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jojoba

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Dec 9, 2011
1,584
21
What the title says, really.

More generally, I'm about to upgrade my very slow, cheap and buggy smart phone, and up until recently I was certain I would get a SG3. Now I'm having last minute doubts due to ecosystem integration with my iPad and Air so I'm also considering the iPhone, possibly a second hand 4s...
 

iphonefan74

macrumors regular
Sep 15, 2012
135
0
What the title says, really.

More generally, I'm about to upgrade my very slow, cheap and buggy smart phone, and up until recently I was certain I would get a SG3. Now I'm having last minute doubts due to ecosystem integration with my iPad and Air so I'm also considering the iPhone, possibly a second hand 4s...

Its as simple as plugging the SIII into your computer, opening the music or videos folder then dragging and dropping songs or videos from iTunes. They dont have to be MP3 or MOV files either. If you already have an iPad and an Air, why do you need and iPhone?
 

paulsalter

macrumors 68000
Aug 10, 2008
1,622
0
UK
I use an app called isyncr

automatically syncs music/movies at a set time of the day or manual (movies need to be ones you have added, itunes drm ones wont work)

also supports playcounts/last played date/time

I have mine set to auto sync while I have my evening meal, works perfectly
 

Wrathwitch

macrumors 65816
Dec 4, 2009
1,303
55
I use an app called isyncr

automatically syncs music/movies at a set time of the day or manual (movies need to be ones you have added, itunes drm ones wont work)

also supports playcounts/last played date/time

I have mine set to auto sync while I have my evening meal, works perfectly

Same. The only thing it won't transfer is DRM protected files (I believe its called dRM). Either way, protected files like movies.
 

blackhand1001

macrumors 68030
Jan 6, 2009
2,600
37
Its pretty straightforward. You can either drag and drop them onto the phone, use isyncr as others mentioned or use a whole bunch of other programs on the play store. You also could use google play music and upload your itunes library online.
 

jojoba

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Dec 9, 2011
1,584
21
Its pretty straightforward. You can either drag and drop them onto the phone, use isyncr as others mentioned or use a whole bunch of other programs on the play store. You also could use google play music and upload your itunes library online.

Great, drag and drop will probably be sufficient for me, I was just wanted to know if there were any compatibility issues.

You can, if you know how.

I know, but I prefer to have a dedicated phone. Much more convenient to me in a whole lot of different ways.
 

maflynn

macrumors Haswell
May 3, 2009
73,682
43,740
I had issues with transferring my music and videos to my android phone.

The suggestion of dragging the music over isn't quite feasible when you have a fairly large number of playlists and/or songs. I'd rather have an app do that seamlessly.

I've used DoubleTwist in the past but it failed to transfer all of my playlists or music - quite baffling in that it would say it finished but either I'd have a playlist but no music behind it, or vice versa. I will say this was done a couple of years ago on a Droidx and a Nexus One so the software may have improved since I used it.

I had used a another app (whose name now escapes me) that worked better then Doubletwist but both couldn't handle the video because of DRM. The bottom line is if you live within the apple ecosystem there are some extra steps and sacrifices needed to live with an android phone.
 

djarpit

macrumors regular
Jun 9, 2009
160
0
I had issues with transferring my music and videos to my android phone.

The suggestion of dragging the music over isn't quite feasible when you have a fairly large number of playlists and/or songs. I'd rather have an app do that seamlessly.

I've used DoubleTwist in the past but it failed to transfer all of my playlists or music - quite baffling in that it would say it finished but either I'd have a playlist but no music behind it, or vice versa. I will say this was done a couple of years ago on a Droidx and a Nexus One so the software may have improved since I used it.

I had used a another app (whose name now escapes me) that worked better then Doubletwist but both couldn't handle the video because of DRM. The bottom line is if you live within the apple ecosystem there are some extra steps and sacrifices needed to live with an android phone.


Guys be smart and use the cloud capabilities.

GOOGLE PLAY MUSIC.

  1. Get the music manager
  2. tell it where your music is
  3. get a cup of coffee and let it upload to cloud
  4. check on yoru phone and make what ever you want offline avaiable
  5. or just play what u want on phone and let it cache
  6. and Automagically everything is there
 

MRU

macrumors Penryn
Aug 23, 2005
25,370
8,952
a better place
You can use Doubletwist and AirTwist to sync to iTunes with & without wires. AirTwist also supports AirPlay.


You can also just download Samsung's KIES software for mac.
 

djarpit

macrumors regular
Jun 9, 2009
160
0
You can use Doubletwist and AirTwist to sync to iTunes with & without wires. AirTwist also supports AirPlay.


You can also just download Samsung's KIES software for mac.

IMHO you dont need any of that if you have wifi or if you need your all of your library on phone in less than 20 mintues.. which probably can be the case only when you first get the phone...
 

GHDpro

macrumors newbie
Aug 30, 2012
9
2
Netherlands
Actually my experience trying to connect a S3 to a Mac (MBA) was frustrating and disappointing.

First, Samsung Kies software doesn't work (or at least won't install) on Mountain Lion (10.8). There may be workarounds that I haven't tried, but out of the box the software will first trigger Gatekeeper and when you're past that hurdle (by changing Security settings) it will proudly proclaim it "only works on 10.5 to 10.7". Great.

An alternative piece of software called Android File Transfer doesn't work either with the S3 with latest ICS update. So that's out.

That leaves with... nothing! The Mac will not recognize the S3. Period.

