If this has previously been discussed please forgive me – I have had a look but cannot find my exact problem.
To start from the beginning – I own a 10 year old iMac which is perfectly serviceable (I think) and good enough for my purposes. However my iTunes has completely screwed up. I have spoken to Apple who were not much good so I’ve decided to lay my problems at the door of The Massive.
I started subscribing to Apple Music in June 2019 and I think this may have been where the problem lies. A lot of my music (and 99% of it is legitimate purchases which I have downloaded from CD to the iMac) is now showing with the cloud symbol – no problem really as I just have to download the music from the Cloud. Herein lies one of the problems as my iMac is a bit old and is still using High Sierra OS and the feature to which they direct me “Sync your iPhone” or whatever it’s called doesn’t appear on my computer.
Every so often there’s a track or an album which Apple has decided that it doesn’t like and I am not allowed to play so I have to download my album yet again. However they have the selfsame album on their bloody store so why can’t I play my totally legal downloaded version ? I have to find their version on the store and download it to my computer. The worst is when I can’t find my original album or it is an album that someone lent me which I have no way of getting again.
Has anyone else had a similar problem and, if so, how did you get round it ? I spent two hours or more on the phone to Apple last week and it hasn’t really helped and I’m baffled.
Apple Music/iTunes
by 21 Comments
Sorry, I don’t Mac so I can’t help beyond my usual quip.
It struck me that we should do iTunes as a subject for an Afterwiki.
I really have no idea why anyone bothers with iTunes anymore. Buy a fi**
yebbut, he has a Mac and has his music on iTunes. I really can’t see the point of these comments.
So he can’t buy a fi** then? He’s like stuck with a Mac and iTunes for evermore? It’s worse than I thought. Next you’ll be saying you can’t play vinly
Lodes, if the post had said I’ve had it with this fucking Mac and its shit iTunes -anyone got recommendations for a better bit of kit then fine FiiO away.
Johnny doesn’t appear to have reached that point.
Me, I have the yips about all hard drive storage of music – fire, theft, failure. Having to do back ups. Might as well rely on streaming.
I think I was saying stop dicking around with Macs and iTunes, you know it makes sense.
I had a similar but different issue recently: see my blogger feedback. My point being that just because I tunes have mislaid it, any downloaded files, rips etc should all still be there, and absorbable without wasting disc space duplicating. Apropos all the get rid of macs and iTunes guff, a) I like my MacBook and b)alternatives to iTunes on a Mac are a faff and a pain if you are a ripper of your own cds or have other than Apple downloads. If I had a fio it would be as well, but my iPod still works, if full. I don’t listen to music on my mobile telephone (another Apple branded one, I fear) as I have no need or desire.
I’ve had iTunes on my Mac Mini (well, technically on a SSD hard drive) for several years and I’ve never had any issues with this sort of thing. Can’t you turn the cloud thingy off? What about disabling your wifi connection? Would that help?
I’ve been using iTunes on a Mac or PC since version 2, and also never seen any issues like these.
There’s one golden rule with iTunes – once you’ve added your audio files to the library, don’t move or rename them, or iTunes won’t be able to keep track of them.
In addition if storing on an external drive on a Mac don’t rename that drive either. On a PC there’s another issue with external drives as drive letters can change if other drives are plugged in – the fix here is to use the Disk Management tool to assign a permanent drive letter.
Your one golden rule – I’ve never had a problem like the one you describe. Either I’ve misunderstood your meaning or you’re doing something wrong/ got iTunes set up wrong
If you ripped the music from CD to your Mac, it should still be there regardless of the cloud / Apple Music settings. I can’t remember the exact directory structure of High Sierra, but check in your music directory – under ITunes and then Media – are the music files there ?
If so, turn off the cloud / Apple Music settings and the change the library (under iTunes preferences / advanced) to where your files are – it should reimport all the missing stuff.
Opening a channel into your Mac for Apple to sneak and peek into is a mistake. I’ve manged for years of trouble-free listening by not upgrading iTunes and not using cloud or streaming and not having an Apple (or Amazon – another control freak corporation) account of any description. My Macs have zero interference from the megacorps. Yes, part of this is because I’m a rebel, me, a rugged individualist and stick-it-to-the-man free thinker, but most of it is because I believe that, having bought the kit, the machines, how I use them is my business. Like a record player, or a bookshelf. I expect one day my happy little fortress of tech will break down, but whatever I replace it with will not include subscribing to money-sucking megacorps. Nothing wrong (or particularly difficult) about backing stuff up to external hard drives. Drag and drop.
Advice – revert to the earliest available iTunes that will work across your devices, don’t open Apple Music, and keep all your files backed up.
Above is the correct answer.
I’ve been using iTunes almost from the beginning, and never had any trouble. But I’ve also never subscribed to any cloud or streaming service – yes, “oh the convenience…!” but I’m perfectly capable to put the music I want to listen to on a playing device (Walkman, iPod, MiniDisc….) without anybody “helping” me.
(You only need the latest versions of iTunes if you’re dependent on synching it with streaming services or the like.)
Whilst I admire you and HP’s “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” attitude I think there is no reason whatsoever to dismiss streaming services. As I understand it HP gets all his requirements from the Eel Market and Fatima is a proper good person what buys everything from strictly legal sources. I have no problem with either approach (the Eel Market served my purpose for many a year considering how much money I had previously invested in records, tapes, CDs et al) but these days I am more or less exclusively a streamer. OK, I have to revert to my “collection” every so often for that bootleg or that rarity but I would estimate that 98.7% of my everyday listening is available simply by me saying “Alexa, play Little Feat Live in Amsterdam and after that I’ll have a bit of Taylor’s new album if you don’t mind”. And she never does mind. I also get to listen “for free” to some of the nonsense recommended on here and then haughtily dismiss it with a “That Riggs fellow is plainly bonkers”.
I know streaming services pay pittances especially to struggling artists but like it or not that’s the way the music cookie has crumbled. The big artistes will always be rich, some obscenely so, but the smaller, more niche acts will in the end adapt and survive.
Which streamer are you on again Lodes ? Tidal ?
Did have Tidal but given I have Amazon Prime and my ears are definitely not what they used to be I find Amazon HD plenty good enough for the majority of my listening
I’ve nothing against streaming, or radio, or whatever (even listening to music on your telephone apparatus), but I stop when someone like Apple or Amazon tries to mix everything up.
And I draw the line when I get messages like “We’ve already got the track you just added to your personal computer in our database, so we’ll delete your version (our algorithm says it’s identical, although it’s 3 minutes longer…) and you can always (well, as long as you’re a subscriber) listen to “our” track.”
I keep my streaming completely separate from my collection. So none of the problems you mention. As I have already admitted these days I access streaming far more than my own “records”.
I do use iTunes on Windows – primarily because I always use iPhones and do let it update but Lodes is right – don’t try to mix it with streaming.
What’s mine is mine. Backup in as many places as you can – you can’t have too many backups
The other thing I forgot to add is turn off automatic sync. Turn off everything you don’t need (and there’s a shitload of that in iTunes). The core functions of storing, accessing, and playing your “records” are still handled well by iTunes. It’s also flexible – you can edit tags and art easily. All the rest – the shit Apple has shoveled onto it since its inception and touts as “upgrades” – I live without, and would junk if I could. But then we can all remember when Hotmail and Skype were simple, non-corporate, intuitive, and fun. The universal tendency to proliferation and complication is seemingly unstoppable. If computer upgrades resulted in spending less time staring at a screen, rather than more, we’d live in a happier place.
Me too. Haven’t updated it for years though they try to get me to on a regular basis.