iTunes Match data usage and your teen

[tiresias314]

Since iTunes Match went live, I enabled my account and uploaded all of my music (over 16,000 songs). When you enable iTunes Match, it deletes all the music on your iPhone and forces you to re-download all of it through the Music app.

After 5 days of re-downloading all of my music, I was receiving numerous warnings from AT&T indicating my data usage was close to exceeding my 4GB maximum, and then I did exceed my 4GB. 15 days into my billing cycle, I was at 5GB whereas my average monthly use is 2GB or less. I looked into it, and my data usage went from a daily average of 50MB/day to, after 11/14 when I enabled iTunes Match, 200-300MB/day.

After 90 minutes on tech support, we found the culprit:

Settings -> Store -> "Use Cellular Data"

Prior to enabling iTunes Match, the toggle's text beneath it simply indicates turning it on will use the cellular network automatically downloading purchases (purchase something on your computer's iTunes, and if your phone is on 3G somewhere, it automatically downloads the song/app if under 20MB).

Well, after enabling iTunes Match, the toggle's text becomes: "Use cellular network for iTunes Match and to automatically download purchases."

If you queue up as much music as you think to carry while on wifi, but then leave wifi, the phone will continue to try and download it once on 3G. If you carry 10+GB of music, you can see how quickly this may go over your monthly allowance (as I already have).

So far, there isn't a "pause all downloads" button in the Music app that would allow you to hold the downloads and resume once on wifi, so unless you know to toggle this on/off, your iTunes Match downloads will continue unless you turn off all cellular data (thereby cutting off email, web browsing, etc).

I would imagine, if you're on 3G and want to download new albums, you'll have to disable this toggle, download the new stuff, then re-enable.

I asked the Apple support supervisor to possible bubble the idea up to a supervisor to include a "pause all iTunes Match downloads" within the Music App, or something more clever. Just be wary of your data usage with the iTunes Match, and if you're downloading a lot of music, make sure you're setting this toggle appropriately.

 

[srf4real]

I've been wondering when the first "holy cow my data usage blew up" type thread would show up..

I have grandfathered Verizon's unlimited plan, but still heavy cellular usage concerns me as well because I don't want to end up getting 'throttled' as a heavy data user. Thanks for posting your fix as well.

A lot of parents are going to be getting a big surprise for christmas in their cellular bill next month!

 

[bushido]

Since iTunes Match went live, I enabled my account and uploaded all of my music (over 16,000 songs). When you enable iTunes Match, it deletes all the music on your iPhone and forces you to re-download all of it through the Music app.

After 5 days of re-downloading all of my music, I was receiving numerous warnings from AT&T indicating my data usage was close to exceeding my 4GB maximum, and then I did exceed my 4GB. 15 days into my billing cycle, I was at 5GB whereas my average monthly use is 2GB or less. I looked into it, and my data usage went from a daily average of 50MB/day to, after 11/14 when I enabled iTunes Match, 200-300MB/day.

After 90 minutes on tech support, we found the culprit:

Settings -> Store -> "Use Cellular Data"

Prior to enabling iTunes Match, the toggle's text beneath it simply indicates turning it on will use the cellular network automatically downloading purchases (purchase something on your computer's iTunes, and if your phone is on 3G somewhere, it automatically downloads the song/app if under 20MB).

Well, after enabling iTunes Match, the toggle's text becomes: "Use cellular network for iTunes Match and to automatically download purchases."

If you queue up as much music as you think to carry while on wifi, but then leave wifi, the phone will continue to try and download it once on 3G. If you carry 10+GB of music, you can see how quickly this may go over your monthly allowance (as I already have).

So far, there isn't a "pause all downloads" button in the Music app that would allow you to hold the downloads and resume once on wifi, so unless you know to toggle this on/off, your iTunes Match downloads will continue unless you turn off all cellular data (thereby cutting off email, web browsing, etc).

I would imagine, if you're on 3G and want to download new albums, you'll have to disable this toggle, download the new stuff, then re-enable.

