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Apple Releases Major iTunes Update
shunnicutt writes "Apple has released iTunes 4.5 (and iPod software 2.2 and QuickTime 6.5.1) and relaxed some iTunes Music Store restrictions: now tracks you purchased can be authorized to play on up to five other computers, instead of three. However, they reduced the number of times you can burn a playlist to an audio CD from ten to seven. Another new feature is iMix, which allows you to publish playlists on iTMS, including comments on each track. The iTMS also offers a weekly free single for download."
crazney adds "This release also changes their network sharing protocol in a way that breaks the open source iTunes sharing applications that have been released (based on my work on iTunes 4.2's DRM)."
kefoo writes "Among the new features is Apple Lossless Encoding, which claims to compress losslessly to half the size of uncompressed CD quality audio." Hm, and I was about to re-rip all my CDs at 320 kbps MP3 ...
Update: 04/28 14:56 GMT by P : I just tested, and I can listen to previously de-DRM'd AAC files from playfair, but I cannot use either playfair or FairTunes any longer. The former "Couldn't get DRM key for user," and the latter produces a blank file.
Additionally, the app now also features a cool track melding feature not mentioned in the heading. This makes it a lot easy to make seamless listening possible for tracks that are supposed to proceed without pausing, So now I can finally listen to classical tracks the way they are supposed to sound. Seamless and lossless. Cool.
One cool feature mentioned in 4.5 is "iMix", which publishes your playlists to the iTMS for all to see. So out of curiosity, I tried to publish my "top 25 most played" playlist. Out of the 25 songs on the list, only seven were available at iTMS.
Sure, one could argue that I have eclectic taste in music, but on the other hand, they are missing some pretty big names: Radiohead, Frank Zappa, John Coltrane, Charlie Parker, Chick Corea...
On an unrelated note, I wonder if iTMS is going to start offering lossless files. That would be cool.
WARNING: If accidentally read, induce vomiting.
This whole limit of computers is kind of redundant if they let you burn audio cd's. Aren't most people burning an audio cd, and then ripping to MP3 from there?
Can someone explain why I can't install it through my preferred medium?
Cheers!
Though I'll admit that the join-tracks feature was much-welcomed, what else did iTunes users get? Instead of downloading songs with propietary DRM, now we can encode our songs with a new proprietary DRM--songs that won't play on anything else? I think I'll stick with FLAC. The ability to publish my important music playlists for the whole world to see? I think I'll stick with Audioscrobbler. A free song from another bland RIAA-sponsored band? Epitonic has always provided a good sampling of independent artists and their music for you to try out. A wishlist to download those Top 40 songs later? Well, why don't I just download the songs now off allofmp3 now with their ridiculously low prices, in whatever format I want, without DRM? Import unprotected WMA files? Winamp
Has anyone gotten it to work under wine? I'd love to be able to use it under Linux, but since they don't seem to be forthcoming on a native client, at least it would be a way to let me give them money! ;-)
[TMB]
Some initial, unofficial reports are coming in that a 4mb AAC translates to about 30mb Apple Lossless.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
Notice that the DRM scheme has changed. You can now burn 7 playlists to CD when it used to be 10. However, the flip side is that you can now authorize 5 computers as opposed to the old scheme of 3.
Not a bad tradeoff in my opinion. I can't remember the last time I played a physical CD. Sure, there are going to be those that complain about not having the CD but really, the idea of digital music is so that you don't have to lug around a CD.
No trees were harmed in the composition of this; however, numerous electrons were inconvenienced.
And maybe this is available in other MP3 players - but this is my list after setting up some new Smart Lists this morning:
1. Nested lists: so I could have one list that says "if genre = rock", then a sublist that just has "if My Rating is > 3" or "if year published is 2" and the other "if My Rating is > 3" (which I use to differentiate between "Background work music" and "Driving kick ass music".
2. Copy playlists: Another major issue with the above is that if I have 2 playlists that are 90% the same, I'd like to set the first one up, then just copy the list logic into a new one and only edit the 1 or 2 differences.
3. iSync iTunes I have a laptop, and so does my wife. Right now, all of our music sits on a Master hard drive on a Powermac, then synced to my iPod, which when I'm at work I plug into my laptop and place on "manual" (so it doesn't copy the laptop music files). This works out, but it's not what I'd like.
What I'd like is to go home, sit with my laptop and have it say "Oh, I see Playlists X, Y, and Z on your main computer have updated, and I've updated these MP3 tracks ratings/tags/etc. Let me sync up."
Then I could select the lists I want on my laptop from the main machine and only those files would be copied to my box. Since, if I buy music from the iTunes Music Store I can play it on 5 separate machines, it would be nice to have an "auto-sync" kind of system.
I think that's about it for now. I like the option of a new lossless recording (if I ever get my computer tied into a good sound system I can use it - I think there's some new devices that can stream from your Mac to from about $200 that might be worth a look).
