i can't download a purchased cd from my iMac to my iPhone 5. an error message comes up that says iTunes doesn't recognize the iPhone.

It is because you have too old a copy of iTunes. The latest version is 12.6.1. iOS 10.3.2 requires the newest version of iTunes, which requires OS X 10.9.5 or above on the Mac. Your OS X version is too old to support the latest version of iTunes. That is why you cannot get the media to your iPhone. You need to update OS X and then update iTunes.

Is the app for your iPhone or your Mac? If the app was designed for the Mac it will not run on your phone and vice versa. The reason for this is both devices use different operating system, the Mac uses Mac OS (currently 10.12.5) and the other uses IOS (currently 10.3.2).

If I'm understanding what you have written correctly, you purchased a CD, music I'm guessing, and you downloaded it to iTunes on the iMac. Now you are trying to sync it to the iPhone? Do I have this correct? If so, depending on what version of iOS you have on the iPhone, it may be that you need a later version of iTunes on the computer. Looking at the profile you show older versions of OS X, and the latest version of iTunes is 12.6.1, which requires OS X 10.9.5 or above to run. You need to check all these things.

I am guessing that you are posibly running into DRM/copyright issues; even though you paid for the CD, the music industry does not like or allow you to copy/rip music from a CD. I've had CDs that have protections built in; as well, some apps such as Roxio Toast refuse to function if you are trying to copy a commercial CD.

winnie64 wrote:

thanks for your help. so there is no way to get the music on my iMac into the cloud??

Nope, not unless you update your devices.

Do you have a reason for not wanting to update your devices?

Where are you getting this message?

With your iPhone connected via USB launch iTunes and if you get a message tell iTunes to trust the iPhone.

Actually 10.3.2 is the current iOS. Please open iTunes and report the exact version number, as well as report the exact version number of OS X that you have.