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is it just me or is iTunes Match a super pain to use!?

CrAkD

CrAkD

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Feb 15, 2010
3,180
255
Boston, MA
I bought itunes match as a developer to get the extra 3 months. I turned it on and kind of forgot about it. I decided to clean up my Itunes library. I retagged everything and all of a sudden my iphone is totally screwed up songs wont play every other song is missing. If I update a song in itunes why does it automatically update to itunes match? Instead of create a duplicate I have to deal with. Also why do I have to turn itunes match off to load songs on my iphone? I dont want to have to stream or download any song I want to listen to especially with a 64gb device. Also when you turn itunes match off on the iphone and set itunes to sync NO music itunes match music stays on it! if itunes match is OFF why are there still 120 artists with cloud icons next to them? Sorry for the rant but im just fedup with itunes match I wont be renewing. good riddance.
 
I Love it!!! once its organize its amazing! I have over 9,000+ songs and everything works good except on 3G sine its sooo slow with my sprint account (service)
 
yeah after i upgrade all my songs to 256 im unsubbing from the stupid ****.
It basically downloads the song to your iphone as you play it. So ****ing pointless.
 
ZeRoLiMiT said:
yeah, the new iOS6 has streaming so its getting a lot better! You will like it more..
Click to expand...

Still won't help any unless every phone company offers Unlimited data with the iphone 5...
You'll listen to songs for a few hours and your data is gone
 
I'm going to try out Match one more time on my iPhones because of an annoying bug where iTunes does not sync over meta data changed unless I delete the song or album and resync. With iTunes Match, the changes sync over within seconds automatically.

I've also had to delete several albums on my phone because the song selected to play was wrong. Taxman by the Beatles would play Eleanor Rigby. Deleting the album and resyncing worked.

It still has some issues with play counts and last played dates syncing back to iTunes but who know if Apple will ever fix that.
 
I had to restore my phone to get the wrong iTunes match songs off my phone. I deleted them from iCloud turned off iTunes match on my phone and loaded all the songs on my phone and every song had doubles! iTunes match is staying off. Finally all my music is on there and all the artwork is right not messing with it.
 
I just signed up for it and there's a couple hundred songs that won't add to iCloud. They just show up grayed out on the iPhone and with an exclamation mark cloud icon in iTunes. I've tried half a dozen times to right-click and add the particular songs to iCloud via iTunes. It works for some, but not all. Pretty annoying and I'm not sure how to go about fixing this.
 
HeezyBear said:
I just signed up for it and there's a couple hundred songs that won't add to iCloud. They just show up grayed out on the iPhone and with an exclamation mark cloud icon in iTunes. I've tried half a dozen times to right-click and add the particular songs to iCloud via iTunes. It works for some, but not all. Pretty annoying and I'm not sure how to go about fixing this.
Click to expand...

Yeah I have about 60 songs in iTunes with a cloud with a line thru it logo and it says "an error occurred" don't know what the hell is wrong there
 
I love it and hate it at the same time. But thats probably cos i'm a bit particular about my library.
I have my main library, thats approaching 30k tracks. Decided I would start a new iTunes library just for match, and set about adding albums to it a few at a time.
So far I've added 340 albums/5000 tracks. I only have 4 albums uploaded, and that it because they are not in the iTunes store. Fair enough.

Now as good as that may sound, its taken a hell of a lot of work to get all the other tracks matched. Nine times out of ten, one track from an album will be unmatched, and get uploaded. Normally this will be down to the track length being slightly different to the iTunes store version, so I trim it down, rescan it, and it matches.

Now there are some albums that I've tried adding & removed several times, as I cannot for the life of my get to match fully. I'm trying to find a common reason as to why they don't get matched, but I'm yet to find one.

One thing I have noticed, is that many tracks that are marked as explicit often get uploaded.

On the odd occasion I've even bought an odd track as I cannot get it to match my rip.

If I was less concerned about these types of things, then I would just turn off that "iCloud Status" column and not worry about whether it was matched or uploaded, however it pains me to see 17 out of 18 tracks matched, and one uploaded!! Also, I wouldn't be happy with that odd track being a different bitrate and format to the 256 iTunes Plus format.

All that being said, once the albums are in there and matched up its great. Makes managing music on iPhones and iPads a lot easier, and I suppose once its done, its done.

