[Hairby]

I think you have to remember that no software is going to perfectly match the way you want to use it all of the time. If vendors tried to do it you would have so many preference options that the system would be tied up in knots.
Itunes is good enough and for 99% of users it does exactly what they need, but there are some small annoyances, although thinking about it nothing i would say i hate.

[SirBrass]

I totally agree with the author of the article here. I switched TO iTunes long before I bought either 1) my first iPod (a 1st gen 1GB nano that I gave to a friend when her iPod mini gave up the ghost and I got my 80GB Classic) or 2) bought my iMac (been using it for about half a month and I'm in LOVE :P).
I have friends that prefer WMP or WinAmp above iTunes and really can't tell me why other than "iTunes sucks!" But they can't tell me why. I found it to be the best darn music playing and media-cataloging FREE and supported program around. And this was long before I started buying from the iTunes store (at least a year or two before). I even submit that it was iTunes (and then the addition of an iPod b/c I wanted to take my music that I played in iTunes with me and play more than just what I could burn onto an audio CD) that brought me back to the fold of the Macintosh-faithful. This simple, yet elegant and useful tool has been a solid computing companion for at least 4 or so years. WMP is now laggy and such a resource hog, and winamp.....oh please, it hasn't changed a bit. Not useful at all. And those old m3u playlists I have? Not even close to the usefullness of my smart playlists (who needs static playlists any more except for the ever-useful 'on the go' one?)
Even when I was a devout PC user (I loved my PC games.....until I got my PS3 that is), I would be saying much the same thing to the guys at PC World.
Oh, and I've even heard from one of my orthodox PC-using, Apple-hating friends that he uses safari gleefully over firefox (while I LIKE FireFox), so why does PC World have their panties in a bunch over that little inclusion? I think they're just trying to take pot shots at apple, if you ask me. Why? Because their readerbase is shifting to MacWorld. Why? Because we're so effin' fed up with Windows (especially that crapware called Vista. I call it Windows ME version 2), that's why.

[jkleis]

I do not see the excuse for iTunes suddenly stops downloading podcast that you have signed up for.
What is the point that it does't even ask about if it is okay - and then give you the options 1) don't ever drop a download for this particular podcast, 2) don't ever drop a download for any podcast - at least when you have 10 GB free harddisk space.

[XMattingly]

Well pointed article, Mr. Breen. I not only like "list" articles, or articles that break down "list" articles, but also responding to them. In list form. : )

These are at least my take on the PC article:

1. Inefficient updates: The commentary is overblown, and you're right to point out that if you're on dial-up, for the most part you won't need the extra media enhancements. Comparison to OS updates is very fair; especially since bandwidth issues was aforementioned. My only minor concern would be if there was a major glitch in iTunes that needed an update to fix.
2. DRM: If PC World guy followed the news of the past couple of years, he would see that there was an obvious insurrection attempt by record execs to overthrow Apple's media dominance. I believe DRM was their issue all along, not Apple's. Thoughts on Music
3. Music Folders: Double-clicking an MP3 to get it loaded ain't all that difficult, either. The flexibility is definitely there, but I'm more in favor of a centralized location, anyway. Who honestly needs to be able to access all music files on their machine, regardless of how much they may be scattered to the winds?
4. Pushing: Smarmy comments about crapperware aside, I can't defend Apple on this. Having unnecessary software installed through an updater was a surprisingly underhanded, aggressive thing for them to do. So in this case, I say to PC World writer: don't blame iTunes, blame Apple.
5. Subscription: Interesting times that we live in, where there are so many options for media consumption. Find a model you like, and regardless of its popularity it can be frustrating to not to have it available on your platform of choice.
6. Neglected Podcasts Halted: I wasn't aware of that one, but I think it's a responsible move on Apple's part. I would guess the vast majority of folks don't do regular maintenance on their machines, so it's their way of simply keeping you from hurting yourself.
7. Check Box: PC World guy complains about it, then answers his own question. Shouldn't this be a "10 Gripes" list? Yeesh.
8. NBC: Right you are, Mr. Breen. I do admire Apple (Jobs) for taking a stance on this (same deal for record biz wanting to toy around w/ pricing on albums/songs), and holding their ground. Bait and switch is one of the quickest ways to erode consumer confidence. What was NBC's answer to that? To air their shows on the internet... with commercials. So they're basically stuck with an old business model for new media.
9. Dock Controls: This comment definitely had me going, "c'mon buddy, did you really research this?". But it did get me thinking that it would be kind of cool to have some simple player controls tucked up in the menu bar. I wouldn't doubt it at all if a shareware app already exists for this.
10. Exporting: Once again, 3rd party developers happily fill in the gap for minority requests.
11. EBooks: IPods are, after all, music players. How many times in your life can you count having carried around a paperback novel in your back pocket?