Well, you could switch USB mode to "PTP". This is supposed to work (for photos only) and indeed the S3 is recognized by iPhoto and Lightroom. But they don't see any of the photos I took ("0 photos").

In the end the only solutions that worked were AirDroid (sort-of a web interface for your Android device, works alright but having to use a browser isn't terribly convenient) and Droid NAS (which enables access through Wifi, but is unsecured, so be sure to only try this at home).

Of course if you have a Windows PC supposedly things get much easier (I haven't tried this myself yet). But as (I presume) most people on this forum are Mac users I do find it a bit odd so few complain about S3 syncing issues...
 

paulsalter

macrumors 68000
Aug 10, 2008
1,622
0
UK
I do find it a bit odd so few complain about S3 syncing issues...

Not sure if mine is different to the S3

I have the S2 running ICS, Nexus 7 on JB and an older tablet running android 2.3

Because my iPod syncs wirelessly I didn't want to go the wired route for getting syncing working with Android so never tried it (but from what I have read ICS does have the option to mount the device so you can drag/drop, not sure if JB has this)

Apart from DRM's content I have found iTunes/Android syncing almost the same as iTunes/iPod syncing (both do it daily and without me having to do anything to start the sync off)

I did think I was going to get issues syncing, but my MacBook, iPod and Android devices all sync perfectly, couldn't be happier
 
Last edited:

tbayrgs

macrumors 604
Jul 5, 2009
7,467
5,097
Guys be smart and use the cloud capabilities.

GOOGLE PLAY MUSIC.

  1. Get the music manager
  2. tell it where your music is
  3. get a cup of coffee and let it upload to cloud
  4. check on yoru phone and make what ever you want offline avaiable
  5. or just play what u want on phone and let it cache
  6. and Automagically everything is there

I went this route as well and it works great. Any time i added new music to my library, the music manager automatically added it to my Google Music library. Only downside is if you have a limited data plan.
 

aznguyen316

macrumors 68010
Oct 1, 2008
2,001
1
Tampa, FL
I use itunes, thus am using isyncr. It syncs play counts and ratings as well which is huge plus for me. I just sync via playlists.
 

jojoba

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Dec 9, 2011
1,584
21
All this info has been so useful - thanks!!

So, with the exception of GHDpro's post (that sounds totally annoying - I'm also syncing to an Air btw), this doesn't sound like anything that should weigh heavily against a SG3.

So, I think I'm leading towards the SG3...
 

jojoba

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Dec 9, 2011
1,584
21
The google music manager is telling me it's only available in the US :mad: so I'll try the isyncr route now.
 

jojoba

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Dec 9, 2011
1,584
21
So, I'm trying doubletwist, but my Air won't recognise my phone. It doesn't show up under 'devices' in the doubletwist desktop application (or anywhere else, for that matter). My phone, on the other hand, tells me that it is 'connected as a media device' after I plug in the USB.

:confused::confused: ??...
 

jojoba

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Dec 9, 2011
1,584
21
So, this really isn't working for me. I downloaded iSyncr to my Air (and my phone). The installation seemed to go fine. However, when I click on it, or open it with Alfred, it doesn't show up. I tried to reinstall and open it again. Same results. I then went to the applications folder and tried to delete it. I got a message saying it couldn't be sent to the trash because it was open. However, when I go to 'force quit', it is only the finder that shows up, so I can't force quite iSyncr in order to send it to the bin. I can't see it either, even though it says that it is 'open'. Restarting the machine doesn't help.

Another :confused::confused::confused::confused:

:mad::mad:
 
Last edited:

towg

macrumors regular
Jul 9, 2012
244
18
Cardiff
Syncing music (or anything) is a world of pain on the mac. Tried Android File Transfer, iSyncr, and some others I cant remember the name of.

Kies connects to the S3 but hangs when I try to sync my library. You'd think that considering the mac is such a big platform there would be better support.

Its abysmal!
 

paulsalter

macrumors 68000
Aug 10, 2008
1,622
0
UK
So, this really isn't working for me. I downloaded iSyncr to my Air (and my phone). The installation seemed to go fine. However, when I click on it, or open it with Alfred, it doesn't show up. I tried to reinstall and open it again. Same results. I then went to the applications folder and tried to delete it. I got a message saying it couldn't be sent to the trash because it was open. However, when I go to 'force quit', it is only the finder that shows up, so I can't force quite iSyncr in order to send it to the bin. I can't see it either, even though it says that it is 'open'. Restarting the machine doesn't help.

Another :confused::confused::confused::confused:

:mad::mad:

Not sure what Alfred is

if you are going the WiFi route, just load iSyncr on your Mac, you dont need to do anything else with it, it just runs like a service so your Android can see iTunes (you should see an icon in the top menu bar for it)

Then run the iSycnr app on your phone, it should see the mac that has the client installed and then list all your playlists so you can pick which to sync
 

MRU

macrumors Penryn
Aug 23, 2005
25,370
8,952
a better place
Kies connects to the S3 but hangs when I try to sync my library. You'd think that considering the mac is such a big platform there would be better support.

Its abysmal!

+1million


Android syncing software on the mac is piss poor no matter who the manufacturer is. At least Samsung have Kies as poor as it is, HTC have yet to release their mac software for the One series....

Its like all the manufacturers and Google seem to think mac users only use iOS devices.

Google need to take charge and release standardised forward that syncs to ALL android based software handsets.
 
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