Once upon a time you dressed so fine, went out to the record store, and bought your albums. Those days are no more, although iTunes wants you to think otherwise. That’s why they added a few new features to add a little bit of that old record store attitude to the boring process of downloading tunes. Introducing iTunes 9.0 – it’s bright, it’s shiny, and it’s kind-of-sort-of new.
The first thing you’ll notice about the new iTunes is the clarity of the new user interface. First, everything is white. The backgrounds are bright and clear and the new iTunes Store carries this UI aesthetic into the shopping experience. The icons are cheery and a little more “open” and friendly.
Photo Gallery by Picturesurf
As for functionality, we’re not looking at much. I haven’t found the Facebook integration yet but I did try the new LPs and was impressed. The LP I bought, Highway 61 Revisted by a young man named Robert Dylan (I think he’s opening for MGMT this year) included three videos and a number of alternate takes of the album material. Was it worth $16.99? Sure. You got the liner notes, written by Mr. Dylan, and a sense that you’re buying something more. Does it replace the LP experience? No. It’s a value add and may not be worth it for some.
Home Sharing essentially turns any computer into an Apple TV with full cross-syncing capabilities, a nice way to share your music with other computers.
Otherwise, we’re looking at a facelift and an a bit more media content in albums. It’s free, it’s available now, and it’s just like Snow Leopard: a few pieces of steak but not much sizzle.
You *like* the new interface? It’s awful! The store is great, but the app itself always looks like it’s not focussed, is way too bright, very Vista/Web 2.0-Shiny and not at all in keeping with the more subtle, grey and beautiful look of (Snow) Leopard. What’s happened to Marble?!
Though iTunes design seems bright and roomy. Actually it does not meet the expectations of iPhone users. The iTunes 9.0 is good but not the best one. Apple could have done more.
I’m still waiting for it to finish installing..
I’ll be up all night at this rate! Thanks for providing a hands-on and good example with Bob Dylan :)
typo/missing words in the first paragraph. “Once upon [a time,]“.
just thought you should know.
thanks. fixed.
I can’t stand the design. The background is blindingly white, and the buttons are over-designed.
Is it 64-bit on Snow Leopard? iTunes was one of the few shipped apps that wasn’t 64-bit.
Nope, though the interface definitely shows a heavier influence of the use of Webkit. I still think they have some UI tweaking to do as it’s impossible to read the “Clean” symbol with a similar color text and background.
It’s faster for me, too, which is good b/c it was frustrating before. I like it. I do wish the grid view had an option to make the background black like before, but meh.
There’s a few features they’ve added that really benefit how I use iTunes. First, in the iPhone sync, they’ve split TV Shows and Movies, and made it so you can sync movies by playlist instead of individually (they also show the movie thumbnails in the individual selection). Also, they only show applicable playlists (IE, only those with the appropriate media type in them) instead of all playlists.
Second, with the smart playlists, they added a sub-choice option, so you’re not stuck to saying “any” or “all” of the criteria alone…you can say “all media type is music and any of the following criteria” which is very handy to me.
The interface is cleaner to me, and these added features really make it easier to manage my iPhone movies (I stick them all in a playlist for each syncing, with a separate one for iPod Touch) as well as my smart playlists.
Also, just noticed with photos in the iPhone sync, you can add by event and face as well as album, so I don’t need to create an album when I have an event that does the same thing.
It’s a bit annoying that you have to have the latest version of safari (4.0.3) installed to be able to use the iTunes-Store in V 9.0. This is what the error message tells me, anyway. I never use safari and usually skip the upgrades. Not really a fan of such enforcements.
Like it…very much
Grid view is broken. Seems to be stuck in Composer sort view. Also can’t adjust the size of the tiles. Genius Mixes looks promising though!
Go to View > Grid View > Show Header. Once selected you’ll see tile size, sort options etc. Seems to be turned off by default, which confused me as well.
For $16.99 I would rather buy a CD + DVD combo. Way too much.
ITUNES 9.0 EATS CUSTOM RINGTONES. BACK UP ALL YOUR .M4R FILES OR YOU’LL BE RECREATING THEM LIKE I HAD TO. THIS S/W IS A REAL PoS.
HI John Biggs..
Thanks John for posting this nice article, currently i am using iTune 8 but after read this fantastic article i think i have to use iTune 9 now and also from my friends i heard good review about iTune 9 but still i am using 8 so thanks for change my mind..
One thing that’s not bright and roomy is my computer’s memory footprint. iTunes 9 added yet more bloated, additional processes that run on start-up and piggishly consume system resources unnecessarily.
I love the new iTunes minus two things:
1. No more shopping cart mode that I can find – used to be under Preferences / Store / Checkout by shopping cart. I preferred this over the alacarte model as I could control my spending more…
2. The new volume control was a little confusing at first.
What a lame waste of time of a “hands-on”. Bright and roomy. Sheesh.
Take your left hand, make and “L” with your left hand, and look in your mirror. There you go.
The share to twitter and facebook, becomes available in a drop down menu option once you purchase an album or song from the Apple Store only.
They fucked up the Grid view with that white crap background.