What are your thoughts on the New iTunes 11?

Drew Reece wrote:

It's unfortunate, but I'll have to avoid iOS 7 too but it really is OK living away from the bleeding edge, you currently loose very little by running iOS 6 & iTunes 10.7.

Boy I hope someone at Apple reads your comment. Shareholders should also know that some folks are NOT upgrading. There was an article yesterday about the lower than expected adoption rate of iOS 7 compared to iOS6:

http://www.macrumors.com/2013/10/18/ios-7-now-on-73-of-devices-but-adoption-rate s-much-slower-than-ios-6/

Could it partially be because people don't want to be forced into iTunes 11? It should be a wake up call to Apple that iTunes 11 needs to be better. Much better.

Drew Reece wrote:

DeepblueELO wrote:

Without Steve Jobs at the helm Apple is losing core values. Apple before: targeted to innovators and the ones who want to change the world. Apple now: Let’s reach the masses. This shows on iTunes 11.

Very sad.

Apple, wake up!

Whilst I dislike iTunes 11 I don't think you are looking back with any kind of accurate perspective.

Steve Jobs was the one who brought about the iMac which removed the floppy disk & only supported the tiny number of USB & Firewire devices (to much consternation at the time). He constantly pushed Apple forwards, which is why we have the iPod, iPhone and iPad. Steve gave us the iPod shuffle with no buttons & the iPod hifi that failed to take off.

iTools, .Mac, MobileMe, Mac OS, FCP… were 'reworked' or rebuilt entirely every few years under his tenure, Apple always do this, they often drop support for older devices too. For example, no iCloud on 10.6 and they killed off MobileMe that worked on 10.6 at the same time.

Want the latest iLife or iWork? - 10.7 or better required, but Apple don't even sell the last Mac OS on the App Store anymore. Try buying an older copy of Pages or Garageband from Apple, you'll need to find a boxed copy on Amazon.

The innovation Apple brings to it's products is about refining the experience to be better than the existing products. Tablet PC's, smart phones, MP3 players all existed before Apple 'innovated' them into popular usage.

Apple iterate, refine and improve products to bring them to the masses, it was never about selling to a minority (with the exception of pro products, which are niche by definition).

Your "change the world" consumer has never existed in my eyes, I think you are miss-remembering Jobs's recruitment question to John Scully (Do you want to sell sugar water or change the world?).

I'm not sure if there has ever been "innovative visuals" in iTunes, coverflow was made by an external company that Apple purchased and others had made music visualizers before iTunes existed.

iTunes 11 is merely another example of Apple tearing the past down in the hopes of making something better. Personally I'm willing to wait a few versions in the hope it will suit me better otherwise I'll move on to another application.

It's unfortunate, but I'll have to avoid iOS 7 too but it really is OK living away from the bleeding edge, you currently loose very little by running iOS 6 & iTunes 10.7.

The skill is defining the wheat and discarding the chaff. If you don't have someone creative with vision at the helm then you risk all at the hands of a bean counter.

Apple seriously needs to re-evaluate its stance in the corporate world. Do they appease the shareholders or appeal to the creatives?

Where Apple seems to fail is in the realisation it is creativity that got the brand where it is. The 'halo' effect from that reputation is why Apple was able to drag itself from the abyss.

To go mainstream without a creative leader stifles innovation. It's demonstrable in the way Apple has failed with iTunes.

Jonny Ive needs to step up to the plate. It needs a Brit to haul Apple back to where it should be.

Drew Reece,

I agree with most of what you have very well said.

I just which they had not torn down the bridge, until they had built a better one. Removing basic features and ruining usablility are not the way to move forward.

And while those that are having problems syncing, maybe in the minority, but without syncing, for most it makes their iDevices just very expensive bricks.

I have to admit that this is the first time that in 15 years I have been bitten by one of the major bugs. An Apple Senior Advisor suggested I should delete the iTunes Library.itl and create a new one. Unfortunately, I have 230 GB of media, and I would have to import every single song, audiobook, etcetera, one at a time, and then delete the duplicates.

I'm not going to whine, or say I'll never buy another Apple product. I have spent time working with the Senior Advisor, an Audible tech, and an Overdrive tech, to narrow down the problem and look for a solution.

MacinNW_Brent wrote:

I have to admit that this is the first time that in 15 years I have been bitten by one of the major bugs. An Apple Senior Advisor suggested I should delete the iTunes Library.itl and create a new one. Unfortunately, I have 230 GB of media, and I would have to import every single song, audiobook, etcetera, one at a time, and then delete the duplicates.

What's wrong with File > Add folder to library? However rebuilding would lose ratings, play counts, playlists & date added info. All but the last can be saved and restored if you really need to go down that route...

If your media folder contains no duplicates now, rebuilding the library won't introduce any.

tt2

Playlists, date added, ratings etc are also stored in the 'iTunes Library.xml' alongside the 'iTunes Library.itl'. Open it in a text editor that can read big files like 'Sublime Text 2' mine is over 800000 lines or 33 MB (TextEdit may choke).

I believe that if the main 'Library.itl' DB is corrupted you can delete it which causes iTunes to rebuild the library.itl from the library.xml on next launch. I have a vague memory of being able to import the xml file itself to bring in the files listed inside it too. There must be more info on Apple's support site or within MacOSXHints.com. I think the .xml is a mirror of the library so that other apps can browse the iTunes content without the DB access, e.g. Garageband & iMovie.

I'd recommend testing this on a backup away from your main system or user account, the senior advisor may not have explained what would happen clearly enough.

There may also be backups of previous library.itl's within the music folder. They get created when iTunes does a major DB update, so they could be very out of date. See what you have in ~/Music/iTunes/Previous iTunes Libraries/

I don't know how much of this fits with iTunes 11, I'd hope the main repair & DB features are still the same.