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
A couple weeks ago there was a discussion on /. about iTMS. One of the points I made is that I haven't used iTunes in a while because I have 4 computers at home and it was a hassle to keep authorizing/deauthorizing them because you were limited to three authorized systems. Another point was made that Apple should expand the number of authorized computers to 5 because their OS X "family plan" lets you install OS X on up to 5 computers...therefore they should be consistent.
As for reducing the playlist burn amount from 10 to 7, I don't think anyone will notice. Although CDRs are dirt cheap, they are pretty wasteful for the small amount of music they hold. Flash and HD music players are the way to go.
Good work, Apple! Next step: Get the songs I buy on iTMS to work with TiVo's Home Media Option.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
what will be real interesting is if APPLE start selling lossless from the iTMS.
Previously the DRM limitations forced people to burn to cd then re-rip with out drm. the problem with this is
drm'ed mp3 > cd > mp3
the problem was that drm'ed mp3 !=mp3
because when the mp3 is ripped from the burned cd, it will not be indentical to the original mp3.
with lossless encoding this problem is fixed because
drm'ed lossless > cd > lossless
drm'ed lossless = lossless.
Obvioulsy APPLE is aware of this, they have effectively removed the DRM issue (at least for files that start as lossless)
Monkey's Audio is another efficient way to compress audio without reducing the quality.
On its site is a comparision chart. MA is able to compress an album to about 53% of its size, while WinRAR does 61.9% and ZIP using WinRAR 2.7 goes all the way up to 91%.
MA is not available yet for Mac and Linux, though.
I don't know about you, but to me half the size of uncompressed audio sounds like a lot. How do gzip, bzip2 and FLAC stack up?
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
I don't understand why Apple isn't getting these apps running under Linux... Or Palm... Or Symbian. Damnit Steve, stop playing the proprietary game already. I respect software which needs to be purchased, but only on apple hardware, or windows--your main competition--is just wierd. Use a few million in cash and get the software ported. I have enough shiny Apple hardware... but, lets talk about that rumored phone... iWant.
At the time iTunes for Windows was launched, I went to the suggestions page at apple.com and suggested a WMA importer for iTunes, and suggested on /. that others do the same, as a malrge number of users have ripped all their music to WMA and therefore couldn't play it in iTunes.
I am glad Apple were listening - it's really pleasing to see a major company release a tool which will reduce the number of Windows Media files in existence in the world.
I have been a user for about 10 years. This ends Feb 2014. The site's been ruined. I'm off. Dice, FU
Just occured to me that iTunes isn't just for the computer, in the sense that all formats that are 'officially' supported are designed to work with the iPod. iTunes will generally accept anything that Quicktime does, but this fact is not advertised as such to avoid people complaining that they can't use these files with their iPod. If Apple chose to use their own format, as opposed to FLAC, there could be a number of reasons:
- lock-in?
- not made here attitude?
- FLAC lacks a good integer based decoder?
- ALE has some yet unadvertised advantage of FLAC?
- something else?
I have no idea which it is, but time will give us the answer.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
Josh
FLAC - Free Lossless Audio Codec
From the FLAC's developer page: (emph mine)I bet that's why.
I thought it was pretty cool at first to be able to shift-click (on Windows here at work) the arrows and have it search my collection - but it doesn't seem to make much sense. For example, say I shift-click the arrow next to an artist, Lackluster. It shows me all the music I have by Lackluster, but what I usually want is all the music by Lackluster *AND* the stuff he's remixed. I suppose if you don't have any remixes or don't care about them, this wouldn't matter, but in any case, no matter what, it just seems to make more sense to just use iTunes' little search field up at the top. I know what I'm looking for, I just type it in, and up it comes. iTunes' search makes even browsing unnecessary for me most of the time.
I think those little arrows were some marketer's idea to get people to buy more music on iTMS, and then they thought they'd better make them do something else so it wasn't so blatant, so they threw in the option/shift-click thing to zero in on stuff in the local collection. I guess if you just really don't want to use the keyboard, the little arrows would help, but for me, they just clutter up the screen. Thank goodness they made it an optional feature!
I might be interested in using them to find my music/artists in the iTMS, except that the iTMS really doesn't have pretty much anything I'd be interested in (or don't already have). I know that's more a reflection on me than the iTMS, but that's how it is.
This ought to shut-up the iTunes critics. Lets see what Napster does to try and compete with this.
It's interesting how Apple has chosen to enable two lossless codecs into 4.5. On the one hand, you can use iTunes to import your CD's into it's own Apple (potentially proprietary) lossless format, or you can now import losslessly encoded (or not) WMA files which iTunes converts to AAC.
(Thinking aloud) Prior to reading about 4.5 this morning, I was encoding my CD collection into a FLAC archive. Using foobar2000 I could then encode my FLAC collection to just about any other format, including AAC. Up until iTunes 4.5 however, there was no direct method of importing losslessly encoded formats (other than wav files). Importing WMA vs FLAC now makes this process at least one step easier - Windows Media Player's WMA tagging is also extremely easy. Using foobar2000, one can also transcode WMA files into virtually any other format as well. WMA arguably has more overall support than FLAC - at least as far as portables are concerned. I'm not saying I'll switch away from FLAC, but it may be worth investigating.
