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I just bought my first ever Apple product

Chaotic42

Lifer
I need something to listen to while I work out, and in an almost joking manor I went to see how much iPods cost. The Shuffle impressed me because of its size, so I picked one up at the store for $77. Not too bad.

I'm really impressed by this thing. It's super-light, super-small, and the sound quality is better than I expected. Unfortunately the coolness of the device is horribly overshadowed by iTunes. I truly hate this software.

Is there any way to copy music to and from the iPod using Windows Explorer?
 
Originally posted by: Chaotic42
I need something to listen to while I work out, and in an almost joking manor I went to see how much iPods cost. The Shuffle impressed me because of its size, so I picked one up at the store for $77. Not too bad.

I'm really impressed by this thing. It's super-light, super-small, and the sound quality is better than I expected. Unfortunately the coolness of the device is horribly overshadowed by iTunes. I truly hate this software.

Is there any way to copy music to and from the iPod using Windows Explorer?
If you don't like iTunes, why would you buy an iPod? Personally, I would return it and go get a Zen Stone Plus or a Sansa Clip, both are just as small, cheaper for 2GB storage, support drag and drop, have screens, and have FM tuners if your gym broadcasts TV audio over FM.
 
Well, on Windows, it does leave a bit to be desired, especially if you are used to other players. It eats a lot of memory, especially when you have all the album artwork in there, since it likes to have much of it ready to go for Cover Flow.

Personally, I think that applications should use a minimum of memory, that even though modern systems all ship with 1GB+ of RAM, that is no excuse to get sloppy. However, I do recognize that progress happens, and as such things will use more RAM. I can understand iTunes using a lot of RAM for album art and song caching. But I just opened up TextEdit, and it uses 8MB... and really that strikes me as a lot of RAM for a text editor to use you know?

But seriously, what do you, the OP, not like about iTunes? And did you know beforehand that you didn't like iTunes?
 
Originally posted by: loup garou
If you don't like iTunes, why would you buy an iPod? Personally, I would return it and go get a Zen Stone Plus or a Sansa Clip, both are just as small, cheaper for 2GB storage, support drag and drop, have screens, and have FM tuners if your gym broadcasts TV audio over FM.

I love itunes and the ipod integration (I realize this is going to bite me in the ass in the long run). but given your background.. I'd say do this. you'll probably be happier.
 
use vpod...works nicely if you dont want to use itunes (you honestly DONT need itunes since you're going to be just listening and not looking at a lcd screen.).
 
Originally posted by: TheStu
But seriously, what do you, the OP, not like about iTunes? And did you know beforehand that you didn't like iTunes?

It seems overly complicated and slow. I guess that my problem isn't with iTunes, but with the fact that I even have to use iTunes in the first place. The iPod Shuffle has no display at all, so to me the entire playlist idea seems useless. I just want to be able to copy certain songs over to the iPod. I don't need it to setup playlists, I don't need it to have any album art at all, I just need the songs that are here to be over here. To me, just being able to drag the songs from where-ever and drop them on some iPod icon would be the best way to go about getting music onto my Shuffle. I don't want a giant music store/player/converter/copier/searcher/indexer/sound leveler.

It also makes no attempt to blend in with Windows at all. I realize that this is an Apple product, but if this program is targeting Windows users, it needs to at least look like a normal Windows application. Like they themselves said, "We're no longer just computers".

Granted, this is all just opinion. Just because I don't like iTunes doesn't mean that it's a bad program.

I also don't like the fact that instead of just existing on the iPod, the songs are somehow encrypted into a database. Instead of existing as "Lesson 21-Numbers in Context.mp3" on the iPod, it's "UCEQ.mp3" in the "F00" directory. I suppose this is some kind of anti-piracy feature, but my stuff is legal and this is just daring me to find a way to beat this system.

As far as knowing what to expect with iTunes, no I did not. I've used precisely three Apple products in my life. Apple IIe systems in grade school, an OS8 system for 5 minutes in college in 1998, and this Shuffle that I bought yesterday. I'm probably not going to return the iPod because, as I said, I like the little thing. I may (this is a big "may") even buy music off of Apple's store someday. I'll probably end up just dealing with iTunes and chalking this whole thing up to experience.

Edit: Spelling
 
If you enable manual syncing in itunes, you can then drag items from your iTunes library straight to the playlist.

I think there are 2 reasons that iTunes on Windows doesn't match
1: It does pretty much exactly match (sans window closing button placement) the OS X Version
2: Very few things on Windows match each other in terms of interface. Office 07 and WMP11 match each other, but don't really match IE7. Which in turn do not match Explorer, and any third party apps just conform to their own standards.
 
Originally posted by: TheStu
If you enable manual syncing in itunes, you can then drag items from your iTunes library straight to the playlist.

I think there are 2 reasons that iTunes on Windows doesn't match
1: It does pretty much exactly match (sans window closing button placement) the OS X Version
2: Very few things on Windows match each other in terms of interface. Office 07 and WMP11 match each other, but don't really match IE7. Which in turn do not match Explorer, and any third party apps just conform to their own standards.

Well, I don't use iTunes to listen to music. There's absolutely no reason for me to use it as anything except a file copier, which it doesn't do particularly well.
 
Originally posted by: loup garou
Originally posted by: Chaotic42
I need something to listen to while I work out, and in an almost joking manor I went to see how much iPods cost. The Shuffle impressed me because of its size, so I picked one up at the store for $77. Not too bad.

