iTunes7 and ruling

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-14 06:52pm

iTunes7 and it's RIDICULOUS initial performance problems came up in venting. As I said, my older Macs run it fine, but much more powerful Windows boxes struggle for a good fifteen minutes until everythings cached and iTunes-friendly.

That said:

If someone had told me iTunes7 had 'browse by album art', I would have laughed and said it was stupid. However, it actually works really well, and I can flick through my thousands of songs and find the ones I want pretty fast. Of course, useless compared to the bloody search bar that's right there... but it's neat and I like it.

Has anyone else run into Windows-performance problems? Every now and again iTunes spikes on resources and I get stuttering, and it seems to be much more sensitive to streaming problems.

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-14 07:06pm

No Windows issues but the fucking thing will not get album art for my songs. Will it not get album art for the songs on my iPod? I have no songs in my Library, just on my iPod.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-14 07:10pm

I don't use the internal iTunes thing, since I don't have an iTunes store account. I just use a dashboard plugin (on Mac) and a Yahoowidget on PC. Is the internal album-art thing busted?

I've got some utterly niche New Zealand jazz stuff, and there is no album art anywhere. I need to scan the CD.

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-14 07:17pm

I do not think it is busted, but I figured out a way to get my album art onto the iPod. I juut browsed Amazon and saved all of the pics on my hdd. Then I just drag and drop into the "Get Info" section of the songs.

One thing that I do like about iTunes 7 is the option to have gapless playback. That fucking rocks my socks off.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-14 07:28pm

I'm trying to understand how you're using iTunes with nothing in your library. What do you use it for?

And what the hell is gapless playback anyway? Does it just build a database of how much streaming various songs need so there's no pause? Does that work on iPods too? I seldom use my iPod outside my car these days.

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-14 07:45pm

I only use iTunes to transfer mp3s to my iPod. I deleted all of my mp3s from my hdd to clear up some space. I will download new albums, transfer to iPod, and then delete them from my hdd. Gapless playback is when an album has songs on it that run back to back, without a pause between tracks. For example, when listening to the TOOL album Lateralus, tracks 10, 11, and 12 run back to back, maknig it seem like one long song, approx 22 minutes. And yes, it works on the iPod.

Spyder · Post by **Spyder** » 2006-09-14 10:59pm

I'm not so sure keeping your ipod as the sole storage device for your MP3s is a good idea. The HDDs in them aren't exactly failsafe.

Darth Quorthon · Post by **Darth Quorthon** » 2006-09-15 12:29am

Makes an interesting way to view my Rush collection.

(Click for larger size)

And no, I haven't really noticed any windows performance issues. I did notice that it took about a second for the album info to scroll up in the lower half of the screen after the matching album art "slid over".

The concept of automatically updating album art seems cool, but having to open an iTunes store account rubs me the wrong way. I can easily just save the art to My Pictures and then drag&drop it. There are plenty of places on the net that will let you download album art without making you open an account.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-15 12:32am

Some of the performance issues I had at first could be related to remote storage, since the XP version seems to occasionally decide to fuck up the streaming and spike the CPU to 80% for no reason. The iBook on the same arrangement doesn't have any problems, though.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2006-09-15 01:34am

If I had to guess why the Mac version performs better... The Mac version probably uses Quartz Extreme or CoreImage to render all the album art using the GPU with very little performance impact on the CPU.

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-15 03:15am

Spyder wrote:I'm not so sure keeping your ipod as the sole storage device for your MP3s is a good idea. The HDDs in them aren't exactly failsafe.

Everything is backed up on CDs.

Spyder · Post by **Spyder** » 2006-09-15 03:54am

JLTucker wrote:
Spyder wrote:I'm not so sure keeping your ipod as the sole storage device for your MP3s is a good idea. The HDDs in them aren't exactly failsafe.
Everything is backed up on CDs.

Good man.

