb extension cable to my keyboard so I could route the cable behind my new desk back up to the iMac. It's not very long. Maybe a foot, but I bet I did that at about the same time I installed itunes 9.0 and SL.

And I bet that's the cause.

 

[mac2x]

Less than 50mb?

45 MB according to Activity Monitor for me.

 

[sbryan]

I was hoping for an Upgrade to HD option for movies and TV Shows that I already own.

 

[ChrisBrightwell]

From Apple: "Both the Apple Keyboard and the Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad include two USB 2.0 ports that allow you to connect a mouse, iPod, iPhone, digital camera, or printer. "

It used to specifically say this "The Apple Keyboard page says: "Devices that draw high power from the USB connection, such as iPods, hard drives and some flash drives, can only be used with the new keyboard when it is attached to the aluminum iMac."

Also Endgadget review:

•....... three USB ports (and two on the keyboard, which are powered enough to charge an iPhone and iPod),

which was the feature the 24" white imac received first and then all the aluminum imacs got it as well when they came out.

... none of that makes it a powered USB hub.

 

[trip1ex]

... none of that makes it a powered USB hub.

Aluminum Imac is setup to provide extra power to the Apple keyboard USb hub. Imac is plugged in.

Hence the keyboard supports high current draw usb devices.


Hence it's powered.

Evidence is clear. Sorry.

 

[mac2x]

... none of that makes it a powered USB hub.

USB is powered. That's why if you plug in an external HD to a USB port, it works without any other cable.

 

[Eric S.]

iTunes 8 does everything I want, for now. Everything I read about iTunes 9 makes it sound like an overbloated, over-featured, buggy piece of software. Does anyone think that there's something in iTunes 9 that is really a must have?

 

[mac2x]

Well I have had zero, zip, zilch problems with iTunes 9. It uses the same RAM as iTunes 8 did. The new iTunes store is much better designed and user friendly, IMHO.

 

[lostless]

As for everyone says its a memory hog, turn off cover flow view. With cover flow view, my memory usage can get up to 600+MB (not that I mind with 6 gigs of ram on my computer). With no cover art being shown, it drops to 100MB or less instantly. Cover art is a major memory hog.

 

[ChrisBrightwell]

Aluminum Imac is setup to provide extra power to the Apple keyboard USb hub. Imac is plugged in.

Hence the keyboard supports high current draw usb devices.

Hence it's powered.

Evidence is clear. Sorry.

You're wrong. It provides some power, per the USB spec, but it is not, by any means, a powered hub. You can argue it all you want; you're wrong. If there's no AC adapter, the best you're getting is an out-of-spec power draw from the keyboard and half-baked solution.

Don't believe me? Plug an iPod classic and a bus-powered external hard drive into the keyboard and watch your Mac throw a warning about trying to pull too much power over the USB port.

Hell, I have a WD Passport drive that I bought last night ... the keyboard fails to power it by itself. If the hub in the keyboard were powered, this wouldn't be a problem.

But it's not.

USB is powered. That's why if you plug in an external HD to a USB port, it works without any other cable.

USB provides power, per the spec, but that's not what makes a hub "powered" or "unpowered".

 

[Madaracs]

There ARE problems with iTunes 9.

Ok So like most of us I was so excited when I saw how awesome iTunes 9 interface was! It looks amazing and everything!!! Anyways heres when I was ready to go back to iTunes 8... So even though it hasnt been out for long it has A TON OF BUGS! #1 I can't update my apps it says "an error occured" link>>> http://www.flickr.com/photos/42383458@N06/3907926628/
anyways It also froze and exited out a lot almost like it magically force quit its self! I have had my library completely mixed so on and so forth. Here is a link to people who had similar problems. >>http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2152025&tstart=30
just switch back to iTunes 8 and wait for a update

Frequent 'spinning wheel' issues featuring our favorite apple pinwheel are rampant.

I'm beginning to suspect, however, that the only users that are affected are those with very large libraries. My wife's computer is not AS affected and my mac mini's that I mostly stream content with have little or no data on them. They don't bog down as much either.

However, my library which includes over 22K music files (all legitimately imported I might add) and 88 Movies (also legitimate) seems to have frequent time-outs and other issues as well.

Reverting back to iTunes 8.0.2 FIXES the 'spinning wheel' issues and makes everything snappy again.

There IS a problem and Apple needs to fix it.

 

[mac2x]

iTunes is using 134mb for me, iTunes Helper is using 4mb. What does the helper do anyway?

I really do wish iTunes wasn't such a resource hog, however I have noticed it is faster than iTunes 8.

As someone noted, Cover Flow will do that. iTunes Helper has something to do with interacting with iPods/iPhones but since I have neither I can't tell what exactly it does. It is in the Open at Login list by default in the Accounts preference pane, so if you don't need what it does you can remove it from the list.

You're wrong. It provides some power, per the USB spec, but it is not, by any means, a powered hub. You can argue it all you want; you're wrong. If there's no AC adapter, the best you're getting is an out-of-spec power draw from the keyboard and half-baked solution.

Don't believe me? Plug an iPod classic and a bus-powered external hard drive into the keyboard and watch your Mac throw a warning about trying to pull too much power over the USB port.

Hell, I have a WD Passport drive that I bought last night ... the keyboard fails to power it by itself. If the hub in the keyboard were powered, this wouldn't be a problem.

But it's not.



USB provides power, per the spec, but that's not what makes a hub "powered" or "unpowered".

