iTunes 11 iCloud sync simply doesn't work

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Level 1

4 points

iTunes 11 iCloud sync simply doesn't work

Yesterday with most of the world I updated to iTunes 11, as I've been awaiting the new iCloud syncing feature, and not sure I could be more disapointed.

I have multiple macs (all with the same apple account), Apple TV's, iPhones, iPads, and nothing seems to talk to each other.

If I use the Podcast app on the iPhone and iPad, these will happily sync podcasts, this is a feature I was hoping was going to come to iTunes ?

I (incorrectly) assumed that with iTunes 11, I would be able to watch a podcast on my iMac, pause, fire it up on my iPad, pause, continue to watch on my MBP ?

What actually happens is, I start watching on my iMac, the iPad knows nothing of this, and wants to start from the beginning, and again, my MBP has no idea that the podcast has been previously played on any of the other devices ?

Assuming this was a glitch with podcasts....as lets be honest, the Podcast app was horrible when first released, so I decided to try with a TV program...one I got free from iTunes during last years '12 days of Christmas promotion'. On my iMac, I maked the episode as unwatched.....went to my MBP, clicked on TV, changed the filter to unwatched......and waited.....and waited, and waited.....nothing.

I then for a sanity check, restarted the MBP, Click the 'Update iTunes Match' (it was a long shot), click the refresh button....nothing!

Went to 'Videos' on my iPhone expecting to at least see the Doctor Who episode as an unwatched TV show....again nothing!, tried on the iPad, even fired up my Mac Mini.......guess what, nothing!

Please please please somebody tell me I'm being a complete muppet and I need to switch on/off something, and this isn't the quality of releases we can expect from Apple in the future.

Thanks in advance

Darren

Posted on Nov 30, 2012 1:04 AM

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Answer 1

Nov 30, 2012 2:01 AM in response to Darren5120

Go to iTunes Preferences > Store

Turn on the 'Sync playback infomationacross device' option (see below).

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Answer 2

Darren5120 Author

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4 points

Nov 30, 2012 2:06 AM in response to Ian Parkinson

Thanks for the response Ian, however that's already set. Does this work on yours ?

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Answer 3

Nov 30, 2012 2:06 AM in response to Darren5120

Yes it appears to work for me.

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Answer 4

Darren5120 Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 30, 2012 2:07 AM in response to Ian Parkinson

For all TV, Movies, Podcasts etc ?

Which devices are you syncing with please ?

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Answer 5

Nov 30, 2012 2:07 AM in response to Darren5120

Only tried with a TV show on iPad.

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Answer 6

Darren5120 Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 30, 2012 2:08 AM in response to Ian Parkinson

Ah.....ok.

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Answer 7

Darren5120 Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 30, 2012 2:44 AM in response to Darren5120

Just to add a little weight to this.

I created the following smart playlist and tagged a few TV episodes and unwatched

The playlist synced on my MacMini and iMac via iTunes fine, however when I view the playlist on the 2 different machines, I get different results.

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Answer 8

Nov 30, 2012 8:12 AM in response to Darren5120

I've been trying all morning to get my podcasts to sync between my iPhone and iTunes to no avail. I even had a phone conversation with an Apple Customer Support rep and she didn't even seem to know there was an iTunes 11, much less how to troubleshoot it.

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Answer 9

Darren5120 Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 30, 2012 8:24 AM in response to SlayrAbraxas

I've tried all day, to no avail either. I think this is the Podcast app 1.0 all over again :s

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Answer 10

noahs

Level 1

19 points

Nov 30, 2012 11:31 AM in response to Darren5120

I unchecked the "sync playback information" checkbox, clicked ok, and then went back in and turned it back on. I now have syncing for TV shows working. Now to try podcasts…

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Answer 11

noahs

Level 1

19 points

Nov 30, 2012 11:36 AM in response to Darren5120

Bingo. Unchecking and rechecking the "sync playback info" box also worked for podcasts, which actually syncs playback position via iCloud now. Though I still am seeing lots of bugs with the podcasts app.

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Answer 12

Darren5120 Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 30, 2012 11:39 AM in response to noahs

Thanks fella, I'll give it a go. :)

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Answer 13

andacey

Level 1

8 points

Nov 30, 2012 7:03 PM in response to noahs

Still doesn't seem to be working for me, I have an iMac, an iPod Touch and a MacBook Pro. I sync my iPod with my iMac and when I switched to the Podcasts App all of my Podcasts showed up fine, great. I upgraded to iTunes 11 on my MacBook Pro but I still don't see any of my podcasts in iTunes on here, even after turning off and turnning back on the sync playback information option.

Is this because I've never had my podcast subscriptions on the MacBook? Seems a little silly that it won't sync them across iCloud if it synced fine to the Podcasts App and that was while I'm still using iTunes 10 on the iMac.

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Answer 14

Darren5120 Author

Level 1

4 points

Nov 30, 2012 11:35 PM in response to andacey

This is exactly the problem I have, I have (for a couple of years now) synced my iPad and iPhones to my MacMini. It seems after noahs trick, podcasts will sync with the MacMini.

The problem is, my MacMini is a machine that just sits in the corner running various web servers and has iTunes on all the times as this feeds my AppleTVs (I have content in the library not purchased from iTunes)

After the iTunes 11 update, I manually subscribed to the same podcasts that were on m iPad, iPhone and MacMini on the assumption that they would sync the play position/play count via the cloud, which it doesn't

After spending some time last night testing, TV and Movies (bought from iTunes) don't seem to sync with my iMac either, however seem to work with my MacMini ?

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Answer 15

andacey

Level 1

8 points

Dec 1, 2012 1:38 PM in response to Darren5120

Yeah, seems to sync fine with my iMac, which had all my subscriptions in there, but won't sync with my MacBook Pro which doesn't have my subscriptions. It'd be nice if I could somehow automatically sync those over instead of having to re-add everything.

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