Why is iTunes so bad?

[TheNiceGuy]

I seem to go through this regularly. I've been using apple mobile products for about 10 years now. I really like the simple, intuitive design of the hardware and its firmware. BUT, I routinely run into super irritation with iTunes, especially when I am in a hurry and I want to do something that takes literally less than 1 minute with any other device I have had.
For example, I have an iPhone4, and I want to add a bunch of university audio lectures. I just want to "drag and drop" them from my desktop to iPhone.
It won't let me do it.
I'm guessing its to "improve the user experience" or some B$.
Can someone explain why it is so convoluted and there is no ability to do something as intuitive as "drag and drop"?
I'm sure after having to reorganize my PC data, watch tutorials, and accidently delete wanted data, I can get this sorted out. Again.
In this case, probably has to do with having built a new PC, so now it wants to force me to spend the night trying to track down duplicate files to create a new gay 'library' on my PC to replace the now-gone HD on my old PC (some I can't, they are only on my phone), or else it will delete everything when I "sync" it, which of course is better for my "user experience" than allowing me to drag the goddamn songs onto the iPhone in 10 seconds.
Its so shocking coming from a line of products that are on the other side of the spectrum for ease of use and intuitiveness.
Why do they complicate it? Is it to make it as irritating and difficult as possible so people will just buy things through a slipstreamed iTunes purchase or be forced to login to they shopping network every time you want to change anything with the phone?
Is there a quick easy way to add songs like I can to a USB drive, etc., without having to relearn every iTunes update, which I don't use anyways?

 

[QueBert]

you can drag and drop in iTunes, you just can't drag and drop in Windows Explorer. I also keep iTunes open so it's not really an issue to me. The reason they do is it due to iOS's file structure. iTunes makes everything as simple as possible, want to just clink sync? it works, want to drag and drop? it works (inside of iTunes)

Not from Apple, but there are dozens of 3rd party programs that let you use an iOS device like an external HD. I tried a couple and they worked, but it lead to more work for me so I went back to strictly using iTunes.

 

[podspi]

I have to agree, iTunes is just getting worse and worse. There was a time that it rightfully killed most other media players, but then they borked the design. It's slow, buggy (crashes all the time if you have a very large library like I do), and is completely non-intuitive. And I don't base this off my personal opinion (though I agree with it), but with my iPhone and iPod-owning family and friends.

 

[QueBert]

I have to agree, iTunes is just getting worse and worse. There was a time that it rightfully killed most other media players, but then they borked the design. It's slow, buggy (crashes all the time if you have a very large library like I do), and is completely non-intuitive. And I don't base this off my personal opinion (though I agree with it), but with my iPhone and iPod-owning family and friends.

How big is your library? Granted I don't have the biggest library, but I have 125k songs and iTunes has crashed on me no more than any other Windows program. As for it being slow, I leave it open and I can use the search to find a song in my library instantly.

 

[JackBurton]

I rarely use iTunes on a desktop or laptop anymore. Ever since iTunes Match, I've been able to untether my mobile devices from my laptop which has been AWESOME! Having access to my 40GB+ music library anytime anywhere on any device is awesome!

 

[khha4113]

you can drag and drop in iTunes, you just can't drag and drop in Windows Explorer. I also keep iTunes open so it's not really an issue to me. The reason they do is it due to iOS's file structure. iTunes makes everything as simple as possible, want to just clink sync? it works, want to drag and drop? it works (inside of iTunes)

Not from Apple, but there are dozens of 3rd party programs that let you use an iOS device like an external HD. I tried a couple and they worked, but it lead to more work for me so I went back to strictly using iTunes.

If I can't do that with drag-and-drop between computer and my phone directly and without restriction (must use Itunes), I wouldn't call it 'Simple'!

 

[QueBert]

If I can't do that with drag-and-drop between computer and my phone directly and without restriction (must use Itunes), I wouldn't call it 'Simple'!

Ok, I mean simple as in easiest. I don't have to track down the music or find my device. Android has restrictions too, without a 3rd party app I HAVE to drag and drop my music, which is a pita. But to each his own I guess. And again, there are probably 50 programs that will let you drag and drop to an iPhone. For Android there's nothing that let's me still drag and drop from iTunes. I like more choices, and with iOS, even if it's 100% not because of Apple. I have the most options.

 

[LikeLinus]

Ok, I mean simple as in easiest. I don't have to track down the music or find my device. Android has restrictions too, without a 3rd party app I HAVE to drag and drop my music, which is a pita. But to each his own I guess. And again, there are probably 50 programs that will let you drag and drop to an iPhone. For Android there's nothing that let's me still drag and drop from iTunes. I like more choices, and with iOS, even if it's 100% not because of Apple. I have the most options.

A lot of what you are saying makes no freaking sense.

"Android has restrictions too, without a 3rd party app I HAVE to drag and drop my music, which is a pita."

Uh, iTunes is essentially a 3rd part app. You have to download and install it, it doesn't magically appear on your PC when you buy an Apple product. So what exactly is the difference between download iTunes or any one of a number of products for Android? At least you aren't locked into ONE tool like you are with your Apple device.

