So many problems with iTunes Match...

I gave up using it months ago. My biggest problem was with artwork never downloading even after several days. Also, it had a weird habbit of taking songs from certan albums to make up tracks on other albums that had the same songs such as greatest hits. The original album would then be missing tracks. This happened only with albums purchased in iTunes.

My sub is up for renewel next month and I've turned off autow renew so it will cancel.

Understood...can't blame you. FWIW I was also having a heck of a time with some album art either being completely wrong, changing or just missing. This was on albums purchased from iTunes as well as my own CD material. Sometimes it would be okay on our Macs, but wrong or missing on our iPhones or even Apple TV. Very frustrating.

After "fixing" it repeatedly I quickly learned to keep a "backup file" of all of the artwork I had scoured from the Interwebs so I could add it again - using the various "guaranteed" methods other suggested. I just took a look at my "backups file" (in iPhoto) and there are over 600 covers!

In any case, things improved after I stopped using large files and stuck with cover art that was 500 x 500 px or smaller (Apple uses 300 x 300 px). But some would still get screwed up...that was until this last version of iTunes and, knock on wood, all of the artwork I've added and/or corrected seems to be "sticking". I have no idea if it has anything to do with iTunes itself, iTunes Match being tweaked or ???

Some folks seem to be having better luck with other options now. Sad. My sub is good through next December and iTunes Match is mostly working okay so I guess I'll continue to give it some time.

Let us know if you find a better alternative or...

TIA!

Here is a screenshot of what my iTunes Match was doing to my music right on my computer. You can see clearly the problem. Notice how it renamed Love Gun to the Best Of Kiss and used tracks from best of on Love Gun. Click on it to see a larger image.

Unreadable downloaded song !!!!

Hi, everybody : more or less happy users of iTunes Match,

I am a french jazz musician.

I made a record that I DON’T WANT TO BE SOLD ON ANY COMERCIAL PLATFORM.

For this reason it cannot match with iTunes catalog of course and I had (another) problem with iTunes Match.

The problem is not here of course !

In fact, I had to let the tunes be transfered by ITM. Till this moment everything went fine.

But - and that for only one of the tunes the behaviour of ITM is unsupportable : it skips the song when I want to read it.

But strangely it works in streaming !

I must precise that the song has been uploaded to ITM and is readable and re-downlabled from my Mac.

To be able to listen to my own record on my iPhone, I must stream it (mainly the concerned tune) and then, the offline streaming files (or whatever their names are created and I can listen to it even offline (tried plane mode). It not the problem of my record (of course) but the apparent new glitch of ITM.

I am sure that if I can read the tune offline (airplaine mode) : it means that it is somwhere inside the iPhone. But the download cloud icon is still here BUT if I click on this "cloud icon" the song is downloaded be becomes non readable again (it skips the tune !). I tried the maximum including restore the iPhone, erase all the music with the control panel General/"use" (utilisation en français).

I must add that the same problem occurs with my iPad (and so may be related the the way the servers 'transforms the file to make it readable on iDevices).

By the way, I have tried to "RE" upload the file : perhaps an error during the upload process (I had so many problems with ITM that I think I know how to do this) but iTM seem to keep a copy of the file originally uploaded because when I put the song back on my Mac and ask for a ITM update, the new files (of my record are not uploaded but matched : so the are still there a couple of hours after having them removed from Apple's server)

How long does it take to Apple to erase a File from a server ?

Must ì wait longer (a whole day ?).

Regards.

Forgive my clumsy english : as I said, I am french.

Thank you

Unbelievable behaviour don't you think ?

hexonxonx wrote:

Here is a screenshot of what my iTunes Match was doing to my music right on my computer. You can see clearly the problem. Notice how it renamed Love Gun to the Best Of Kiss and used tracks from best of on Love Gun. Click on it to see a larger image.

Yep...same issues for me, although I haven't seen the wrong track thing...but I've never looked at every single album. Guess I should put that on my to-do list. There are mixes of "Matched" and "Uploaded" tracks for numerous albums though...many very mainstream.

For me some of the cover art was just wrong...or missing...or... For instance the Beatles Anthology set consists of six discs totaling three volumes with three unique covers per volume. The cover art was correct on "Vol. 1, Disc 1", but "Vol 1, Disc 2" would display the cover art from Vol. 2. Others were worse. I'd "fix" them and eventually they would go back to being wrong again.

Again, more recently though all of my "custom" artwork as well as the ones I've fixed are okay.

Wonder if it has anything to do with the elimination of cover flow in iTunes?

Anyway, hope I haven't jinxed it. 😉

Michel Goldberg wrote:

Unreadable downloaded song !!!!

