Can't Sync Playlists Since Turning on iTunes Match

Sorry for the late response.

My experience is:

1. iTunes Match does take a long time to propagate, or cycle through everything.

2. If you want control back, you don't need to unsubscribe, just turn it off on your phone or device.

3. It doesn't synch everything. It's not like just uploading everything to a purchased cloud space. It's a complicated license mess that's fantastic when it fits, they supply songs without uploading, but if your library includes things that don't fit, there is no "user space" to fill the gap. It's easy because they have licenses to cloud stuff that fits the mold.

Playlists that include podcasts, iTunes U, or "non iCloud approved" tracks wreak havoc since enabling iCloud disables numerous user manual synching controls.

For example, I can still synch iTunes U playlists, but since I have iTunes music match emabled those playlists don't exist on phone after synching.

As of 20121207 7:44pm. I don't mind this being fixed and proven wrong though.

I dig iTunes Match, but do hate the other user manual controls being disabled when enabled.

Can't they let user manually synch playlists still synch and show up?

I don't care if they cloud this or that, bat taking the ability to manually synch a simple playlist ***** hard and makes the service undesirable to many.

Sorry. I see you turned off iTunes Match on your device.

Once you do that, have you hard resettled your phone and rebooted computer?

Sorry, yes, sometimes you have to do that now..,

Thanks for the help netsoup. I got through it, but not in time for the xmas party. Oh well. It just seems bizarre to have to re download so much data from the icloud and not be able to just transfer a local copy from one device to another.

Submit your suggestions to Apple.com/feedback. They do listen and if they can find a way to implement it, they generally will.

The challenge with mixing Cloud and Local syncing is managing duplication. For instance, you have a playlist that has 20 songs from 15 of your favorite albums and you sync that via iCloud/iTunes Match. Second, you have iTunes locally sync those same FULL 15 albums. Lets assume each album has 10 songs for simplicity. The goal would to only end up with 150 songs on your device, not 170.

Then you buy a 16th album from iTunes and it automatically downloads to your device and iTunes library. You add a 21st song to the playlist in iCloud and then also mark the album to stay sync'd using your iTunes local sync.

Today, although you can only choose between iTunes Match vs local iTunes on a computer, you can download from iTunes Store and sync from another source (ie iTunes Match OR local iTunes). When you do this, iTunes locally will sync the songs/album AGAIN to your device. Even though you already have a copy on your device, its from iTunes Store directly and iTunes locally does not know the difference between the copy it has and the copy on your phone. So guess what? You end up with 2 of every song on that album. 😟 I turned off automatically downloading music to my iPhone and only buy from iTunes now and sync. I go to play the album and I get 2 of each track and it blows when you want to just listen straight through of a continiously mixed DJ set album.

The Apple way is to make this simple and "just work." So given the current way downloading from iTunes Store vs local sync... there is a long way to go before iTunes Match and local iTunes Libraries can work together well on the same device. So the more people that plant the suggestion to get this straightened out on multiple fronts, maybe the higher on their list it will get. 🙂

It does not just work though. I would not rationalize or make excuses for them.

It's not that complicated. When I disabled iTunes Match apple wiped out my entire device. It's not their library, it's mine. The mechanics of iTunes Match is iTunes allows you to download their copy of your music, but even though I have both local copies on my computer it is easily able to tell the difference. If I delete it from my computer it asks if I also want to delete the cloud version.

This is no grand design to "untether" me from my computer. I still synch and backup via iTunes. It is just a poorly implemented, half backed design in some respects like playlist management and allowing you to synch or download via cloud. It takes too much control away for now and needs to be fixed or at the very least I would not rationalize for them. It is fantastic in many ways though.

Before iTunes Match, you could not sync your iOS device with more than 1 library. After iTunes Match, its the same rule. These are things you and I have already hashed out. Lets not repeat them.

Yes - iTunes and iTunes Match stay in sync. But right now your iOS device only acts as a window into iCloud or a subset of your iTunes Computer library. Just depends on which method you use. If you tried to keep the window and the subset aware of each other on the iOS device, then its going to be a complex mess for the user. The average Apple User does not want complexity. They want it to just work.

Every software solution has limitations. iTunes has alot of flexibility if you are willing to be flexible. If you are not willing to be flexible, then I am afraid you need to examine who is the one with the limitations.

Ok. It's simple. I know there is advantages to iTunes Match but lengthy explanations of "why it's like this" are just excuses and rationalization a sometimes. iTunes Match has advantages, no arguement. It also has flaws and bugs.

If you can't even synch a playlist manually or lose access to anything not itunes match approved it's not "protecting us from complexity". Songs are ID when loaded and its really not all that hard to let you have some control and manually synch without duplicating. Its a heavy hand forcing you to only use their cloud. Only being able to synch one computer or library and wiping your device clean any time you use another pc or toggle cloud has always been a self imposedlimitation of apple iPod/iPhone, other devices and platforms let you actually use multiple computers or even copy your music back to other computers. Apples heavy hand at control is a drawback sometimes, especially when it doesn't "just work".