[MacTechAspen]

[quote name='Chris Breen']
>

mrrichardlewis said:

> What I would really love is to be able to have my music on my local hard drive, video on an external drive, yet still have iTunes manage all of it!

You can. Just turn off the option to copy files to the iTunes Music folder when adding to library (found in the General tab within the Advanced preference) and then drag your video files into the Library entry in iTunes Source list. The titles of your videos will be added to the iTunes library but the files will remain on that external hard drive. As long as that external drive is up and running when you launch iTunes, you're good. Unplug it, though, and iTunes won't know where to look for the files.

And use FrontRow to watch your videos. It also allows you to have movies anywhere (as long as you put an alias to the drive/folder in your Movies folder). And then you get a very pleasant interface and much better full screen experience then watching videos from iTunes itself.

[lester8r]

Howdy. Interesting discussion. I'm using iTunes 7.7.1 with OS 10.5.4, and I don't see an option for "iTunes Mini". Is that a widget? I've been using YouControl, which parks nicely up in the menu bar. Thanks for all of the valuable feedback!

[SirBrass]

It's actually obscurely named. In the window menu, select zoom and it switches to the mini player.

There's also an iTunes widget for dashboard that's essentially a mini player as well.

[sheilanolan]

I'm a PC user who's been converted to Safari which is much faster and better than IE for me. iTunes beats Media Player easily and I have no problem adding music I've downloaded from e-music. I guess they're just sore because they're the poor cousin!

[jessehogie]

I always find the people discussing things like this hilarious. Its just a program...yet people seem to fight tooth and nail over it and throw insults at each other. If you don't like one program, use another. No need to be mean. Its all personal preference

[jkleis]

I am not sure that you have that many options if you wan't to use your iPhone, iPod, apple TV, airtunes (even though you can use airfoil). So iTunes is deeply integrated in the mac software/hardware platform - and is good at many things.
However, as it is, I constantly have problems with the podcasts that are automatically cancelled . Instead I have the possibility to make a wget script, combined with some perl, and then I can get it as I wan't it to do. But it would be much simpler just to give me an option, e.g. in a plist file, to turn this behavior off.

[touringsedan]

The Dockable itunes is present.
If you right-click on your taskbar and choose 'Toolbars'-'iTunes' you will have a dockable mini itunes just like Windows Media Player. Though it does lack a screen it has all the other features and is docked to your task bar.

[Imagine_Engine]

I enjoy iTunes and my only issues are wanting more DRM free music and having access to NBC media.

[tewha]

I found myself really amused by the comments over on PCWorld. It was painfully obvious that the writers of those comments (not the article, it was mostly good) had never explored iTunes.

[tewha]

XMattingly said:

4. Pushing: Smarmy comments about crapperware aside, I can't defend Apple on this. Having unnecessary software installed through an updater was a surprisingly underhanded, aggressive thing for them to do. So in this case, I say to PC World writer: don't blame iTunes, blame Apple.

I find it mildly annoying, but not significantly so. Unlike Firefox, the Safari installer won't automatically set Safari as the default browser. So other than taking some disk space, there's really no harm.

So I find it especially amusing in light of the "iTunes won't waste my disk space with podcasts I'm not listening to!" complaint in the same article. Stop trying to have it both ways! :)