TurningTest2 & Drew Reece,

I created a second iTunes library, but when I the Apple Senior Advisor was directing me to redownload the stuff with a cloud icon, and since the bulk of the media was not from the iTunes Store, meant I had to import the rest, and then remove the duplicates.

You might be correct that there is a better way, and maybe we were focused in the wrong direction.

My iTunes Library.itl is only 5.6 MB, but I have no idea how to read the gibberish, nor what went wrong so that it will not sync DRM restricted audiobooks any more, or how to correct it.

The .xml file while similar is different from the .itl from what I have read in Apple Support. They did mention building a new itl from the xml, but did not say how.

Either way, I am not alone with this problem. There are other, how many I don't know. I have a workaround, so I can do more research and wait a bit longer.

Brent

The .xml file is provided for 3rd party support. It lists your media and playlists. It is also updated (as is the .itl) with almost every action in iTunes. If you create a new empty .itl you can import the .xml file (or a backup) from the other library and it should rebuild most of content within the libray. If you have the xml and a "corrupt", .itl file, e.g a zero length file of the correct name. iTunes should offer to rebuild the .itl from the .xml automatically and this process may restore more of the data than importing the .xml file normally does. Cant' say I've ever needed to put it to the test.

Other options are to step back through the archive of .itl files in Time Machine or the Previous iTunes Libraries folder (see Empty/corrupt library after upgrade/crash for the rollback process) until you find one that works and has most of your content listed, then scan the media folder for new or missing content to make the two consistent with each other. See Music Folder Files Not Added and Super Remove Dead Tracks for tools to help.

.

tt2

A warning to those who have held off, but were thinking of upgrading to Mavericks (with iTunes 11 included) - some users with large libraries complain that iTunes 11.1.11 (11) now beachballs indefinitely when quitting, failing to save changes to the music library each time.

Some of us who use podcasts also can't successfully sync an iPhone anymore without power cycling the iPhone before each sync if we've used the Podcast app since the last power cycle.

Consider waiting for someone to post instructions on how to "down"grade to iTunes 10 under Mavericks, or for someone to confirm that there are fixes or workarounds. Or if you decide to tread, make very sure you have a full system backup.

McGroarty wrote:

A warning to those who have held off, but were thinking of upgrading to Mavericks (with iTunes 11 included) - some users with large libraries complain that iTunes 11.1.11 (11) now beachballs indefinitely when quitting, failing to save changes to the music library each time.

The current version of iTunes (installed today on my MacBook Pro -- but I did not install Mavericks because I have pro apps that I need to make a living with, so I always wait until braver professional users report that all is well, ususaly after several months) is 11.1.2 (31). I just did a sync with both an iPhone 5 (iOS 7) and iPad 1 (iOS 5). Each sync was done via wi-fi. No issues, although there was a temporary beachball when iTunes was looking for the iPad, whch was sleeping. The beachball eventually went away.

Stuff happens with new software installs, particularly a new OS, but "some users" will always have issues with any software, even if that's a dozen people out of a million. That shouldn't stop anyone from updating.

That said, I will not be upgrading my Mac Mini to Mavericks until some update of Cover Flow is incorporated into iTunes. (It's still running iTunes 10.) I will install Mavericks on my MacBook Pro once it has been confirmed that Final Cut, Avid and Adobe CC run OK on it.

Mark Block wrote:

....I will not be upgrading my Mac Mini to Mavericks until some update of Cover Flow is incorporated into iTunes. (It's still running iTunes 10.)

I'm right there with ya. Let me count the ways that I'm stuck in limbo because iTunes 11 is lacking:

1. No updating my iPad Mini 1 to iOS7

2. No buying a retina iPad Mini (was really looking forward to that too)

3. No updating my iMac to Mavericks

Some readers might think that's crazy, but my favorite thing to do is to spend time in iTunes 10.7 with my music collection...with glorious artwork! In iTunes 11 the joy is gone. I'll give up all those updated goodies above to continue with what I have (and hope every day Apple brings iTunes back to greatness).

Several hours later, iTunes 11.1.2 (32) has appeared. Folks in the other forum are reporting success on quitting iTunes now, although syncing results are mixed.

McGroarty wrote:

Several hours later, iTunes 11.1.2 (32) has appeared. Folks in the other forum are reporting success on quitting iTunes now, although syncing results are mixed.

Well that sums up the iTunes 11 experience right there. People are just happy they're able to quit out of it! 👿

I'm still on iTunes 10.7 also and won't upgrade to Mavericks because I know it'll install iTunes 11. So I lose updated iPhoto & iMovie app also. They need Mavericks to run and I'm not attempting to update them because if I do, they will no longer run on Mountain Lion don't care! Need my iTunes 10.7

abombaci wrote:

I'm still on iTunes 10.7 also and won't upgrade to Mavericks because I know it'll install iTunes 11. So I lose updated iPhoto & iMovie app also. They need Mavericks to run and I'm not attempting to update them because if I do, they will no longer run on Mountain Lion don't care! Need my iTunes 10.7

If you can, please send your message directly to Apple's feedback page. It might be the only way they hear about it...

http://www.apple.com/feedback/itunesapp.html

I upgraded to Mavericks and hit the iTunes 11 problem. I use iTunes 7.2, the last one that is still useful for me (sorting worked properly). All I had to do is change the permissions on iTunes.app to allow Everyone instead of System (forgot which line it was but only one had System) and I was able to remove 11 and reinstall 7.2. I don't have an iPhone, so this may not work if you need iOS 7, but if you stay behind the upgrade curve, you can install the iTunes you prefer.