It would take about 2 seconds to edit a Smart Playlist in iTunes that would show all songs in an album by an artist. This of course ignores the fact that the Browse button in iTunes is already set up to show songs by any combination of Genre, Artist, and Album. ;)

My point is that iTunes is far more powerful and flexible than most of its detractors admit.

No, but if I want to pull up a hip hop album like mentioned earlier, and lets say that hip hop artist xyz is featured in one of these albums, it then associates that artist with that album, and it annoys the hell out of me.

Look I admit it, I am not the average user when it comes to digital media, and I prefer the open source products. Those open source products are a bit harder to use and don't have the pretty interface, however they let me do whatever the heck I want to, and that is why I use them. That, and they support every freaking format known to man, and I also refuse to use anything with DRM.

iTunes is great for people that just want it to work. I want it to work the way I want it to work, and I want it to obey my commands. I am not the average iTunes user.

I am not saying iTunes is horrible, but it is not my first choice of media player at all, and it can be a bit resource hoggy at times.

That would make Smart Playlists the better choice for you. Using combinations of them you can easily* create any list you like from your music.

* Maybe not as easy as it could be: combining AND/OR requires three Smart Playlists, for example, but it's not hard.

It takes all of 2 seconds to select the song, hit Command+I and fix up the artist name to your liking. And I somehow never had a problem playing an album at a time, works particularly nice when View is set to ... whatever its name, middle choice, artwork on the left, songs from the album on the right.

And if you tell it not to copy songs and not to organize, you'll just have to add them once to the library and there, your files remain untouched, unmoved and unrenamed. True, importing takes a bit of time, but not that much and you only do it once.

Well I just did that like 2 nights ago. I wiped out my library completely. wiped all preferences for itunes. Relaunched iTunes and had it scan a mounted network share to add all the music into the Library.

I still got duplicate songs, and I checked and it is physically copying those files twice. I also get a few things that aren't organized to my liking and I turn off all the automatic stuff.

Maybe I should get some tips from you. There are several versions of mp3 tags, my car stereo uses 3.2 and my mp3 player (no, not an ipod) uses 3.3, iTunes does not change both versions of the tags.....

And I do need to know the filename, it'd be nice to be able to change the file name based on the tag info (after I get the tags right). Unlike some people, I create MP3 files, not often, but enough, and I want to name them and tag them. After I import them into iTunes (and it moves them based on the blank tags) I have to tag them, remove them, readd them so they get organized appropriately.....

I would like to do as much of this in OS X native apps as I can, but seriously, there is a lack of good non-iTunes music management for the mac. If I'm missing it, please provide me with links. I even pay for good software that I use.

Thank you.

Note that there is a huge amount of 3rd-party add-on software for iTunes - in particular, a whole bunch of AppleScripts that can automate most common operations.

There are lots of scripts available to rename tunes based on ID3 tags - mine are like this:

The Blues Gypsys (2008) Blues Paradise-11-She's Leavin' (Pt 1).mp3

try dougscripts.com

I LOVE iTunes. You guys are just way, way too demanding... well above what the average user would want or need.

I only have a few hundred songs. I skipped most of the options in iTunes and simply stuck key words in "Comments" and that works just fine for my finding, sorting purposes. I don't want anything more complicated, or time consuming, than that.

VLC does seem have a slightly better sound, though. Then again my hearing is suspect.

High-quality mp3?
 

Isn't that an oxymoron?? Really, and this is probably better served in a new topic, when even 'CD quality' digital music leaves a bit to be desired (amp-DA quality is one BIG problem), how can any mp3 compression be labelled high-quality? No, I'm not criticizing - I'm asking.

Frank

(And yeah, I kinda like the sound of analog and tube amps, so I'm weird.):rolleyes:

This is a discussion of iTunes, not MP3. iTunes will happily handle non-compressed files. As a test, I just used it to play a 32 bit, 192000 Hz sample rate AIFF file, and iTunes played it perfectly.

