Sep
12
iTunes 7.0 on Windows Review
September 12, 2006 |
Just got a hold of iTunes 7.0 and the first install failed on my Dell 700m laptop. It complained that someting or other quicktime was missing… not a good beginning. I will post updates as I get further into the install - if I do.
Second round - now it opens a Windows Installer window, apparently telling me what my command-line options are. Weird, but it looks as if the install is proceeding in another window.
The installer now gives you the option to install Apple Update - which is not further explained, but I assume it is a replacement for the iPod software updates which are now automated. That would be nice, I guess, though I can see that people using non-apple tools might get cut out because of this.
The install does take a while, but no longer than any other iTunes intall I have done on this machine.
And then it asks me to restart the machine… so I will do that and be back later.
Afer reboot, it seems as if iTunes a somewhat flashier logo now. The regular license agreement pops up and is not read but accepted as usual.
Welcome to iTunes - the (new?) iTunes Setup Assistant has a few questions for me - do I want it for find music files in my My Music folder? Do I want to convert my unprotected WMA files into AAC? I say yes to both - why the hell not - I don’t have WMA files anyway.
Do I want my folder to be organized? No (default).
Here is the cool one - iTunes infroms me that it can now download Album Art if I have an iTunes Store account (I do).
And finally, do I want to go to the store, or to my library. The store is set as the default, of course.
The redesigned interface looks very clean. It is now grouped by Music, Movies, TV SHows and Podcasts. It also tell you how many new podcasts you have waiting for you.
The store also has a cleaner interface now, with Movies obviouslt being the new entry here, as well as iPod Games (such as Mini Gold, Tetris and Pac-Man). You can buy all the games (9 in total) for $44. A bit of a hefty price, I think.
While I am browsing through the store, iTunes is going through my collection to see gather ‘gapless playback infromation.’
Interestingly, a lot of podcasts I used to subscribe to but don’t anymore started showing up again now - maybe because I allowed iTunes to search through my My Music folder where they used to be. How does iTunes know they are podcasts, though?
I would like it to not bug me about the MiniStore at the bottom of the screen - it keeps asking me if I want to turn it on, but doesn’t give me the option to turn it off. Annoying.
Movies are now played in a seperate window and open a lot faster than before and the controls are now blended into the video.
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lol, On my mac I had iTunes 6 running downloaded, clicked install told me to close iTunes 6, closed it. done then loaded up iTunes from dock = Done no restart either. Apple don’t port their software to Windows Very well.
Good for you jamie
man this version seems so much slower on my machine, it seems to be bloated and i dont really see how it is better, other than the album art (no big deal to me, as i already manually add these with tag&rename before i add to library). i think if it does not slow up, then i am going back to the older version…really alot slower, anyone else seeing this? i am usually all over anything new from itunes as usually it is some improvement.
Thanks
specs:
Abit KV8-MAX3
Athlon XP 3000+
1GB Shared Ram
I had those same Quicktime errors when I tried to install iTunes 6.0 and afterward nothing Quicktime related worked properly (and still doesn’t) I had to completely wipe my computer and restore it to a point before I installed iTunes (NEVER EVER use Window’s restore utility, it WILL F’up your computer).
Plain and simple Apple’s programmers suck. Just look at the horrible database design of the iTunes and iPod databases if you doubt me.
just so you know, the mini store can be turned off by going to View > Hide mini store.
hope that helps
iTunes installed perfectly on my centrino laptop. The software does seem horribly bloated though, it looks cool but it doesn’t seem to play back music as well even. I’m thinking of going back to 6 if it doesn’t clear up.
iTunes 7 installed perfectly on my P4 with 1Gb of RAM. The “gapless playback” scan puzzled me though — it didn’t seem to have any effect on my library and playback of some albums like “The Wall” by Pink Floyd which plays back from my iPod with gaps between tracks. Since I just installed v7 this morning, I’ll assume that I’m either not using iTunes correctly, or that those features are not working correctly yet. Dunno, I’m still a bit puzzled and wondering if v7 is really going to be something I’m going to like using. My podcast updates aren’t working either for some reason; hopefully that’s temporary. Hmmm…
I had version itunes 6.0. It worked fine. I installed 7.0 and the program screwed up all of my songs. I have to listen to them all at full volume for them to sound semi-normal. Otherwise the songs sound scratchy and distorted. The worst part is that when I deleted 7.0 and tried to re-install 6.0 it told me that 6.0 would no longer work because the format of the songs had been altered and were no longer 6.0 compatible. awesome. sweet. I hate apple.