I still don't get it. If a hub is unpowered it should provide no power at all. Yet a quick glance at the USB device tree in System Profiler indicates that 500mA is available at the Keyboard Hub. That indicates to me that it's powered. I'd love to see evidence to the contrary!

 

[phairphan]

I upgraded right away and have had a few crashes, and a few inconsistencies while searching on the iTunes Store (searches not showing up).

I've had a few spinning balls of death, absolutely DESPISE the white background on Grid View, and wish I had a bit more control while doing Genius Mixes - which by the way, I really like.

Using up 109.3 MB of Real Mem, and 98.4 MB of Virtual Mem.

I wonder if the size of the iTunes library has anything to do with the amount of RAM that iTunes uses...

Other than the few nuisances mentioned above, iTunes 9 is a decent upgrade which seems a bit rushed out the door. Hopefully they'll polish some things with future updates.

iTunes 9 does seem to eat up a bit more memory than 8 (276 MB and 1.23 GB virtual, no cover flow), but I like it. I have a large library and the program feels more responsive than 8. I wonder if they did some optimizing of the code for larger libraries. iTunes does use more RAM the larger your library is (on both Mac and PC). A few crashes here and there, most involving iTMS. I'm pleased with it (the iPhone 3.1 update, however...)

 

[veo321]

Still having problems

iTunes 9 is laggy, slow, and unreliable, Apple needed to wait another month before taking it out of beta.

 

[mac2x]

Granted I don't have the largest library (Only 5 GB), and that it's all music and only a few podcasts, iTunes 9 is using 32.73 MB real memory and 989.40 MB virtual memory right now for me.

 

[veo321]

Granted I don't have the largest library (Only 5 GB), and that it's all music and only a few podcasts, iTunes 9 is using 32.73 MB real memory and 989.40 MB virtual memory right now for me.

Geez Only 5GB thats a horrible maximum it should be more like 10GB!
(thank god my library is less than 1GB lol)

iTunes is using 134mb for me, iTunes Helper is using 4mb. What does the helper do anyway?

I really do wish iTunes wasn't such a resource hog, however I have noticed it is faster than iTunes 8.

Itunes Helper is what recognizes a iPod when its plugged into your computer and opens it automatically.

 

[mac2x]

Hehehehe, I'm sure it will grow.

 

[ChrisBrightwell]

Yet a quick glance at the USB device tree in System Profiler indicates that 500mA is available at the Keyboard Hub.

500mA is the very definition of the USB spec. It requires that to power thumb drives, keyboard, mouses, scanners, and more. These are all low-power devices.

If I plug a mouse and a hard drive into my keyboard, the hard drive fails to spin up. There's not enough power! That 500mA is shared amongst the keyboard and all of the devices connected to it.

That indicates to me that it's powered. I'd love to see evidence to the contrary!

I have an unpowered Belkin USB 2.0 hub that shows the exact same thing.

Learn to use a volt meter.

 

[mac2x]

OK, thanks. I don't have any other hub, so I had nothing to compare with. Does the HD work w/o a mouse plugged in, or is there truly not enough power for it at the keyboard?

 

[ChrisBrightwell]

OK, thanks. I don't have any other hub, so I had nothing to compare with. Does the HD work w/o a mouse plugged in, or is there truly not enough power for it at the keyboard?

Keyboard draws 20 mA on its own, and the HDD requires the full 500 mA as far as I can tell. Taking the mouse out doesn't leave enough power.

 

[kate-willbury]

itunes is pretty much the worst media player out there.

 

[NicP]

Agreed. iTunes 9 takes up a minimum of 50mb of ram (as did itunes 8). It loads fairly quick and all, but the ram/cpu usage should go down significantly. Apple really should invest some time into making a very clean, simple, standalone mp3 player for OS X which isnt hindered by all the crap that comes with itunes (ipod, movies, iphone, genius, music store, apps store, iTV, etc).

It should really be something like winamp. Small, light and blistering fast.

What's wrong with VLC?

 

[trip1ex]

500mA is the very definition of the USB spec. It requires that to power thumb drives, keyboard, mouses, scanners, and more. These are all low-power devices.

If I plug a mouse and a hard drive into my keyboard, the hard drive fails to spin up. There's not enough power! That 500mA is shared amongst the keyboard and all of the devices connected to it.



I have an unpowered Belkin USB 2.0 hub that shows the exact same thing.

Learn to use a volt meter.

I get the impression that the iMac can provide more power to the Apple keyboard than USB spec calls for.

Otherwise why would Apple say the keyboard can support hi-current USB devices only when plugged into an iMac?

There is precedence for this at Apple.

For example, Apple USB speakers required more power than USB spec. The G4 Cube had usb ports that could provide more power than spec as did some of Apple's monitors back then.

 

[Howard Brazee]

I get the impression that the iMac can provide more power to the Apple keyboard than USB spec calls for.

Otherwise why would Apple say the keyboard can support hi-current USB devices only when plugged into an iMac?

There is precedence for this at Apple.

For example, Apple USB speakers required more power than USB spec. The G4 Cube had usb ports that could provide more power than spec as did some of Apple's monitors back then.

Maybe it depends on what is plugged in. As with my PC at work, my classic iPod won't worked plugged into my wife's keyboard with her mouse on her iMac. I haven't tried it on my iMac, which is a year newer and has the aluminum keyboard. There are two elements in how this works - each device uses up a constant voltage, and some products use more power than others.