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-15 08:19pm

Alright. I see that the new iTunes has an option to get Album Art. Will it only get the album art for the songs in your library? Also, in the directory where you save your albums that iTunes rips, there is a folder labeled "Album Artwork". In this arem ore folders that eventually lead to an .ITC file. What the fuck is with Apple and these fucking file types? I WANT FUCKING ALBUM ART ON MY IPOD FOR SONGS THAT I DID NOT PURCHASE ON ITUNES!!! GODDAMMIT!!!

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-15 08:43pm

Yes Tucker, you're totally misusing iTunes and it won't help you.

Further, I wish people would shut the fuck up about 'zomg teh buyzors'. iTunes finds art for songs you didn't buy, you just need an account in the music store so you can access their database. Apple isn't owning anyone or charging. In any case, there are piles of 'get album art' thingies ANYWAY, like the ones I use because I don't use the music store. Don't blame iTunes because you don't keep anything on your HDD. I use iTunes, and would NEVER, EVER buy anything from the silly music store - and I have no problems. OH NOES APPLE IS OWNING ME SOMEHOW.

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-15 08:47pm

I tried finding art for the Firefly soundtrack and it did not find any. i have that soundtrack in my Library.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-15 08:50pm

SO? SO? *I* have the Serenity album art. Get this: I google-imaged for 'serenity' and 'firefly' and 'soundtrack'. Shit, that was hard. AGAIN, I just use the yahoowidget 'itunes companion' which does it for me. Macs have it easier, with Dashboard widgets that do it too. Apple throws it in to iTunes and people fucking complain.

EDIT - Eight seconds from go to whoa. It really isn't that hard, guys.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/artma ... _cover.jpg

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-15 09:09pm

I tried dragging and dropping the album art into my iPod. It shows up in iTunes but not on the iPod when I eject it.

Redleader34 · Post by **Redleader34** » 2006-09-15 09:11pm

Cant you edit the .ID3 tags ?

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-15 09:15pm

Hate to ask a stupid question, but is it even capable of displaying art? You do know you have to cycle to the art-showy bit? Nanos and 5G don't default to showing art, they default to the trackname/duration bar screen like other iPods. I think you just click the button a few times.

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-15 09:20pm

I have my iPod set up to display album art. Here is another thing that is fucking retarded. I added the album art for the Harry Potter audio books. It shows up on the iPod right beside the track title. But like I said earlier, the art will not show up on other albums.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-15 09:24pm

Some songs in my library somehow acquired 'blank' art, and to see the art I added on iPods I had to go into 'info/artwork' and delete the 'empty' white art, leaving only the useful one.

But hey, don't bother trying to work out what's gone wrong - your utterly nonstandard use of iTunes is causing problems, so it must be shit!

JLTucker · Post by **JLTucker** » 2006-09-15 09:28pm

Since when did I call iTunes "shit"? Never. Also, I am not talking about the fucking songs in my library.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2006-09-15 09:33pm

Yeah, I can't see how using the software in a totally nonstandard way would cause problems. It's not like the whole paradigm is based around editing and modifying music on a pc for play on a remote device or anything.

But since only people who can't even use google have this problem it doesn't concern me. Sorry for trying to help you.

Golan III · Post by **Golan III** » 2006-09-16 03:30am

the new iPod interface is fucking cool, IMO. Plus the library organization of different file types (music, tv shows, movies, etc) is vastly improved.

Overall, I like it!

LMSx · Post by **LMSx** » 2006-09-16 08:26pm

This album art thing is sweet, if you're a normal human being capable of social interaction you'll love it. Gapless playback works about 70% of the time- my ripped version of Frances the Mute, for example, plays perfectly, but there's still an (albeit smaller) gap between any songs from albums or concert bootlegs that are mp3 sourced. Annoying as it is though, I suspect that's a problem with the source and not iTunes.

The only downside is that iTunes can't offer artwork for artists that aren't on the store-mainly The Beatles and Radiohead. Google can fix that, however.

These were my two biggest complaints with iTunes, and while they should have been resolved sooner, at least Apple has fixed it.