What has your response been from Windows Users about iTMS

I have heard good things about it from regular computer users.

Now the Windows zealots are all "OMG I WILL NEVER DOWNLOAD THAT THING OMG~ I AM STICKING WITH WINAMP2.0!!!!! $

Well, at my office, we are all stuck on Windows. Really, my coworkers are all Windows users, but a few of them have been looking at my iBook and have a keen interest in Apple. So, when they downloaded iTunes, they immediately shared their library of music without me even mentioning the feature. It was really that easy, and they were very surprised by this capability. So basically we have this huge pool of music we can seamlessly share with each other with a very straight forward application.

They loved it and I pointed out that such an application didn't really exist before on the Windows platform. This was all because of Apple's innovation. I pointed out that this was just a taste of what it's like to be a Mac user. Hopefully this will sell some Macs.

Worked fine for my two PCs at home. My sister loved the Sharing feature because she no longer has to burn CDs when she works on the other PC or setup a Windows Share - it all works so flawlessly.

One of my friends who is using Windows 2003 Server is experiencing major problems with iTunes. Every time he tries to add a bunch of songs to the library the app crashes and takes Windows with it. And for any of you that have used Windows 2003 you know how hard it is to crash that OS (please refrain from the "HOLY **** ITS WINDOWS IT CRASHES 50 TIMES A DAY" comments.). My other friends using Windows XP have not reported any problems.

They were slightly aggravated at the "Organize iTunes folder" option being on by default. Screwed up directory structure quite badly apparently because their songs weren't tagged properly.

Almost everyone I know who tried it likes it, if not loves it.

But, one of my roommates downloaded it, then decided he didn't like it and preferred his WinAMP. Meh. To each his own - even if they are "any DRM is teh EV1L", ogg/vorbis, GNU-yet-still-can't-get-the-hang-of-Linux-and-get-the-balls-to-drop-windows zelots, like my roommate.

A long terms 'doze friend of mine tried it yesterday...

Today he asked me advice on ordering his new Powerbook and asked to use my Ti for a while so he could get used to OS X before it arrived!

I think this could be one of the best moves Apple has made in ages, and will get them a load more business from people who want to use 'the real thing' but were too scared up to now...

And all this in a country where we can't even download music yet!

My closest friend is long time pc user and he loves iTunes - the look, the sharing, the stations. Not a single bad thing to say about it, unlike those bastids at USA Today.

That's just it. Not everyone has to like iTunes, but those who don't like it, generally go back to Winamp.

Windows Media Player is used by some, but it certainly isn't very popular.

And interestingly, Winamp's only encoder in version 5 is for AAC (not MP3), unless you pay extra.

By the way, ogg is supported by iTunes, if you download the QuickTime plug-in for it. You need a fairly fast computer for Ogg on iTunes though.

a fair number of people in my office and at a few other locations I've talked to have downloaded iTunes for Windows and really like it. Both the PC-heads in the next office to mine really quite like it although one of them probably won't use it 'cos it won't talk to his crappy Nomad thingie.

The guy I sit next to is a complete �bergeek and basically refuses even to try it because its got something to do with Apple. Its the same old story as us Mac users berating Microsoft just because its Microsoft without actually trying it.

Even my boss kinda likes it which IMO is a bit of a surprise.

It went onto my machine first thing on Friday morning and has hardly been closed since and its really handy being able to access the 3500+ tracks on the test iMac next door

the people that I know that have Dled it, love it....but say "well i'm going to stay with WMP, its more inside the OS, and simpler"

Now i have a PC...i'll be DAMNED if WMP is easier, i'm STILL trying to figure it out...

anyway, afew of my friends are kinda mad its not for 98 as they don't have 2K or XP...oh well

Well...

I haven't heard any comments from Windows users on iTMS whatsoever. Heck, I haven't even installed the software.

But now that I have a few minutes. I'll tinker with it and let you know what I think.

brb.

I think Gabe likes it: http://www.penny-arcade.com/view.ph...003-10-20&res=l

Hell froze over - upgraded my copy of iTunes.
I may lose the ability to see my music at home when I'm at work. But now I can share with others at work.. and I'm the only mac in a sea of windows and Linux bpxes.

The Linux guys are jealous.. i doubt Apple has any plans for them though..

um. 2 seconds into my evaluation of iTunes I uncovered a glaring oversight.

