iTunes Match Does NOT Stream to iDevices

[clayj]

Put simply: Music you've uploaded or matched in iTunes Match is stored in the cloud and will stream through Macs and Apple TVs... but if you use an iDevice (iPod Touch, iPad, iPhone), the music is DOWNLOADED to your iDevice and played from there. (Apparently streaming through iDevices was a feature of iTunes Match until late in the beta process, when it was abruptly removed for some unknown reason.)

For me, this is a dealbreaker: I signed up for iTunes Match precisely because I wanted to stream my large music collection through my iPhone and my iPads. If I had space on these devices to store downloaded music, I would have synchronized it there in the first place -- as it stands, I'm already short on space and don't need to be worrying about running out.

I've called AppleCare and explained this to them, and they've refunded my $24.99. When Apple puts the streaming-to-iDevices functionality back into iTunes Match, I'll sign up for it again.

 

[ericg301]

I'm pretty sure iTunes Match was NEVER advertised as a streaming service. If I remember correctly, Apple went out of their way to say just that - it's way to download your songs to all of your devices.

The idea is that if you have a large library, you can temporarily remove songs that you've already listened to in order to download new ones.

 

[ndmx52]

xx

 

[pooryou]

I'm pretty sure iTunes Match was NEVER advertised as a streaming service. If I remember correctly, Apple went out of their way to say just that - it's way to download your songs to all of your devices.

The idea is that if you have a large library, you can temporarily remove songs that you've already listened to in order to download new ones.

It was advertised as something that would be usable and useful though. So far it doesn't seem they have thought things through properly.

Deleting songs manually?? Is this 2001 again?

 

[High on Life]

I'm pretty sure iTunes Match was NEVER advertised as a streaming service. If I remember correctly, Apple went out of their way to say just that - it's way to download your songs to all of your devices.

The idea is that if you have a large library, you can temporarily remove songs that you've already listened to in order to download new ones.

I believe you are mistaken. Streaming was the whole point entirely:

If this is true, and streaming was removed, then this is false advertising and I will also call to get a refund.

 

[iphone1105]

It was advertised as something that would be usable and useful though. So far it doesn't seem they have thought things through properly.

Deleting songs manually?? Is this 2001 again?

How is it not useful? It's not useful to YOU, but to me, so far in the days I've used Match it's been an incredible leap into my love of music again. The ability for me to download any and all my tracks in a minute and listen to them is so much easier for me then leaving my Macbook on all day and using splashtop or numerous music streaming apps.

So not useful to YOU, but useful to ME. See how that works? Two people, different needs, different preferences. It either works for you or it doesn't, but it's for sure usable and useful to many, just like it wont be too many. But to blatantly dismiss it is lame!

Good luck!

 

[pooryou]

How is it not useful? It's not useful to YOU, but to me, so far in the days I've used Match it's been an incredible leap into my love of music again. The ability for me to download any and all my tracks in a minute and listen to them is so much easier for me then leaving my Macbook on all day and using splashtop or numerous music streaming apps.

So not useful to YOU, but useful to ME. See how that works? Two people, different needs, different preferences. It either works for you or it doesn't, but it's for sure usable and useful to many, just like it wont be too many. But to blatantly dismiss it is lame!

Good luck!

Yes people have different opinions, that's an amazing revelation thanks for sharing.

 

[TG1]

Interesting, Macworld just posted that songs that you do not explicitly download from iTunes Match are eventually emptied from your iOS device's cache so you won't end up with hundreds of songs on your device.

https://twitter.com/macworld/status/136929603821383680

 

[High on Life]

OP Acted Too Soon

Interesting, Macworld just posted that songs that you do not explicitly download from iTunes Match are eventually emptied from your iOS device's cache so you won't end up with hundreds of songs on your device.

https://twitter.com/macworld/status/136929603821383680

This is honestly just as good, if not better than pure streaming. I'm glad we did some research before we went ahead and cancelled.

 

[ra4oasis]

That "Secrets of iTunes Match" article answered my huge question, and its the whole problem of running out of space on iOS devices. I was really wondering how people would handle the fact that all your music is now available, but you don't have space for it. I figured it'd be just be people self-policing your own storage, which to be honest, is very cumbersome to say the least. I'm very glad to see items that are old/least played get deleted automatically. Sigh of relief. Now I can sign up for this service and let the fun begin!

 

[clayj]

This is honestly just as good, if not better than pure streaming. I'm glad we did some research before we went ahead and cancelled.

I'll only agree that it's AS good as "pure streaming" when they add an option on the phone where you can specify an upper limit of how much space will be dedicated to caching music downloaded from iCloud. It's not acceptable to be at the complete mercy of an algorithm that "knows better" when you suddenly need a bunch of space and there isn't any because the algorithm hasn't decided yet to clean up after itself.

Besides: There are still plenty of bugs in iTunes Match that need to be corrected before I would consider using it regularly -- missing album art, mixed Uploaded/Matched albums, etc. iTunes Match is clearly similar to MobileMe in terms of having been rushed to market before all of the serious bugs had been worked out.

 

[milo]

I'll only agree that it's AS good as "pure streaming" when they add an option on the phone where you can specify an upper limit of how much space will be dedicated to caching music downloaded from iCloud. It's not acceptable to be at the complete mercy of an algorithm that "knows better" when you suddenly need a bunch of space and there isn't any because the algorithm hasn't decided yet to clean up after itself.

Exactly. Plus it looks like the music player will remove old songs to download new ones, but other apps don't have that option. So if you fill up your device by playing music, things like the camera and other apps that download things or use space will give an error saying the device is full instead of downloading old songs. To have it really work, it would have to let the OS remove files based on ANY app needing space, not just the music player.

Or just add the option for users to stream songs.

 

[DNAppleGold]

As some of you might know, ICloud/Match works exactly the way we all want it to on ATV2. Your entire library shows up on screen and you can play anything you want, apprently without downloading. It works beautifully and seamlessly without the clumsy "Play and it may or may not download forever and take up god knows up much space" issues.

For mobile devices, I am very relieved that items you play via iCloud won't perminently take up space. But the solution is not nearly as elegant as on Apple TV.