This computer is already associated with an Apple ID

So I was trying to look at this from Apples point of view to try and understand why they would do this. I guess if each of my friends came to my house and signed into my iMac and iTunes with their ID, they could then Match against my extensive record collection without ever owning any of the music. Or you could setup a business offering to log people into your music library and Match against a collection. Of sourse they could come to my house with their laptops and connect to my music collection anyway, but this builds in a degree of pain. So ok, I get it, but why not have the 5 device limit for authorizing pcs, the majority of families are statistically less then 5 people. And most people have a partner of some kind. So come on Apple, I want to give you some money and I want my wife to enjoy your wonderful Match service.

The bottom line with all of this is if they don't fix it they push people to Amazon or Google. Like most consumers I will accept DRM media if it doesn't hassle me, but I'm not going to put up with this anymore so I have switched to Amazon for music.

AND...here we are, two years into iTunes Match and still no solution for users with more than 25,000 songs. Laughable, all of it, really.

The problem is they took a DRM restriction designed for a single-user operating system (iOS) and applied it to multi-user operating systems (Mac OS and Windows) without any further thought.It is my hope that the issue is the result of poor program management and not poor legal management. If the word "device" to include computers, and this ridiculous 90 day policy, is written into Apple's legal contracts with content providers, we are all screwed, because no changes to iTunes and the Store can be made without adjusting those contracts. Time and lawyers. On the other hand if it is lazy program management and the same UUID-tied-90-day-one-user DRM used on iOS devices was applied to desktops, there is a glimmer of hope Apple will smarten up and resolve this absurd limitation. There are a dozen of different ways Apple can implement common sense limitation to "excessive sharing" of music, while not crippling functionality and infuriating paying customers.

- Limit computers to 5-10 linked accounts every 90 days (the 1 account is the crux of the problem here)

- Limit each iTunes library on each machine to one user, not just the 'device.'

...etc.

I have this issue too, i have NEVER signed in with another apple ID unless i have a split personality i am unaware of, this is, as another person wrote just another example of poor service. Totally unacceotable, and its my **** music i paid for it, i will listen to it when i want!!! there are plenty of free software packages that do the same as i tunes match, none though that are quite as stupid as itunes match.

P.S. i asked apple for my money back, as i have been having this issue for 2 months and they did.

Apple used to be great for customer services, with great products, now they have crap service (help desk closing at 8pm?!!!) and their products are not worth the money either. But as long as people keep buying them, they will keep on not giving a crap about their customers.

Apple, please HELP! My wife and I have the eaxct same problem! One Brand New MacBook Air. 2 user accounts. 2 Apple Id's. How can we both use Itunes????????????????

Create a ticket in the appropriate apple support section under iTunes. Apple will try and see what the issue really is. In my case (2 users with each separate Apple ID on the same MacBookPro) they reset something in their backend system and it should work now but I did not try it yet. Apparently it is in the iTunes Store terms text which of course everyone read and understands all the legal terms before pressing "accept"...

Point is that the apple support really tries and help you out which is worth mentioning!

Greets,

T

Yes, when this happened to me I contacted Apply iTunes support and they flicked a switch in the background and my Mac was then responding correctly to my Apple ID.

However, this does not solve the fundamental issue. The Mac in our household is the digital hub from which we access our content. This flaw which allows the Mac only to be associated with either my own or my Wife's Apple ID is seriously a pain in the neck. What do Apple want? For me to buy a separate Mac for my wife? Sorry, but no. I've spent a lot of hard-earned cash on Apple products over the years but I'm drawing the line here.

Noz.

Same as nozzer et al.

I went to here

https://getsupport.apple.com/Issues.action

chose a chat session and was dealy with in less than 2 minutes

Basically pasted the error mesage into the chat, and said I'd never used a different ID, but had recently had motherboard replaced by Apple.

He flicked a switch on his end and told me to log out and back in again.

Boom! Problem solved in under 4 minutes start-to-finish.

Excellent service!!

So I just ran into this problem & I am ******* ****** off. Why & how the **** can Apple not fix this problem I download movies from iTunes all the time & can't believe there is almost nothing they can do to reset or fix this problem. I called tech support this last Friday & while I got kept on hold & transferred for so **** long they said I literally gotta wait the 90 days. ********. There has to be something they can do.

If anyone knows how to fix this please let me know

Unfortunately the problem has spanned a few major releases of iTunes and MacOS. The heart of the issue is that apples DRM for match and cloud appears to key off of the hardware irrespective of which user is logged into the computer. This is a design flaw at best, as their systems have been multiuser since the inception of MacOS. The solution many have recommended is calling support to get the clock reset. The real solution would be to have the DRM work similarly to other competing products which take multiuser into account or, sadly, to use other products. I have no interest in calling a support line to get my content to work on my computer the way it was supposed to be designed to do.

The sad fact is this has gone on long enough without a fix that Apple is quietly ignoring (at best) this problem and, as a large company with what is probably considered an "edge use case", unwilling to dedicate the resources to fix an underlying flaw in their design. The realty seems to be that you chose to live with the problem, or go somewhere else because Apple's not going to do a real fix. This isn't meant to bash them, but rather explain why they don't have a lot of motivation to help out a small percentage of their users

I can't really understand this.....still with this stupid limit!

I'm Italian but I live in Spain, I have two apple id's (one for each store) for obvious reasons.....well I can't!

Come on! it's been two years!

I now have the exact same problem. My $2500+ iMac can now only be used with one account!

Myself and four other members of the family had intended on using the iMac (with their own system accounts) to access/backup etc their iTunes libraries.

Basically this means my kids can not use iTunes on our family iMac. I can see whay Apple did this but they are really shooting themselves in the foot with this "feature". The Mac OS is suppose to be this great operating system - which for the most part it is, yet I can not have multiple people use their personal iTunes accounts in their system accounts! This is crazy if you ask me. I have actually written a blog post about this which explains exactly what I am trying to do which should be fine in my opinion -

http://blog.balfes.net/2014/01/03/major-apple-me…th-an-apple-id

I get so mad thinking about it... poeple no more itunes or anything from it, thats the only way to make them change something !!!!

I'm wonding why it would give me the flaw on a file that said I had to delete and then redownload to get the correct version. I got the correct one with apparently a flaw to it. I got an e-mail later saying that they fixed the flaw and that I had to delete it and redownload it to get the "fixed" version and as I go to download it I get this. Shouldn't it give leaneancy to that file in precise? If I already got the fixed one and then deleted it and then tried to download it again it would be fine and understandable.

As a recent convert to Apple Macbook Pro I thought my age had finally rendered me stupid.

I decided to go for iTunes match to free up space on my iPhone. The iTunes library is stored on an aging PC laptop. Over the years I have purchased lots of music and have over 3000 tracks. I was looking forward to having access to them from the new Macbook that my wife bought recently.

Thanks Apple for pushing me towards paying for networked storage and then locking me out of it. Oh well, back to CDs, PC and ripper! Luckily we got the old style Macbook Pro with a superdrive. Is it ok if we both use that, Apple Police?