DjChad, Maybe you can help me. Yesterday I posted the subject purchassed music on the itunes for mac board. I have no reolys yet. right now it is on page 6. Since itunes 11 came out it is hit & miss when I purchase music from the itunes store.Some times the music goes into my library like it should but other times my music does not go in my library but is going to the cloud. I then go to the itynes store, click purchassed music on the right hand side, look for what I just bought & click the cloud icon & then the music is downloaded to my library. Spoke to apple support yesterday but they are not aware of this & were no help but said they will send a report to engineering. I really think it might just be a bug with itunes11 but I am not sure. At least I figured out how to get my just bought purchassed music in my library if it is not their but it is not suppossed to work like this. Can you help or confirm that it is a bug.

Netsoup - Have you narrowed down why the files are NOT iTunes Match compatible? Have you tried clicking on the music file(s) in your library and clicking File, Create New Version (This is the method to get to it in the new iTunes 11, I think the option is under something else in iTunes 10). Maybe that would make the file compatible with iTunes Match and therefore upload the file? That wont overcome if its over the duration limit (60 minutes, I think?)

Also, I will think how I want about Apple, just like you will. If you think have a better solution somewhere else, then go blow up their forums. Sell your Apple device. Its your money. Go spend it one something that will make you happy. If you just want to drag and drop files to an SD card... then get any of the Android phones, media players, or tablets. Go use Google Play for cloud storage.

Before you do so, you shoud look at the files that wont sync to iTunes Match and jot down the length, encoding, etc... and determine if your new music player will play them. That way you are not back to square one. I wish you had provided some details on the files. Maybe someone on this forum could have helped you.

But I guess its not help you seek. You want the forum to rally behind you and tell Apple how wrong they are to not fix this "issue"

Here's the deal. I want help and you can't give it, which is OK. It's OK to be wrong, and it's OK to be unable to help.

It doesn't matter why the cloud rejects certain tracks. It's actually besides the point. There's a fine line between fan and fanaticism, and having to rationalize why Apple or anyone else is right all the time and people are "just holding it wrong", whether they are or not is it.

This is about synching playists. iTunes match deliberatly disables the ability to do so. You do realize that itunes match actually replaces some of your library with "clean" versions sometimes, and some things they're just not licensed to upload, etc. You're not dumb. What I don't need is someone rationalizing why Apple is always right. I'm already a fan. I chose them for a reason. Rationalizing why they're always right or people are just wrong for actually wanting to synch playlists too instead of just only restricting themselves to what apple cloud approves once turning this on actually makes them worse, not better. I want them to succeed...

Hi Ernie,

There are lots of bug fixes, some related to itunes match coming with ios6.1 after the holidays.

One of them is bringing back easier ability to download or delete individual songs on your device again. http://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/138ym6/ios_61b2_brings_back_itunes_match_ individual_song/

http://forums.macrumors.com/archive/index.php/252525252520piarco%20/t-1488485.ht ml

I know apple is listening and monitoring their forums, which is why i refuse to rationalize the bugs away. They monitor trends to actually figure out what is just affecting a few and what are real issues. Since itunes match gives matching ids to keep track of cloud stuff once you upload, they can easily let you manually synch again without dups, and you can actually synch your real tracks if they allow. I for one am sick of redownloading a thousand tracks (a fraction of my library) every time I toggle itunes match, and it hits their servers too they know since it's their servers I need to redownload from every time I turn itunes match back on, and I don't have unlimited data or wifi all the time. My experience with djchad is nothing's a bug.

I am unsubscribing because I can't deal with fanaticsm though, and djchad probably can help people more on his own than with me challanging every rationalization. Good luck all!!

Netsoup, Waste of space on this page. I am not wrong about anything I have said

But then again with brilliance such as yours, you'll probably just develop an app for yourself to fix this 'simple' problem you've found with Apple's solution. Oh that is right you don't really know anything at all.

Thanks for the info netsoup. Hope the update fixes all the bugs

Sure thing. Sorry still here, turned off emails but was still here doing research.

Others are letting apple know letting us just select to "force" a synch will also fix the issue of some tracks being replaced with clean versions.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3498956?start=105&tstart=0

Two birds one stone apple. Just letting us "push" a synch to the cloud or at least our own device will make itunes match soooo much more attractive. I'm not going to android just yet for lots of reasons, so I hope you know I'm coming from the right place here... And djchad, if you know apple you know developers are only allowed access to certain apis...

I agree! I can sync photo albums but i cant sync playlists!?! Until the whole world is 3G/4G and/or wifi this isn't working for me. I work in isolated areas and don't always access to the internet. Also I encounter download limitations/caps so that doesnt work either. If I wanted to stream all my music I would probably save a lot of money and just stream from the myriad radio stations or music services available! To add insult to injury I PAID for this! I suppose I should have had my team of lawyers read the fine print and my tech dept review it as well!