I think I will persevere with it, but I'd like to have some reassurance from Apple that it will keep it running, and not pull it as a service should the demand not be as they would like.

----------
HeezyBear said:
I just signed up for it and there's a couple hundred songs that won't add to iCloud. They just show up grayed out on the iPhone and with an exclamation mark cloud icon in iTunes. I've tried half a dozen times to right-click and add the particular songs to iCloud via iTunes. It works for some, but not all. Pretty annoying and I'm not sure how to go about fixing this.
Click to expand...

Are they below 128kbps? Don't think it will match those.
 
I upgraded my old 128Kbps tracks, I had nearly 4,000 of them. I did it by creating the playlist and as each track was upgraded, it was removed from the list.

When all was complete, every track was removed from the downloads list meaning each track downloaded without errors. On the playlist, 32 tracks remain still and each time I delete them and download them, they download without errors but each time, the lower bit rate track remains. No error messages, nothing.

Also, once tracks are uploaded, changing the artwork seems to remove any artwork from the uploaded tracks and I can never seem to get the new artwork to show on my iPhone.
 
CrAkD said:
I bought itunes match as a developer to get the extra 3 months. I turned it on and kind of forgot about it. I decided to clean up my Itunes library. I retagged everything and all of a sudden my iphone is totally screwed up songs wont play every other song is missing. If I update a song in itunes why does it automatically update to itunes match? Instead of create a duplicate I have to deal with. Also why do I have to turn itunes match off to load songs on my iphone? I dont want to have to stream or download any song I want to listen to especially with a 64gb device. Also when you turn itunes match off on the iphone and set itunes to sync NO music itunes match music stays on it! if itunes match is OFF why are there still 120 artists with cloud icons next to them? Sorry for the rant but im just fedup with itunes match I wont be renewing. good riddance.
Click to expand...

It's _NOT_ YOU.

iCloud in general is still very buggy. I feel certain that since they've made such a big deal out of it, Apple will (at some point) get it sorted out.

But until then, which could be some time, it's a real crap shoot.

I'll keep trying it on and off, until it's working properly, but in the mean time I'm using a variety of other free cloud solutions that are working very well for me.
 
shorn said:
I love it and hate it at the same time. But thats probably cos i'm a bit particular about my library.
I have my main library, thats approaching 30k tracks. Decided I would start a new iTunes library just for match, and set about adding albums to it a few at a time.
So far I've added 340 albums/5000 tracks. I only have 4 albums uploaded, and that it because they are not in the iTunes store. Fair enough.

Now as good as that may sound, its taken a hell of a lot of work to get all the other tracks matched. Nine times out of ten, one track from an album will be unmatched, and get uploaded. Normally this will be down to the track length being slightly different to the iTunes store version, so I trim it down, rescan it, and it matches.

Now there are some albums that I've tried adding & removed several times, as I cannot for the life of my get to match fully. I'm trying to find a common reason as to why they don't get matched, but I'm yet to find one.

One thing I have noticed, is that many tracks that are marked as explicit often get uploaded.

On the odd occasion I've even bought an odd track as I cannot get it to match my rip.

If I was less concerned about these types of things, then I would just turn off that "iCloud Status" column and not worry about whether it was matched or uploaded, however it pains me to see 17 out of 18 tracks matched, and one uploaded!! Also, I wouldn't be happy with that odd track being a different bitrate and format to the 256 iTunes Plus format.

All that being said, once the albums are in there and matched up its great. Makes managing music on iPhones and iPads a lot easier, and I suppose once its done, its done.

I think I will persevere with it, but I'd like to have some reassurance from Apple that it will keep it running, and not pull it as a service should the demand not be as they would like.

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Are they below 128kbps? Don't think it will match those.
Click to expand...

I cant even imagine attempting using itunes match with 30k tracks. I have 5k and i want to jump out the window. how do you rescan without doing the entire library? When i turn on itunes match it does everything I do see any other way to rescan without turning it off and on again.
 
My experience with iTunes and iTunes Match over the past few years have been terrible. I really did continue to give iTunes chance after chance in hope of improvement, but after sticking with software that hasn't changed much at all in five years, I've lost confidence and moved onto a much simpler, resource light and less buggy Windows Media Player.
 
shorn said:
Are they below 128kbps? Don't think it will match those.
Click to expand...
I'm not exactly sure, I'll have to check when I get a chance later today. But still, even if they're less than that and therefore can't match shouldn't they be uploaded in the quality they're in?
 
