Can I merge 2 Apple IDs?

This whole thing is INSANELY RUBBISH !!!!!!

i went into the apple store today for an appointment with a GENIUS, who was INSANELY THICK, and didnt seem to have a basic clue about the nature of the problem with multiple ids, and duplicate calender entries and all of these other fun things we are trying to live with, and was no help at all !!

ICLOUD DOESNT JUST WORK, FACT. its complicated , messy, and no-one seems to have the slightest clue how to resolve anything, mainly because of apple's control freakery attitude DNA, so they are incapable of admitting they have made this whole thing a DOGS DINNER !!!!

keynote message ends here.

thankyou..

and one more thing, bring idisk back, you fools!

WAY more complicated than it should have been. I do IT strategy for a living and have been working with computers since 1980, if I had a hard time sorting this out, I can't imagine what average Joe is experiencing.

i went into the apple store today for an appointment with a GENIUS, who was INSANELY THICK, and didnt seem to have a basic clue about the nature of the problem with multiple ids, and duplicate calender entries and all of these other fun things we are trying to live with, and was no help at all !!

Well, if a GENIUS couldn't figure it all, that would certainly explain why this is a never ending problem over on these sides of the forums.

I FOUND A SOLUTION! At least to the 2 id's, one for the store and one for Mobile me mail accounts. What you do is use the store a/c for your "Primary" iCloud settings, which for me is an AOL a/c that I used to set up one iCloud account, and historically used for all purchases. Then use the mobile me account, also used to set up a different iCloud account, to set up a secondary iCloud account setting in all your devices that will only do mail for the me.com address. This can be done. Use the iCloud button to set up the Primary, and the separate mail, contacts, etc. button to set up the me.com iCloud account.

Before I changed all my devices (iPad, iPhone, MacPro, and PC) to the primary iCloud account I saved my iCal settings because they will all go away with this change. I also saved my contacts in an importable setting, but this was not necessary, as the contacts do not go away. I had to edit the future calendar items to point to the cloud, to sync with other devices, but the history is intact in iCal. I also added the mobile me mail account separately on the iPad and iPhone after the change.

This does not help if you have multiple store accounts, but at least you can have the store ID be on point for photo streaming, document sync, etc, (which will never work if you don't have the store Apple ID on every device as the main iCloud) and you can save your Mobile me mail account.

There is an Apple article on "Secondary iCloud accounts" that describes this in more detail.

Hello,

Is there now an easy way to consolidate all Apple ID?

Or sipmply delete an account?

(I begin to be creasy)

I have 2 iphones, 1 Imac, 1 macbook pro, 1 ipad2, 1 ipod tuch and 2 Apple ID

I need the same account and password for everithing.

Thx,

Christophe.

I simply want to change my Apple ID, which is currently an ancient Comcast email address. A long time ago Apple insisted that I merge the Apple ID and primary email account. I fell for it. Now I'm screwed. I'm dropping Comcast for Verizon, so I want to start using my main Gmail account, since once I drop Comcast all mail going there will get flushed.

I tried changing the account ID, but that just created a brand new Apple ID that doesn't get to access any of the stuff I've downloaded over the past SEVEN YEARS. This totally *****.

Apple, are you listening? What can I do?

(BTW, for all of you playing along at home, the ***** above is supposed to represent a word that starts with "s" and sounds like "bucks" ...)

You can continue to use the Comcast address as the login for iTunes - it doesn't have to be a functioning address, it's just a text string in the form of an email address. You will need to change the associated email address to something which does work in case they need to contact you.

You can use a different ID for iCloud from that for iTunes, iTunes in the Cloud and iTunes Match without any problems.

Thanks, but as I said, my Apple ID and primary email address were merged long ago. I don't see a way to disassociate the two.

Go to http://appleid.apple.com . Click on 'Manage your account'. Sign in with your Comcast ID. You will see spaced for alternate email addresses: put something working in at least the first one.

Continue to sign in with this ID in iTunes to be able to access your purchases. You can use another ID for iCloud if you wish.

i think everyone would LOVE to use the same apple id for icloud and itunes, but it comes down to a timing issue. there is a population out there that had itunes ids before they signed up for mobile me (and did not have a .mac account). then when mobile me became available, signed up for a mobile me email account. I really dont remember the logic there on if you could attach the legacy itunes id to the mobile me account -- hindsight is 20/20 but at the time we didn't have the semalessness of itunes and all other things apple, so it was probably a non issue. then icloud concept came out and it became a real issue because of the years of purchases under the old itunes id, we are all stuck. Apple won't allow us to "transfer" these purchases to our mobile me/ icloud apple id (which is our email address).

As far as I can tell, the resolution to this issue for people in this population should be easy, apple should allow for us to transfer purchases to the mobile me /icloud apple id. and for one dump the legacy itiunes id.

am i missing something with my logic?

Exactly, they just need to let us transfer purchases/shutdown the original account in the process. The problem they are probably having is how to get content already downloaded to still work when it's linked to a closed account WITHOUT forcing us to redownload it.

Eric, your logic is spot on.

Roger, the whole point is that we want to be able to sign on with our @me.com e-mail address. Also, we want a way to be fully integrated into iCloud without losing our old stuff.

illinifan29 wrote:

Roger, the whole point is that we want to be able to sign on with our @me.com e-mail address. Also, we want a way to be fully integrated into iCloud without losing our old stuff.

I realize that: but currently it's not possible. There really isn't any technical problem about having one ID for iTunes, iTunes in the Cloud and iTunes Match, and another for iCloud - you won't even notice with Keychain logging you in automatically; and given the number or complaints about iTunes accounts being hacked it's better security if the iTunes login isn't your email address, which is widely known.

I agree that an even better solution would be to allow AppleIDs that are not email addresses.

There is a technical issue. I cannot change my primary email to my @me.com address. I get errors and my iTune Match will not work. So no matter what, until they fix this, I will need two e-mail addresses. My @me.com address and another one (gmail, yahoo, etc.) to use as my Apple ID. Not very smart when every company out there wants their customers fully integrated into their own ecosystem. If I'm Apple, I am wondering "why I am forcing my customers to have email addresses with thrid party companies?"

This isn't the solution. Apple needs to fix this. It's crazy it's been this long and theres no fix yet. I'm set up as you describe and I can't sync notes between iphone and ipad becuase it requires a @me account which I'm using only for email. I really don't understand why this hasn't been fixed and why apple can't step up there game and fix a major annoyance for long time customers.