I find it very odd how a new version of iTunes has me reconsidering WMA as an option for archiving my CD collection, especially as their own lossless codec was released on the same day.
www.brownsauce.org
Don't be silly! If you wanted FLAC and Vorbis playback, 16 hours of battery life, and gapless or crossfaded playback, you'd just buy a Rio Karma.
(Seriously.)
Does iTunes 4.5 support CD Text? I have yet to understand why iTunes hasn't had this support! Just about every burner on the planet supports it. Even factory car stereos support it now.
> 100,000,000 - Number of songs projected to be sold in 1st year
100,000,000 was the number of songs projected to be DOWNLOADED from iTMS - not sold. That projected number also included the Pepsi free-tunes promotion.
> 70,000,000 - Number of songs sold the first 365 days of the service
This number does not, AFAICT, include the Pepsi promotion.
So if 30% of the 100 million Pepsi promotional songs were redeemed then it's still possible that Apple has hit it's 100 million songs downloaded in the first year mark.
It is no surprise that there are no major new features, or that Playfair doesn't work. The main purpose of this release is to close some security holes. This is not surprising; if they didn't do this then RIAA would not let them distribute music any more. Nor is this a big deal. Apple seems to be trying to treat their customers decently. Why should a few pirates be allowed to force them out of the music business? I have no respect or sympathy for the hypocrites at RIAA, who prate endlessly about starving artists while causing said starvation by shamelessly ripping the artists off, but I do respect what Apple is trying to do.
Take a look at most apartment leases. Most of them have a clause about the owner being able to make changes to the lease after 30 days notice. It is not that uncommon to be able to make changes to an agreement.
Hi Josh,
iTunes can play any audio file that Quicktime can play, so we could very easily have FLAC in iTunes if someone with the relevant expertise could be found to make a Quicktime Component that plays back FLAC.
There's already one for Ogg-Vorbis, but it doesn't seem to do Ogg-FLAC.
Of course, this wouldn't be as good as native FLAC support in iTunes, because I doubt things like the track meta data tags would be recognized through Quicktime. Still, it would be cool...
Lord Pixel - The cat who walks through walls
A little bigger on the inside than out
I have over 200 albums, too, (not that I really think that's a lot these days) and ripped them all in a few days with no effort or attention on my part, using the iTunes rip-and-eject mode. Man that's sweet. Pop it in, wait like four or five minutes (or ten) and the CD pops out; then pop in a new one.
I do wish that the default settings for their encoder were more reasonable but they're easy enough to change.
I wish iTunes could tell you when it was having trouble reading a scratched CD, though. As I listen thru my music library every now and then I'll come across a messed-up MP3. I have a "re-encode" playlist for this purpose, so I can remember what tracks are junk and go back and try to re-rip them.
You own a car that has an interior noise floor lower than 40-50dB? You'd have to have such a vehicle to be able to detect a S/N ratio of better than 65dB or so, which is what it sounds like you're describing (max volume - noise floor > source S/N ratio). Have you even TRIED listening to an iPod coming in through RCA inputs to compare the sound against your in-dash unit's D/A conversion? If you've done so, and the results were truly audible, then I apologize.
Look, I'm a car audio snob as much as the next guy (sealed-box sub in the trunk, 5-channel amp, component door units with high-mounted tweeters, etc.), but I'm not about to suggest that true audiophile quality sound is possible in MY car (1997 Nissan Maxima). In my experience, there's simply too much ambient road noise, particularly in the sub50 Hz range and too many issues concerning accurate soundstage (misc reflections as well as dramatic phase issues related to my proximity to the driver's side speakers) to consider any car-audio system to be truly competitive with an above-average home system.
Tim
Even in that case, though, it shouldn't be too hard for the software to see that the sound stops abruptly half-way through the last frame, and infer the endpoint?
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
When I upgraded my iTunes and launched it for the first time, Little Snitch reported that it was trying to communicate to a server on wcg.net. Here is a "Whois" for wcg.net.
Registrant:
Williams Communications Group (WCG3-DOM)
111 E. 1st ST.
Tulsa, OK 74103-2808
US
Domain Name: WCG.NET
Administrative Contact:
Center, Network Operations (YDAAUAZAAI) noc@wcg.net
Wiltel Communications
3180 Rider Trail South
Bridgeton, MO 63045
US
800-934-8434
Anyone have a clue why?
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
I'm curious, which law is this that says if you purchase a CD that you're not allowed fair-use rights (or the UK equiv. of fair-use)?
Slashdot links are also appreciated.
Why does a book have chapters? Why does a play have acts? Why does a symphony have movements, for that matter?
For an interesting counter-example, one of Kyuss's albums has 4 tracks, with 3 tracks per song. Although a couple of them were later separated out on the 'best of' cd.