"For Android there's nothing that let's me still drag and drop from iTunes." It's just as easy to drag and drop from a Windows Explorer window vs. iTunes. Not to mention you can drag and drop from any number of other 3rd party applications on Android. Plus being able to NOT have to install a program in order to move files to your device is light years better than having to always have iTunes.

I've got an iPad and the biggest thing I hate about it is the inability to use it's memory/folder structure with ease. It's a major pain in the ass if I need to transfer from a PC, if not impossible if I don't have a wifi connection. The simplicity of android devices acting like a USB drive is FAR AND AWAY simpler than anything Apple is doing. Work in an actual corporate environment where you deal with other people and you'll soon realize this.

You seem to think your environment is the only one that anyone would ever use. You live in a bubble it seems. Most people don't sit around having iTunes running 24/7 on a single Mac. lol

Don't get me wrong, I like my iPad, but it's a major pain in the ass to get ANYTHING on there.

 

[jhansman]

I still use iTunes because it has internet radio and streams flawlessly to my Pioneer receiver. If I could find a Windows program that had both these features and streamed as easily, I'd drop iTunes in heartbeat. Granted, the Pioneer uses Airplay, but it also supports DLNA. By now you'd think there'd be a Windows player with DLNA and Shoutcast support out there, but alas....

 

[Crono]

It's bad because they kept throwing features into a software product that was supposed to be a music player and store. Now it is several programs in one, so it's no wonder users complain about it being bloated.

 

[QueBert]

A lot of what you are saying makes no freaking sense.

"Android has restrictions too, without a 3rd party app I HAVE to drag and drop my music, which is a pita."

Uh, iTunes is essentially a 3rd part app. You have to download and install it, it doesn't magically appear on your PC when you buy an Apple product. So what exactly is the difference between download iTunes or any one of a number of products for Android? At least you aren't locked into ONE tool like you are with your Apple device.

"For Android there's nothing that let's me still drag and drop from iTunes." It's just as easy to drag and drop from a Windows Explorer window vs. iTunes. Not to mention you can drag and drop from any number of other 3rd party applications on Android. Plus being able to NOT have to install a program in order to move files to your device is light years better than having to always have iTunes.

I've got an iPad and the biggest thing I hate about it is the inability to use it's memory/folder structure with ease. It's a major pain in the ass if I need to transfer from a PC, if not impossible if I don't have a wifi connection. The simplicity of android devices acting like a USB drive is FAR AND AWAY simpler than anything Apple is doing. Work in an actual corporate environment where you deal with other people and you'll soon realize this.

You seem to think your environment is the only one that anyone would ever use. You live in a bubble it seems. Most people don't sit around having iTunes running 24/7 on a single Mac. lol

Don't get me wrong, I like my iPad, but it's a major pain in the ass to get ANYTHING on there.

Please point me to these "any number of products for Android" I'm interested in ones where I can actually create my smart playlists and do everything iTunes can.

With my iPod I can use iTunes or I can use something like iPod Explorer to drag and drop if I so wish. Google offers no software for this, so with my Nexus 4 I can drag and drop, or I can use the exactly 1 3rd party program I've found called DoubleTwist, which is one of the the biggest piles of shit ever. So I have about 100x the options when I want to sync my iPod. Dragging and dropping s fine for some, but I have far to intricate of a collection for this method to work at all. Sorry but working with a large library with smart playlists using drag and drop is about the farthest thing from simple as you could get.

But you can't create smart play lists in Explorer, and even if you do create them with a 3rd party app, dragging and dropping won't work because it won't copy the actual songs from the playlist. While it can be done by hand, if you have a playlist with 40 different songs from 40 different directories it'll take you a solid 5-10 minutes to do what iTunes will do in 10 seconds. DoubleTwist can do this, but from my attempts to use it, it probably will freeze in the middle of copying shit.

Drag & drop for a huge music collection imho is like using Notepad to create and maintain a web site that has 400 different pages. The ironic thing is the only usable 3rd party Android syncing program for the PC is Doubletwist, which is a painfully bad attempt at re-creating iTunes, but it does nothing close to as well. Also DT can't even create smart playlists so imho it shouldn't even be considered as a viable alternative simply because it syncs your music on an Android without the hassle of dragging and dropping.

 

[AstroManLuca]

After my most recent reinstall of iTunes, I've decided that it is the worst media management software, except for all the other ones.

 

[dagamer34]

It's 10 year old software that probably has some "translation" later written into it so that they can write both the Mac and Windows versions at the same time. It also tries to do WAY too much in a single app.

If it were only a Mac app, it would have been redone and split up by now, with all of the App Stores (iTunes, Apps, Books, etc..) combined into one, and the music management and player siloed off. Device management would be a separate app. Windows holds that back though.

 

[Imp]

I don't mind iTunes, it's the fact that I have to convert all my shit from WMA to put onto my iPod that annoys me.

 

[mikeymikec]

I don't mind iTunes, it's the fact that I have to convert all my shit from WMA to put onto my iPod that annoys me.