I'm really impressed by this thing. It's super-light, super-small, and the sound quality is better than I expected. Unfortunately the coolness of the device is horribly overshadowed by iTunes. I truly hate this software.

Is there any way to copy music to and from the iPod using Windows Explorer?
If you don't like iTunes, why would you buy an iPod? Personally, I would return it and go get a Zen Stone Plus or a Sansa Clip, both are just as small, cheaper for 2GB storage, support drag and drop, have screens, and have FM tuners if your gym broadcasts TV audio over FM.

agreed. the ipod's main strength is the system....
 
iTunes on Windows has been getting a little bloated in my opinion...that's one of the reasons I dropped my iPod and switched to Zune. The Mac version however seems more fluid and integrated (maybe that's why). Although now that the new versions of Zune software and firmware still don't completely impress me (it's been a year and they still neglected to put in UNICODE support), I might go back to an iPod.
 
I like a lot of things about the new zune. I'm glad that they got rid of the completely non-wheel wheel "It's a circle, on the Sansa and the iPod, that is a wheel." "Right, but its a D Pad." "A circular D Pad with no markings on it to indicate that it is a D Pad?" "Yep" "So, it's not touch sensitive?" "Nope" "Does it spin?" "No" "Then why the hell is it shaped like a circle!?"

I'm glad that they are slowly but surely adding more use for the wifi, I like the new look of it. But I don't like how they gimped certain aspects of the software, and have no Mac support. It took apple a couple revisions of the ipod to get Windows support... but that was 5 years ago! Microsoft cannot afford to cut out the Apple community, regardless of how small it is. The Apple community has generally shown that they are willing to pay more for the same thing, so long as that thing is well made and easy to use, and from what I have read of the Zune player, it is.
 
I'm not a big fan of iTunes (WIN) either. Winamp is preferred.

I would like to know, if anyone can advise - how can I tell iTunes to not prompt me about Erase and Sync every time I connect my Shuffle to another PC? Is there a way to sync up with multiple computers instead of just one?
 
Being that the iPod is a device which has an integrated user experience, they had to make sure that they could make the RIAA happy. And that includes all the DRM on the iPods. You can't sync to two different computers, you can't copy stuff directly to the iPod, or pull it off the iPod from a drive like interface.

These are irritations, and while I didn't care that much for iTunes on Windows... I still think that once you get the hang of it.. it's very simple to use, and I prefer it's sorting. I just had a directory structure on my local drive before, but if you let iTunes manage all of your songs... it becomes a very nice database of your music.

Again, I'd say just use a third party solution, or return the device. By now, people should realize that iPod, and iTunes, is basically the same thing. 🙂
 
refurb shuffles are dirt-cheap: $39 w/free shipping.

and as for: "It also makes no attempt to blend in with Windows at all. I realize that this is an Apple product, but if this program is targeting Windows users, it needs to at least look like a normal Windows application. Like they themselves said, "We're no longer just computers". "

not many Windows programs look like Windows applications. there is absolutely NO unified interface. WinAmp, Windows Media Player, IE7, etc. have you even looked at Nero, AVG, AdAware, and so on...? every program looks different.

this is not defending iTunes or Apple. but be fair about Windows programs and how they look.
 
I've always been a huge fan of iTunes. I did use songbird for awhile, but I always kept going back to iTunes. Of course now that I own a mac, iTunes is golden.
 
Originally posted by: sourceninja
I've always been a huge fan of iTunes. I did use songbird for awhile, but I always kept going back to iTunes. Of course now that I own a mac, iTunes is golden.

Same here, I love iTunes now that I have a mac.
 
Originally posted by: TheStu
Well, on Windows, it does leave a bit to be desired, especially if you are used to other players. It eats a lot of memory, especially when you have all the album artwork in there, since it likes to have much of it ready to go for Cover Flow.

Personally, I think that applications should use a minimum of memory, that even though modern systems all ship with 1GB+ of RAM, that is no excuse to get sloppy. However, I do recognize that progress happens, and as such things will use more RAM. I can understand iTunes using a lot of RAM for album art and song caching. But I just opened up TextEdit, and it uses 8MB... and really that strikes me as a lot of RAM for a text editor to use you know?

But seriously, what do you, the OP, not like about iTunes? And did you know beforehand that you didn't like iTunes?

Both the Zune software and iTunes use about 55 MB of memory while running on my computer, which is less than Firefox. Not sure if I see the problem here.
 
Originally posted by: Kmax82
Originally posted by: Parasitic
lol old thread necrophilia

And yes, iPods+iTunes in OSX is much better than iPod+iTunes in Windows.

😀 Wow.. yea, almost 2 years old.
With your time machine, how sick is the 3rd. gen iPhone in 2009? 😉
 
Originally posted by: manly
Originally posted by: Kmax82
Originally posted by: Parasitic
lol old thread necrophilia

And yes, iPods+iTunes in OSX is much better than iPod+iTunes in Windows.

😀 Wow.. yea, almost 2 years old.
With your time machine, how sick is the 3rd. gen iPhone in 2009? 😉

HAHAH! 😀 Oh man.. oh well.. I can't read when I first post and even when I look at the date I get it wrong. Phew, I need to get some more sleep at night. 😉
 
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