Okay so I'm still on High Sierra and considering upgrading my OS. HS is working fine for me but I'm sure at some point it would be advised to upgrade. I'm using a 2015 MBP 15". One of my biggest concerns is the new Music app. I do not have an Apple Music subscription and still prefer to purchase my music mainly via CDs. Though I am also curious where I can buy music online in lossless or uncompressed formats which would be better than the lossy files from the iTunes Music Store. I have over 9,400 songs on my Mac using 123GB of storage space. I'm still re-importing my CDs in ALAC. I'm just wondering how the new Music App handles those with "traditional" libraries. Is the app an overall good upgrade?
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Is the new Music app better than iTunes?
- Thread starter bigpoppamac31
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No.
That’s the best answer I can give you. There’s a lot of reports from different users with problems related to their libraries (missing art books, unexpected lag loading the playlists, missing tracks, etc).
That’s the best answer I can give you. There’s a lot of reports from different users with problems related to their libraries (missing art books, unexpected lag loading the playlists, missing tracks, etc).
Hmm okay. So I should just stay with HS or upgrade to Mojave.
Hi,
I had problems in the early releases of Catalina and its new Music app, like the impossibility to sign in to AM or some weird bugs (mismatched covers, buggy interface...). Although today I'm quite satisfied by it, it is definitely not perfect...so isn't iTunes. For instance, clicking back from an album on AM to the artist page leads to a long loading time and the keyboard shortcuts do not always work. Anyway, I have a student subscription and use AM mainly for the iTunes Match function and the free Apple TV+.
If you want to migrate, I'd strongly advise to back up all of your library on an external hard drive first!
I had problems in the early releases of Catalina and its new Music app, like the impossibility to sign in to AM or some weird bugs (mismatched covers, buggy interface...). Although today I'm quite satisfied by it, it is definitely not perfect...so isn't iTunes. For instance, clicking back from an album on AM to the artist page leads to a long loading time and the keyboard shortcuts do not always work. Anyway, I have a student subscription and use AM mainly for the iTunes Match function and the free Apple TV+.
If you want to migrate, I'd strongly advise to back up all of your library on an external hard drive first!
I'm still holding out on Catalina because of Music. They seem to have fixed a lot of the bugs, but also their rate of fixes has slowed considerably. Best guess is that I'll end up skipping Catalina all together and hopefully they'll have a better functioning Music app in whatever comes next.
That will mark the fist time I've ever skipped an update, going all the way back to 1984.
That will mark the fist time I've ever skipped an update, going all the way back to 1984.
I always back up my stuff. I assume Catalina has gotten a few updates since it was released last fall right?
[automerge]1589209189[/automerge]
Yeah perhaps that is what I will do. Is it worth it to go one up from HS to Mojave?
Mojave is fine for me, but it didn't really add much that I'm interested in. It did break a very important app for me which was the first time that ever happened and forced me to go back to High Sierra while waiting for an update, which is why I waited a while before even thinking about Catalina. Unless you really want dark mode, I think you could stick with High Sierra and be perfectly happy.
I don't like the Music app, but my computer came with Catalina so I'm using it anyway. My main issue is when I connect my iPod I can only transfer songs that are in my Music library - I have a folder with 1000s of mp3 files that I can't put on my iPod unless they are in my library first. I don't want them in my library because they aren't organised, just odds and ends I have collected over the years.
Fair enough. But then why not put them in your library a little at a time and organize them?
It's the same code base as iTunes. Basically it's iTunes with movies, podcasts and iPhone synching removed. It's not better.
No.
There are a lot of little things that app up to being ultimately inferior. One example is that the simple act of navigation is made more difficult. Albums open as a separate page, gestures don't work, and it's not exactly fast. It's not a terrible app, but for the removal of bloat, it still needs to get a lot better to match iTunes.
There are a lot of little things that app up to being ultimately inferior. One example is that the simple act of navigation is made more difficult. Albums open as a separate page, gestures don't work, and it's not exactly fast. It's not a terrible app, but for the removal of bloat, it still needs to get a lot better to match iTunes.
I'm OCD about organisation of my library. I couldn't stand to have thousands of single songs that don't belong any album.
It’s absolutely a burning pile of garbage in a dumpster.
You can install iTunes on Catalina using an app called Retroactive. There's no guarantee this will be a lasting solution but it means I still have internet radio and podcasts that can play via AirPlay and be controlled by the iOS remote app. I forked my library so I do use Music for music, but I hate the clumsy interface and the annoying back button.
Definitely worse than iTunes.
a) The interface is worse
b) Syncing iOS devices is much worse
Everyone whinged on and on and on about how iTunes needed to be split up, yet its really no better -_-.
a) The interface is worse
b) Syncing iOS devices is much worse
Everyone whinged on and on and on about how iTunes needed to be split up, yet its really no better -_-.
Yeah I never understood the whole splitting up ordeal. It's not like computers are running with single core and 128 MB ram. No matter how "bloated" itunes gets, it's still lighter than literally any website. Same with dropping 32 bit support. It might have made sense with phones when resources are scarce but on macs? People may say "omg but but but but stability!!!!!11shift1" but just how stable is catalina over mojave? It's laughable.
The problems weren't caused by the split itself - I mean, they could have left the app as it was and just hid the non-music functionality. The problems stem from Apple deciding that the - rather limited - iPhone version of Music was the template to match.
I know right. Catalina has been endlessly useless and unstable dropping 32 bit support was supposedly meant to make things more stable and better. ugh!
Ugh isn't the 'new way' terrible. Lack of status & lack of ability to skip the backup process is really annoying.
I had some problems with iTunes but I find the Music app MUCH worse. My library (quite large, >32000 songs) is on an external NAS (Network Attached Storage) and maybe this is part of the problem. Since I updated to Catalina I have often given up the app completely and gone back to playing music from my CDs. I have reported problems via the Feedback channel (on 29th March) and have waited/am waiting despairingly for an improved updated version.
I could write pages but here are the two problems that annoy me most:
I seem to spend half my life watching the spinning "beachball". One result of this is that scrolling through the library is rough. Much worse than with iTunes (although it occasionally is OK). My suspicion is that this is somehow related to the AMPLibraryAgent process which I see often running with about 100% CPU usage (and quickly running up hours of CPU time).
Another annoying problem is that virtually every time I start the Music app, it resets the Media file to an address on the internal system disk and I have to Change it to point to my NAS. At least that problem is soon worked around.
Sorry I have written so much but these problems are really bugging me! This is the most frustrating piece of software that I have worked with for a long time.
I could write pages but here are the two problems that annoy me most:
I seem to spend half my life watching the spinning "beachball". One result of this is that scrolling through the library is rough. Much worse than with iTunes (although it occasionally is OK). My suspicion is that this is somehow related to the AMPLibraryAgent process which I see often running with about 100% CPU usage (and quickly running up hours of CPU time).
Another annoying problem is that virtually every time I start the Music app, it resets the Media file to an address on the internal system disk and I have to Change it to point to my NAS. At least that problem is soon worked around.
Sorry I have written so much but these problems are really bugging me! This is the most frustrating piece of software that I have worked with for a long time.