CrAkD said:
I cant even imagine attempting using itunes match with 30k tracks. I have 5k and i want to jump out the window. how do you rescan without doing the entire library? When i turn on itunes match it does everything I do see any other way to rescan without turning it off and on again.
Click to expand...
I probably didn't explain too well. I still have my original library, and then I created another iTunes library, purely for Match purposes.
I switch between the two (hold down option when opening iTunes).

I'm currently working through it a few albums at a time. I drag the albums from the iTunes media folder of the original library, and then they get added to the match library (I know, a bit of duplication going on, but space isn't an issue)

My aim will be to get most of the original library copied across and matched up in the match library, obviously it will need to stay within the 25K limit, but there's a lot I can probably get rid of.

Once the match library is complete, I'll scrap the original and the Match one will become the main sole library.

Normally it does take too long to rescan and update match with only 5K songs. Normally a few minutes or so. Lately its been a bit slower, but according to reports online, that seems to be a problem for everyone.

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HeezyBear said:
I'm not exactly sure, I'll have to check when I get a chance later today. But still, even if they're less than that and therefore can't match shouldn't they be uploaded in the quality they're in?
Click to expand...

No, its just won't accept it AFAIK.
There is a way round it though, right-click and create AAC version of those tracks and up them to 128kbps or more. iTunes match should then read them. Once its matched them, delete them and re-download from match and you'll get the proper 256kbps versions.
 
Out of interest, has anyone been able to fully match any Kanye West albums?

I get half the tracks from each one uploaded! Tried re ripped, and different formats, but these ones are stumping me!
 
shorn said:
No, its just won't accept it AFAIK.
There is a way round it though, right-click and create AAC version of those tracks and up them to 128kbps or more. iTunes match should then read them. Once its matched them, delete them and re-download from match and you'll get the proper 256kbps versions.
Click to expand...
Oh okay, thanks for that information. I have one last question for you. How can I tell the difference between a song that was matched and one that wasn't but was uploaded to iCloud in my iTunes library? Thanks so much for all your help.
 
HeezyBear said:
Oh okay, thanks for that information. I have one last question for you. How can I tell the difference between a song that was matched and one that wasn't but was uploaded to iCloud in my iTunes library? Thanks so much for all your help.
Click to expand...

You have to turn on the "iCloud Staus" column. You can find it and add it the same way as you add year, artist, etc.

That will show you whether it's matched, uploaded, error, ineligible, etc.
 
OK, well there is something definitely funky with Match, which after having posted here, has made me more aware that its happening.

With most albums, if only one single track does not match, I normally fix the audio length, remove it from my library (having prior dragged my new file to the desktop), run "Update iTunes Match" and have it refresh. Then add the new fixed audio length file back in and right click that and add to iCloud. In the most, this works, however with some tracks, it clearly is downloading the previously uploaded track.

Anyone else get tracks not being deleted from Match despite checking the box when you delete it from your library?
 
shorn said:
You have to turn on the "iCloud Staus" column. You can find it and add it the same way as you add year, artist, etc.

That will show you whether it's matched, uploaded, error, ineligible, etc.
Click to expand...

Wow I never knew about this column. I just turned it on.....I better turn it off. Every album has at least like 1 track that didn't match even tho the rest of the album matched. That's flipping maddening. On the other hand I put ios 6 beta 2 on my Ipad and iTunes match is pretty tolerable on it considering I didn't load any music on it and I'm just streaming it all from match. Artwork is hit or miss tho.
 
I have over 6,000 matched tracks and 200 uploaded tracks. I have 10 devices synced to the library, 2 macs, 3 PCs, 3 iPhones and 2 iPads. I have the full library on 1 mac and the others download or stream music as and when I choose too. I also have 3 Apple TVs which also stream my library.

When I set it all up I waited till everything had synced then I deleted my entire library and downloaded it in 256k, all 51GB of it. I use iTunes extensively on a daily basis and only purchase music from iTunes. I have not had one single issue on any device and I am thoroughly impressed with the service.
 
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