Don't use iTunes to play songs that you don't want to import into your library. There are plenty of alternatives including quicktime. You don't even have to associate any filetypes with iTunes.
Sooo.... Don't use OSX's built-in music player to play music. Is that what you're saying?
I
KNOW I don't
need to use iTunes to play it (FWIW I usually use Play or VLC). But that's because of the problems I listed with iTunes not being, you know, a MUSIC PLAYER anymore.
You aren't forced to sync iTunes with your iPod. You can drag and drop files onto it. Just choose the option to manually manage your music or use a different program.
Actually, you are forced by Apple to sync iTunes with your iPod. Without 3rd party software, one cannot drag and drop files onto it -- not songs one wants to listen to on the device. In case you've never seen a non-apple media player, that's how virtually all of them work. They mount like hard disks and you drag and drop the media you want onto the device and eject. Done. Easy. Quick. Simple. And it doesn't waste disk space on the host computer.
The option to manually manage your music just stops iTunes from
automatically syncing your iPod with your
entire iTunes library. It still requires you to have a copy of whatever you want to get on the iPod on your computer's hard drive in the iTunes library wasting space, you just manually determine which ones get copied to the device and which ones dont'.
Apple really doesn't seem to understand the user who is pulling content from another machine or a central storage location and just wants to plop it on the device. For example, my music collection is about 40,000 songs, most of them lossless. First it wouldn't FIT on any iPod, and second it exists on a NAS. I don't want or need yet another copy of this content on a Mac that will sync with the iPod. And that also means I can forget about syncing with a laptop.
When I got my first iPod it was nearly as big as the biggest laptop hard drives of that time. I was extremely annoyed that I had to consume most of my hard drive's space to sync music on my iPod -- rightly so.
Another good example would be this -- I have a few movies on my iPhone, digital copies from Blu-Ray purchases, such as Dark Knight and Star Trek. I am never, ever going to watch them on my Mac, but I am forced to have them sitting on my hard disk wasting precious space on my Macbook's SSD just so they can sync with my iPhone where I will watch them. I just want it on the iPhone, nowhere else.
And third party solutions help address this, but I've been burned by 3rd party solutions before. Apple changes something on a whim and the 3rd party software is broken for months (I'm looking at you, XPlay).
The inability to directly manage a device also introduces unnecessary complexity when you have more than one iPod. Now you have to have both sets of content jammed into one machine's library and have to contort to get the right content on the right iPod. Instead of just dragging and dropping what you want on each one and being done with it.
It doesn't make you have two copies of your music to use your iPod.
Yes, it does. The copy on the Mac and the copy on the iPod. What if I just want to load up my iPod and be done? Again, how most other media players work. Take content from wherever -- an external hard disk, a NAS, a thumb drive, another computer -- and copy it to the device. No need for yet another copy wasting hard disk space permanently in iTunes.
Okay. But it supports the two most popular formats plus two lossless codecs in WAV and Apple Lossless. Why would you rip your files to FLAC?
Because this is not an Apple-centric world. Anybody else dealing in lossless music is using FLAC, not ALAC. FLAC is fast becoming the defacto standard for high quality files (including multichannel and high res like 96/24 DVD-A and vinyl rips). Besides, I just used FLAC as an example (it's easy enough to convert from FLAC to ALAC with Max, dbPowerAmp, Foobar). The point is there are players that handle a toolbox of formats, are easily extensible, and are still fast and light (like Foobar). Then there are completely inflexible bloated players like iTunes. Anything other than MP3, AAC, ALAC and WAV is verboten in iTunes, despite the fact that QT plugins could solve the problem. Apple wants a closed world.
Does the iPhone activation process or the AppleTV support get in your way if you don't use either of these devices?
Perhaps they are why iTunes is so bloated and slow.
Let's pause and review, for a moment, what iTunes has become.
OK, it stores and organizes your music. Very good, that's what a music player is supposed to do. Things like the Genius and iTunes store recommendations are bloated but still somewhat related so not too far off target. Radio and podcast management are acceptable diversions.
It's also a store to buy music. Uhhh, ok, but getting a little off track assuming I need to buy music from your online store instead of managing the CDs I already have, or dealing with the acquisition of music off-line/elsewhere. (And that store itself has also become a place to buy videos and iPod/iPhone applications). What does any of that have to do with playing my music?
It also syncs with devices. Uh, OK, doesn't really belong in iTunes, but I can see it. Now that has grown to installing firmware, backing up the device, activating phones, syncing address book contacts and calendars and photos (which aren't even organized in iTunes, I guess I should count my blessings).
Hmm, I wonder why iTunes is so bloated and slow and visually complex, instead of just playing the damned song?
"The Alternatives are NOT Apple products"
So?
The original complainer, Consultant, said:
"Someone else is too busy spreading fud than to actually use Apple products."
in regards to using something other than iTunes to manage an iPod.
Read that again -- you're spreading FUD about Apple products by not understanding how to use them with non-Apple products in a manner that is not supported nor endorsed by Apple.
Well, you can't actually spread FUD about an Apple product when it requires a non-Apple product in conjunction to do what you are positing. In other words, out of the box and to a noob, the complaint is valid.