There is no 'maximize' button for the window. Out of 10 billion available software apps - Apple creates the only one that doesn't offer a functional 'maximize' button. WTF? Reckon I'll grab the bottom corner of the window and carefully drag the window to fill the screen - as best I can. Seems a lot more trouble than merely clicking a button.

Scrolling the iTMS window is laggy. Heck, everything I do has a 1 second delay. Now I see what OSX users have been complaining about Definitely NOT snappy.

Aw, screw it. I'm uninstalling this piece of garbage.

It needs to be better than Kazaa and WinAmp else it isn't an improvement. Unfortunately for Apple, niether Kazaa nor WinAmp needs much improvement.

PS, no I didn't really uninstall iTunes. But I probably won't use it, either. Seems much easier to use and to organize your media than WMP. I don't use WMP, though. If it weren't for the 'music store', there would be no compelling reason to bother with iTunes. There are no groundbreaking features, no improvements over currently available media players - especially in the human interface department.

Good friend of mine downloaded iTunes for Windows and loves it - she ordered an iPod today.

Two of my close friends downloaded, and are both now using it full time. They love it.

Ming

Odd... *zero* lag on my PIII 600 w/XP Pro...

Everyone I've told about it loves it. They all want Macs now, but... too expensive.

One of my Windows-loving friends can't get iTunes installed because of "corrupt .cab files." I tried to help him, but he just gave up.

I have never understood Windows users affinity to windows that take up the whole screen.

However, I find that whenever I am on Windows I like my windows to take up the whole screen. Just doesn't feel like Windows I guess.

WOW.

Did Apple include a hidden installation of the SETI client within iTunes?

CPU usage wanders between 81 and 97%. This is so incredibly inefficient that it defies reasonable explanation. Well, it DOES explain the laggy interface, at least.

Is my Windows box emulating the OSX operating system in order to run iTunes natively? Hey, maybe it's the same iTunes app as Mac users get - the Windows installer merely adds the emulated OSX OS 'layer'

Incredibly bad app, folks. I'm surprised it didn't format my hard drive or something.

I thought Quicktime player was a sluggish and inefficient - but iTunes raises the bar clear up to the stratosphere.

edit: this is on a hotrod 3.8GHz peecee. yikes. Lag means crappy software - no ifs ands or buts.

Spliffdaddy,

The memory usage DROPS with time. People get about 15 MB, which is similar to IE.

Bad download. .cab files are likely the compressed install files.

Spliffdaddy,

The memory usage DROPS with time. People get about 15 MB, which is similar to IE.


Memory usage isn't really an issue. CPU usage, however, is an issue.

iTunes installs with a default process priority of 'normal' and uses 90%+ of available CPU cycles. THAT is a problem.

I'll let iTunes run for a while and see what happens.

Note that I was playing a track when I checked Task Manager. Compare this to WinAmp, which uses approximately 1%-2% of CPU cycles for mp3 playback.

(see updated image above. PS, mem usage dropped from 25MB over several minutes, down to 10MB. CPU usage still unchanged at 90%+ WTF is iTunes doing?)

Somebody please confirm my observation of CPU usage. Maybe it's my particular machine. iTunes seems to work as advertised, though, other than being a resource hog. The sluggishness carries over to ALL open applications - which are competing with iTunes for CPU cycles. Tasks that were instantaneous now have a 3 or 4 second delay. Sorry, guys, this is crap. I wish it weren't so.

update:

I manually lowered the process priority on iTunes.exe from 'normal' to 'below normal'. The result was stuttering mp3 playback. In other words, iTunes NEEDS the clockcycles - it doesn't merely take advantage of 'idle' CPU cycles in order to perform 'bonus' tasks like CDDB lookup or whatnot.

Yeah, I told him to redownload it, and he supposedly did, but I wasn't there in person. Who knows?

Just what are you doing?



This is iTunes on a Celeron 1.4 with XP, playing Weird Al. Memory usage ranges from ~ 1-9%.

Actual conversation with PC loving coworker:

coworker: I downloaded that iTunes.

Me: Yeah? Like it?

coworker: Are the picture and movie programs Apple makes nice like that?

Me: Yeah

coworker: Is it like the rest of the stuff for mac?

Me: Yes.

coworker: Are the iMacs a good computer?

Me: Yes

coworker; Maybe I'll stop over to CompUSA and take a look.

Me: Yes, you should do that.

thank you, Eug!