If you're worried about the D/As in your computer, you can use the built-in digital outputs of your computer to a nice external D/A convertor, or if you don't have built-in digital outputs, get a USB or FireWire sound card with digital outputs.

If you prefer to rip all of your half-inch stereo 30 IPS open reel analog tapes (or whatever high quality source format you prefer) to 32 bit, 192000 Hz AIFF digital, I think that you will find that iTunes should do everything you need*. Make sure to have lots of available hard drive space.

I also like the sound of analog and tube amps. Unfortunately, it's hard to carry them around--an iPod or laptop computer is far more portable. And in some circumstances at least, portability is important.

Trevor


* Edit: iTunes cannot itself rip to high sample rate or bitrate AIFF. You'll have to do the conversion elsewhere. But iTunes will play tracks that use high sample rates and/or bitrates.

Agreed!
 

Trevor,

I heartily agree with your comments (but there are a LOT of non-computer DA's that are cheaply made and really don't do a good job - and some are not cheap in price. Yeah, Quality sound isn't cheap takes a lot of space. Those tube amps get HOT too!) - I was just pondering "high-quality" mp3's. 'Nuff said. Thanks,

Frank

Sounds to me like everyone who hates iTunes just doesn't actually get the very intuitive interface and functions therein. I mean...can anyone really find a more simple app out there.

problem is getting multiple links to the same song...solution: you are not using iTunes right.
You are clicking on the original file on your hard drive that is not in the music library, thus iTunes is adding it again. IDIOTS!!!! just open iTunes and find the song there. Set it to always copy music to the library and delete those F@$#ING originals.

GEEZ! What are you guys talking about. It gets easier and easier with every update, but you are acting like this app should be interfaced with your brain or something. Take some time and learn an app before you bash it. I bet you guys all have PC's, too.

And you wonder why you are desperate for human contact?

From reading his posts, I would be willing to bet that tlarkin is in fact NOT clicking on the original file and thus causing iTunes to add it again. The fact that you would simply assume that was the case without any confirmation only illustrates your arrogance. That, and the fact that you feel inclined to call people idiots!

Here is maybe why I don't like iTunes...

I have been ripping digital music since like 1999ish right when MP3s first came out. I ripped all my CDs and a good chunk of my Vinyl over the years. I used many open source standards that itunes doesn't support like FLAC and OGG, and then my lower quality stuff is typically MP3 256bit VBR or something similar. I ripped almost all of it either one Windows or a Linux box.

Whenever I import my Library (around 75 gigs of music) iTunes doesn't like something and it dupes some albums, and it gets meta data wrong.

It already works fine on other systems and other platforms, so why should I spend even more time than I already have to make it work on my Mac and in iTunes? Plus iTunes can be a bit resource hungry, and yes that matters to me running ARD admin, a few VMs, multiple desktops, various utilities, terminal sessions, etc. I can eat up RAM pretty fast so I need all I can spare.

It is not like I am not capable of learning iTunes or haven't tried, I just don't like it. I don't have to like everything Apple puts out do I? Am I out of the club now or something?

Ok, let me clarify one of the problems I have with iTunes, maybe y'all can enlighten me and make my life simpler.

I use several devices where I need to copy music files manually (to my non-iPod mp3 player, to blank MP3 filled cd's, to share with a friend). So I DO need to know where the file is stored and get them. And looking up each one with the iTunes get info is not easy.

So I import files into iTunes, change the tags. iTunes now has them organized into a folder based on blank or grossly inaccurate tag data. I now remove them from iTunes and reimport them with the corrected tags so iTunes can store them in a logical way.

Many of the files that I have this with are things I have worked on in garage band or other programs, files that are not ripped from CD because they are converted from tape, LP or audio recordings I make.

Thanks for the help converting me.

jpclark49:
I think you too would probably benefit from one of the many iTunes utilities or scripts. Search www.macupdate.com for example.

Can't you just set the Album Artist to the main artist, so it groups them together?