I asked the Apple support supervisor to possible bubble the idea up to a supervisor to include a "pause all iTunes Match downloads" within the Music App, or something more clever. Just be wary of your data usage with the iTunes Match, and if you're downloading a lot of music, make sure you're setting this toggle appropriately.

First of all it doesnt delete what u had already synched. It just adds the songs from the cloud and makes them avab for download.

it was pretty stupid of u to download em all at once anyway (why not just download those that u actually want to listen to at the moment) + without a wifi connection. What did u expect? If u have like 20GB of music, did u seriously expect it to fit in a 4 GB data volume?

 

[tiresias314]

it was pretty stupid of u to download em all at once anyway (why not just download those that u actually want to listen to at the moment) + without a wifi connection. What did u expect? If u have like 20GB of music, did u seriously expect it to fit in a 4 GB data volume?

Read. Comprehend. Post.

I began the download on a wifi connection. If you start it on a wifi connection, and then leave that wifi connection (and don't toggle the switch I'm pointing to), then it continues to download on the 3G connection. A few hundred megabytes of music that were downloading over wifi now goes to 3G and counts against your data limitations (if you have one).

As far as my expectations, I would have expected the wifi download to pause, or warn me that it was switching to 3G connection to download my music (and give me the option to pause the download or accept the risk). As of right now, downloading from iTunes Match has no way for the user to select to pause all downloads. That toggle is the only way to interrupt the download once begun, or else you have to disable all cellular data.

 

[flynz4]

Read. Comprehend. Post.

I began the download on a wifi connection. If you start it on a wifi connection, and then leave that wifi connection (and don't toggle the switch I'm pointing to), then it continues to download on the 3G connection. A few hundred megabytes of music that were downloading over wifi now goes to 3G and counts against your data limitations (if you have one).

As far as my expectations, I would have expected the wifi download to pause, or warn me that it was switching to 3G connection to download my music (and give me the option to pause the download or accept the risk). As of right now, downloading from iTunes Match has no way for the user to select to pause all downloads. That toggle is the only way to interrupt the download once begun, or else you have to disable all cellular data.

Please clarify what you mean by "that toggle". Which of the following do you mean?:

a) Settings - Store - Use Cellular Data = off
b) Settings - General - Network - Cellular Data = off

I would think that either would prevent iTunes Match from downloading while on 3G. I only have setting a) set to off.

Thanks in advance.

/Jim

 

[tiresias314]

a) Settings - Store - Use Cellular Data = off

This one.

 

[Heebeejeebies]

Sorry to hear about the extra charges...

It turns out that if you decide to shuffle through all the songs in your library, a similar thing will happen. When you shuffle, the music app will shuffle through locally saved songs as well as iCloud songs and songs not saved locally, will download without a prompt.

Five hour bus ride later, I've gone through a bit of my data usage...

I'm hoping a future update brings the "use cellular data" toggle right into the music app so that it'll be a little easier to control.

 

[bradcb]

I was just wondering have you found a problem with data usage after syncing your music with your device ?

 

[TyWahn]

This happened to me 5 days ago with less than a week in my billing cycle. The difference for me was i am on the 200 MB plan. I've never gone over or even come close. I am nearly always in wifi. I was downloading a few songs in wifi but the progress bar never moved. So I hit the "stop" buttons and quit out of the music app and left. Somehow the whole album downloaded anyway in my pocket. I noticed my phone was warm later, but didn't know why. Until I got the text from AT&T. I went from 144 MB to 282 in 12 hours. I had just happen to check my usage the day before.
The crazy part is my Use cellular data button WAS in the OFF position. Settings/Store/Use Cellular Data
So I don't know that this is a true fix.

 

[ZeRoLiMiT]

sucks but if you shuffle music like they said earlier it will go thru cloud music and music on your phone.

I found the only way to turn that off is go back ...

Settings > Music > Show All Music = Off

then it wont go thru cloud music!

Good thing I have unlimited data on sprint