I was looking for a better explanation than saying that iTunes for Windows sucks.

So let's figure this out.

All I've done so far is install iTunes, reboot, and add a file of mp3s containing about 1700 tracks. I didn't allow iTunes to search for media on my drives. I checked the box that allows for constant sound level volume during playback. All other preferences are factory-preset choices.

AHHHH.

8 minutes later - my Task Manager window looks normal again. CPU usage is down to a steady 3% in iTunes. Geez. What a crippling 8 minute experience that was.

What did I do differently than others?

Frankly I'm shocked that I suffered through the experience without uninstalling iTunes. On a lesser machine it would have been intolerable - and for much, much longer than 8 minutes.

Did it take that long to 'normalize' the volume level of 1700 mp3s??

Maybe there should be a footnote mentioning the possibility of sluggishness until the normalization task is complete. Or better yet, lower the priority of the processes that aren't critical to the app's useability.

Pretty much, Spliff. My mem usage and processor usage shot through the roof "normalizing" my ~4000 song library. I left the computer for about an hour, came back and it was fine. It is now playing over the college network (Apple must have designed this feature JUST for this ), minimized, and is only taking 0-2% processor and using about 11Mb of RAM.

There are a few things about iTunes that bother me: the inability to minimize to the tray (task bar realestate is expensive...), or minimize to Winamp sized bar (ie very very small), the lack of system wide hotkeys (ala Winamp + NowPlaying), the slow startup (~5 seconds for a music player? Winamp takes no time), many Windows GUI-guideline violations, and a few other things. I've sent some suggestions to Apple and am waiting for some 3rd-party plugins to do other things (global hotkeys, writing songs to text files, etc).

My with PC loving friend:

Him: Hey I downloaded Apple's MP3 player you said was good.

Me: oh yeah, you like?

Him: Doesn't play WMA - or am I doing something wrong? None of my music works.

Me: No doesn't support WMA - but it does MP3, AIF and WAV. Even better, it supports AAC which is much better than WMA.

Him: Oh yeah, but I have ripper all my CD's in WMA.

Me: Well - it will save you space if you re-rip them using iTunes and they will sound better.

Him: Meh, I've got too many CD's, WMP9 works well for me. iTunes would be good if it did WMA.

Let him be. WMP is a great mp3 player and organizer, and basically functions like iTunes. It's also less buggy, has more plugins and support for more formats.

OK, last post. I've pretty much ran this into the ground.

I'd have to say that iTunes has a much more understandable interface than WMP. I'm not even close to stupid, yet I gave up trying to organize my media using WMP. I add stuff and it swallows it. Puts it somewhere, I think. Quite often I can never find it again. Don't get me wrong...I've seen WMP in capable hands and it apparently does a great job - according to those that have figured it out, anyway.

Why is it that I can organize my media with iTunes and actually FIND it easily? Either I'm really stupid, or iTunes makes more sense. I choose the latter.

Pretty cool. I went from hating iTunes to liking it. All in the same thread. The 'maximize window' feature would be nice, but once you manually adjust the window size - the iTunes 'maximize' button performs the same function as the, um, real 'maximize' button found in (all) other Windows apps. It's only a pain in the ass one time. After that, it remembers the window size you last set (fullscreen, in my case).

4.5 stars - but I reserve final judgement for later. I haven't made an iTMS purchase yet.


carry on.

(note: self proclaimed anti-Mac troll wastes post #3000 by extolling the virtues of Apple software. Subsequently hangs self)

EDIT: Wow I almost looked like an idiot there... glad you like it Spliffdaddy - i almost responded too quick to your 97% CPU utilization comment.

this prominent windoze user seems to really appreciate apple's efforts ....

prominent windoze user hears about itunes

ROFL

good one!

i for all you peeps that are new...boy did this guy cause uproar in like 2001-2002

but anyway, towards the end more and more of what he said was less troll like

quite bizarre. i watched that clip for the first time in ages, only yesterday, then you go and bring it up

friggin' gypsy mind trick, or what! wanna buy any pegs, daaave?

it still cracks me up every time. even tho' i must have seen it a hundred times.

He's right you know (the windows user). No WMA might keep a lot of people away. Even my CDs at work are ripped in WMA. WMA support would destroy WMP9.

I don't even know how to make WMP9 rip in MP3.

So spliff, roll one up, crank up the volume and check out the visualizer, full screen.

Enjoy!!