Hi, everybody : more or less happy users of iTunes Match, <snip>

Wow! That is weird. When I've completely deleted a track or album from my library as well as iTunes Match/iCloud, it seems to disappear right away. Once I upload it again and sync iTunes Match it's available on my iDevices pretty quickly...although I haven't checked immediately...just when I use it in the car later, etc.

Out of curiosity, what kind of file did you use originally and what kbps (128, 256, 320, lossless, etc.)? Since this is your own recording I'm just wondering if there's some odd transcoding issue going on. But if it's the same as other tracks you've created and it's only happening to just this one track I have no explanation.

Have you tried changing the name of the track? No idea if that would help, but in other computer situations I've seen file naming issues resolved that way.

In any case, hope you're able to sort things out. Best of luck and I for one would like to hear how things go.

Thank you,

In fact it was an AAC 256kbts

Coded by iTunes itself.

No problem with the other tunes of the same album.

In fact as I said I tried to removed the concerned file from ITM.

I waited a couple of hours and put it again but as amazing as it seems, ITM did not re uploaded it because the file was still on the cloud !

How long does it take to Apple to erase a File from a server ?

Must I wait longer (a whole day ?).

Regards.

Hmmm...as mentioned, I've deleted files but have re-uploaded them soon after so I've really no idea about the latency between deleting a track in iCloud and when it's actually purged from their servers. My understanding is that iCloud is spread across Apple's sever farms and no doubt the files are redundant in many (all?) for both backup as well as improved streaming/delivery speeds.

It's common in multiple server situations for one to poll another to determine if a matching file exists and if so to replicate it on the missing server using the other server's data and not upload it from the source again. That can save bandwidth as well as interaction time for the user.

So it might take a while for your file(s) to be removed completely. That may require waiting a day or even longer.

Best of luck. Hope you get it sorted out!

Good and techninally advised answer !

THANK YOU.

I'll remove it and wait 2 days.

Thank you.

Oups,

I deleted the song, waited more or less 12 hours.

The song SEEMED erased (number of songs minus one).

But when I put it back, no upload occured (meaning the song was still on Apppe's servers).

ITM is a mess.

I'll wait for Apple ingeneers advices.

For now, I concelled ITM from my idevices ("manuel sync") witch is faster (really) and has no problem.

Wait and see.

<Edited by Host>

Michel Goldberg wrote:

Oups,

I deleted the song, waited more or less 12 hours.

The song SEEMED erased (number of songs minus one).

But when I put it back, no upload occured (meaning the song was still on Apppe's servers).

ITM is a mess.

I'll wait for Apple ingeneers advices.

For now, I concelled ITM from my idevices ("manuel sync") witch is faster (really) and has no problem.

Wait and see.

Aplle deserves a class action for such a bas service !

Don't you agree ?

Regards…

Hmm...I guess ensuring that our files are kept on their servers more than 24 hours after we delete them could be considered a plus or a minus...minus in your case. They'd be criticized either way I should think. Better safe than sorry? Not sure.

Didn't you metinon that you'd wait 2 days? 12 hours vs 48 hours?

Class action? Seems dubious at best. Although I think we'd all agree it's somewhat defective and that many of us have wasted a lot of time trying to resolve the issues, it would be terribly hard to prove that anyone was harmed and/or damaged to the point of deserving restitution other than possibly a refund. Asbestos poisoning, faulty brakes, bridges falling down under us, yes. iTunes Match? Not so much. 😉 Besides things like that wind up paying a few cents on the dollar (if that) with the attorneys being the real beneficiaries. Unless you work for Samsung of course. Ha!

Hope you're able to get your song back up and available. At least you can still enjoy it! Wish I had that kind of talent. 🙂

You are very kind.

If you give me your personnal Mail, I CAN sens you a procedure to download my jazz record.

You are welcome.

<Email Edited by Host>

Sounds good Michel.

FWIW I'd edit your post and remove your email if you still can. Lots of bots looking for such things (not to mention crazies 😮 ) and I bet you already get enough spam. Just sayin'.

Best wishes!

@richsadams

You're bang-on-the-nail there (earlier post)....the only people who would benefit from legal action are the lawyers.

I also think our problems need to be given a little perspective. I too am disappointed that this service doesn't IMO work as described, but let's be honest, the amount it cost me to buy didn't exactly bring me down to my knees financially. It cost me £25 in the UK, which give or take a few cents, is more-or-less the same value in my pocket as the $30 Stateside. Now in the UK that just about buys a couple of large pizzas and large bottle of pop (soda). I'm sure it's the same over the pond. I think people are getting a little over-reactive. No?

I would prefer to pay really more if it worked ! Like Spotify for instance.