And if you wanted to move away from Apple, there's a chance you'd have to "convert your shit from AAC" as well.

Is it AAC, the default format that iTunes uses for music storage? WMP and iTunes allows the user to change this setting to MP3.

 

[Deeko]

ITunes is arguably the worst piece of major software ever written.

 

[jhansman]

Also keep in mind that when iTunes was released, the iPod was about the only decent MP3 player on the market. Coupled with iTunes (even on Windows), it worked great. Now that many (most?) of us use our smartphones for mobile music, iTunes is relevant only for Mac users to manage music both on the desktop and mobile phone. Still waiting for an Android equivalent; thus far, Winamp is about as close as you can get.

 

[TheStu]

And if you wanted to move away from Apple, there's a chance you'd have to "convert your shit from AAC" as well.

Is it AAC, the default format that iTunes uses for music storage? WMP and iTunes allows the user to change this setting to MP3.

You're more likely to find a device that doesn't play back WMA than you are to find one that doesn't support AAC.

 

[Brian Stirling]

You're more likely to find a device that doesn't play back WMA than you are to find one that doesn't support AAC.

I have about 16GB of music on my HTC One and the only music I can't play is the ones coded in AAC -- WMA plays just fine...


Brian

 

[QueBert]

I have about 16GB of music on my HTC One and the only music I can't play is the ones coded in AAC -- WMA plays just fine...


Brian

Something's not right with your phone, my Nexus 4 plays all my iTunes bought AAC files. WMA's far less supported than AAC across the board.

 

[mikeymikec]

Support for either non-standard format is neither here nor there. Both of them could have picked MP3 (which was by far the most popular format and probably still is), and neither did out of their own interests, not their customers' interests.

The person I responded to very likely didn't choose an iPod because of the AAC format. What percentage of people do buy a music player because of its default media format or the standards it supports? Rhetorical question.

 

[QueBert]

Support for either non-standard format is neither here nor there. Both of them could have picked MP3 (which was by far the most popular format and probably still is), and neither did out of their own interests, not their customers' interests.

The person I responded to very likely didn't choose an iPod because of the AAC format. What percentage of people do buy a music player because of its default media format or the standards it supports? Rhetorical question.

AAC sounds better than mp3 at the same bitrate. It's not a standard like mp3 which is a big minus. But has better SQ and I can play it on any of my devices so I always prefer AAC files. AAC files are also smaller, if you have a large library you'll definitely save a decent amount of space.

 

[mikeymikec]

AAC sounds better than mp3 at the same bitrate. It's not a standard like mp3 which is a big minus. But has better SQ and I can play it on any of my devices so I always prefer AAC files. AAC files are also smaller, if you have a large library you'll definitely save a decent amount of space.

Apparently AAC is a standard as well:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Audio_Coding

While I consider myself to be interested in audio quality, I doubt that I could tell the difference between an MP3 or AAC once put on a mobile device and played through standard earphones. If the MP3 was particularly poorly encoded (say 128kbps or less) and the audio track was something that shows up poor lossy encoding, then I probably could, but a manufacturer would hardly pick default music format settings which would make their device sound bad. I normally encode mp3s at 320-128 VBR and I doubt that many could tell the difference between that and something that iTunes writes by default, given that the demonstration is on a portable music player and standard earphones.

I also doubt that audio quality played a role in Apple's decision either. I think one simply needs to look at how much more difficult it is to transfer music from an iDevice, and the fact* that an Apple-formatted iPod is different from a PC-formatted one (presumably the file system). Apple is trying to be as media industry friendly as possible at the expense of their customers.

* - something I picked up when reading about transferring music from an iPod, I don't know for a fact that it's true but I have no reason to doubt it given the context.

If an agreement between music player makers and distributors had been reached to set AAC as the standard just when portable digital music players were starting to become mainstream, then it sounds like it would have been a good choice. I don't know much about the format though except the first paragraph of wikipedia on the topic.

As for file sizes, I'd be surprised if AAC is so much better than what I currently encode MP3 at. The first full album I picked (GnR Appetite for Destruction) is 64MB. The first iPod apparently was a 5GB model. That's a lot of albums (80).

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

iTunes may not be perfect for media management but having the new MTP interface on Android phones which takes like 10 minutes to load the files in a directory is far worse. Sure it's drag and drop but its the worst drag and drop in the world right now.

I would kill for the old fashioned USB Mass Storage.

 

[Crono]

iTunes may not be perfect for media management but having the new MTP interface on Android phones which takes like 10 minutes to load the files in a directory is far worse. Sure it's drag and drop but its the worst drag and drop in the world right now.

I would kill for the old fashioned USB Mass Storage.

I think a lot of people agree, which is why there is still a market for mp3 players like the Sansa Clip. Music management is a hassle, I much prefer simple <ARTIST - ALBUM> folders and players that support the default folder/file hierarchy without rearranging all my files in their interface. Drag, drop, done.

I do like that my phone (stock music player on HTC One) automatically gets album art for things like podcasts and music that I don't already have the album art for.