I started this a week ago (April 10, 2006), but don’t expect anything too exciting…
We’ve finally done it and joined the iPod generation! I got a fairly substantial bonus last week (which has already been spent on kitchen updates), but I decided that the kids should get something for my hard work too…So, out of the blue I bought them both new, 30 GB, video iPods. Of couse, in reality, I wanted one and would settle for living vicariously through them…Heh heh. But I do have one beef in particular:
iTunes is a pile of garbage! Utter crap. Or at least it’s usage in combination with 2 iPods and one global database of music sucks. Here’s how we are set up…I keep ALL our music on one network drive on my server, so all our music is available to each one of us. Well, iTunes makes it’s own index of the library for each person. Nothing wrong with that, but it also assumes that only IT will be changing the music in the repository…WRONG! I’ll add music, change the tags inside the files (artist, title, album, year…), or move files, and it befuddles iTunes. Can you “rebuild” the index? Nope! Delete it and start fresh.
A couple other things annoy me:
Only one copy of iTumes can be running on the PC at any time, so, if, say, Dylan left himself logged in with iTunes running, there is no way for Quinn to start it up; he doesn’t know Dylan’s password to log in and quit iTunes, and he doesn’t have the user rights to log Dylan out. So he can: a) Reboot the computer, possibly corrupting Dylan’s index, or b) Wait until Dylan’s home…Which do you think it’ll be? Reboot!
Lastly, to charge an iPod, you need to plug it into the computer. This seems like a great idea, except that when you DO plug it in, it mounts the hard drive inside as a disk drive in Windows and warns you: “Do not disconnect!” So, in order to properly disconnect the iPod from the computer, you have to log in, stop the Windows disk drive service and THEN disconnect. PAIN IN THE BUTT.
There are other things I hate about it, but those are the most annoying to me.
The iPods themselves are fantastically cool little devices, though! I’ll have great fun playing with them!
whiner. Is there a better product?
Terry got me a 30 gig video iPod for Christmas and I, too, have mixed feelings. First of all: beware of iPods just past their warranty dates. Brady’s busted then, and he is not alone. I’m e-mailing you an article from the New York Times a few months ago that talks about this.
When I installed my iPod, I misunderstood how it dealt with music in the library and, after transferring all my music from another application, I mistakenly deleted it (in the other application) and lost everything! Also, music I’d purchased online through Dell’s Musicmatch won’t transfer to iTunes, nor can you buy music through iTunes and then use it elsewhere. Talk about encouraging music piracy! Twice I’ve run into a problem with my iPod that Apple doesn’t acknowledge in its troubleshooting (and it sure took me a lot of trouble to find out how to solve it, which, once found, was easy). The problem was, it would not shut down (hence draining battery constantly).
Also, I find iTunes not at all intuitive to use.
But after all those complaints, I love my iPod. I download all sorts of podcasts, even a video yoga class. I can be seen walking down the street, giggling my head off, listening to Bill Maher or Ricky Gervais podcasts. This is not to mention how much easier it is to do laundry when I’ve got some favorite tunes playing in my ear.
Speaking of tunes and podcasts, if you haven’t subscribed to Coverville, do so right now!!!
Pffft. Philistines. One day you will bow before and worship any Apple product.
Seriously though, I have some comments you may find helpful.
About iTunes:
I find the way it organises files wonderful, becuase I literally drag and drop folders (one time a 40GB network folder) onto it, and it does the copying and organising itself which is most endearing. However for times (such as yours) when it is not appropruiate, i THOUGHT there was a way to turn it off and make it read from files you ad from anywhere. I will check.
Ok I checked. I suggest trying the following:
Find iTunes preferences (no idea where it is on Whundows) and go to the advanced tab and turn off “Keep iTunes Music Folder Organised” and “Copy files to iTunes Music folder when Adding to Library”. Might help? Or do I misunderstand the issue?
As for the multi user thing, I dunno what that’s about. I just set up another user account on my computer and ran itunes happily on both at once. Must be a windows thing.
I’d go and try it on the PC here, but that would require me to a) get out of bed and b) use windows. Both of which would spoil my day.
As for the charging:
Yes it sucks (SUCKS!) that the latest round of upgrades didn’t come with a AC adapter. If your ipod isn’t enabled for disk use, you don’t have to eject it before you unplug, as it does it itself, though I have no idea whether it would if you weren’t logged in. FYI an AC adapter costs $39.
Anyway enough rambling from me, but maybe there’s something useful from my experiences in there?
Sam.
Yes, they are a problem…too cool to be without, but not really made to last.
Sigh…nothing’s perfect. I have 2 year replacement protection (from the store) so I hope that’s good enough.
I’m working on ways to get away from iTunes…I’m not so much worried about DRM (Digital Rights Management) in the music, because most of our music is ripped from CDs that we own and I CAN’T bring myself to buy music in a strictly digital form. “vPod” is pretty simple and easy way to update the iPods…I dunno.