NB: there is some way to set favorite sequences using the numeric keypad, but I forget how. On my mac '0' starts the visuals at the beginning (the orange circley things).

Your mileage may vary.

It needs to be said: Apple has come a LONG way since then.

It's becoming increasingly difficult to have any beef with Apple - other than the lack of G5 Powerbooks.

-s*

lol I remember those days. :grin: uproar indeed lol

Him and kelly hogan trashed the place.

There's something very wrong here!

iTunes.exe?
Windows widgets?
Ugly jagged text?

ah-eeee!

That's what was eating up your processor resources. I experienced the same situation when first adding and 'normalizing' about 900 files - my Win2K P4 2.4GHz work box ground to a veritable halt. Once that task was complete, things returned to the version of normalicy I've grown accustomed to with Windows.

If I had loaded 5,000 tracks instead of 1,700 - I might never have liked iTunes. Seriously. Eight minutes is twice as much evaluation time as I usually devote to 'new' applications. There's simply no way I would have struggled through 20 minutes, or God forbid, an HOUR. I don't think anybody would have a favorable opinion of iTunes if they used it during 'sound level normalization'. Heck, try it yourself. I bet the word 'snappy' doesn't come to mind, to say the least. Apple sincerely needs to mention the (temporary) penalty for enabling that 'Sound Check' box. Better still, they could lower the priority of the process that scans the media and sets the average sound level. That would allow most other tasks (those set to normal priority) to override the priority of the 'normalization process' - which would eliminate the sluggishness at the expense of taking longer to 'normalize'. In other words, the negative effects of 'normalization' would be gone - but you would have to wait longer (initially) for the benefits.

Again, iTunes for Windows is very impressive. It HAD to be, really. Even if took forever to create it.

But if I were Apple I would work on that 'normalization' issue. For example, my Sony OpenMG Jukebox software locks the window until sound level normalization is complete. While this seems a worse solution than allowing the user to continue doing other tasks during normalization - it certainly prevents the user from perceiving that the software is slow and laggy.

no no no

It's WinAmp 2.71

Anything more current loses the ability to change the font size manually.

Just to let you know what you're up against...

I have my WinAmp set up to accept voice commands. I can say the name of the song and it plays it. Courtesy of the 'voodoo voice' plug-in (freeware).

I have my WinAmp set up to accept infrared signals from a remote control. Courtesy of 'Win Lirc' plug-in and a $6 Gateway-sourced remote control.

I have my WinAmp set up to accept input from touchpanel monitor. Re-skinned for larger (finger-sized) text, sliders, and buttons.

So I tried it with 4+ GB of files. Several hundred, copied from my DVD MP3 disc to iTunes directory of my Win 2000 P4 1.6.

It took about 45 minutes to copy the files, organize them, and do the sound check.

The machine slowed to a crawl, but I could still surf. 25-99% CPU utilization.

After it finished all that it's using <5 % of CPU time.

I'm tempted to convert my iPod from a Mac one to a Windows iPod. Almost...

Same here. I'm thinking about making my iPod a Windows-based drive. Dealing with XPlay on Windows is a chore. It works, but I keep having to rebuild the iPod database which wipes out my playlists on the iPod (stupid....ever hear of BACKING UP WHAT YOU'RE OVERWRITING?).

I love iTunes, BUT, on XP Pro, when you lock your computer it stops playing. VERY annoying when listening to internet radio.

Mike

I use MacDrive.

My problem is all my music is on a PC, and iTunes Windows doesn't work with a Mac iPod, even with MacDrive. What I do is backup the music to an external drive, and then load the music from my Mac's iTunes.

I keep it Mac because I like using iSync for my contacts (instead of using something like ephod on the PC), and because data transfer on MacDrive XP is better than FAT32 on OS X.

I'm thinking it's only a matter of time before your Mac iPod will work on a Windows peecee. The solution might not come from Apple - but I believe it will come. The number of folks tinkering with iTunes just increased fifty-fold.

Whoa. That freaked me out.

I wish the sound wasnt so flat and hollow with the windows version of iTunes. Alot of people are having this problem, but not everybody, so it's probably some sort of hardware issue.

I cant stand listening to iTunes for more than a half hour with the sound issues, it really makes my ears hurt. If they fixed this problem then iTunes would be my full time player. Until then I'll have to stick with WMP9 and the wonderful iTunes skin for it - which makes the two players virtually identical


Chris