Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Multiple Apple IDs and iTMS new DRM

bkar89

bkar89

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jul 27, 2012
130
0
Norway
So i have more than one Apple ID with purchases made in iTMS. One older account and one new iCloud account.

I can no longer access my content from my old account. because I'm only able to switch accounts my mac is associated with every 90 days. Switching back and forth between these two accounts is now made really impractical.

Any one successfully merged two Apple IDs?
 
Easiest workaround: Create another use account on your Mac and tie that to the older Apple ID.

Music is mostly DRM free, so is it video that you're having trouble with?

B
 
Every iTunes account could be independent of your iCloud accounts.
Also you can use each iTunes account with up to 5 Macs, therefore you can share the content between them.

<<I am not sure about the following>>
I guess you can try adding the item you bought with the other account into the other Library, it will prompt you a message and maybe ask you for the password then you authorize it?
<<I am not sure about this>>
 
balamw said:
Easiest workaround: Create another use account on your Mac and tie that to the older Apple ID.

Music is mostly DRM free, so is it video that you're having trouble with?

B
Click to expand...

The DRM seems to apply when downloading previously purchased music aswell. The music file alone is free from DRM but the iTMS download service is not.

----------
McGiord said:
Every iTunes account could be independent of your iCloud accounts.
Also you can use each iTunes account with up to 5 Macs, therefore you can share the content between them.
Click to expand...

This is no more. You're computer or iOS device is now locked to a single AppleID for 90 days at a time. You can only change the single allowed account once every 90 days.

So if you have made purchases with more than one account, you are ducked.

I have contacted Apple support about the matter. The couldnt do this before, hopefully they have changed that along with the DRM change.
 
bkar89 said:
You're computer or iOS device is now locked to a single AppleID for 90 days at a time. You can only change the single allowed account once every 90 days.
Click to expand...

Unlike iOS devices, you can have multiple user accounts on a single Mac each tied to a different iTunes or iCloud account. Make use of that fact.

Yes, there are some particular audio tracks (like free tracks with DRM, etc...) that still use Fairplay DRM. For everything else, download the non-DRM files and combine them into a single iTunes library.

B
 
balamw said:
Unlike iOS devices, you can have multiple user accounts on a single Mac each tied to a different iTunes or iCloud account. Make use of that fact.

Yes, there are some particular audio tracks (like free tracks with DRM, etc...) that still use Fairplay DRM. For everything else, download the non-DRM files and combine them into a single iTunes library.

B
Click to expand...

Mulitple users does not work. Its per computer not per user. I tested this just now.

Its not Fairplay that is the problem. If you go to purchased in iTunes and redownload a song you previously bought. If you purchased it with another account than the one you're computer is associated with, you get a pop up stating the fact that you can only change accounts once every 90 days. If you already done this once, you cant change accounts until the cooldown period is over. And as a result you are denied the download.

One thing that might work is a virtual machine... but jeez... I'm the owner of both accounts, Apple should have a solution for this.
 
bkar89 said:
Mulitple users does not work. Its per computer not per user. I tested this just now.
Click to expand...

That's new then. I know it works like that for Apps, but iTunes was always separate.

Unless you're using iTunes Match, don't use iTunes in the cloud as your backup. Download the items once and combine them into one big non-DRM iTunes library.

iTunes sucks as backup because some items can be removed permanently from being downloadable.

B
 
Can one download past purchases on one iTunes account but still freely switch between other iTunes accounts so long as one does not download past purchases in the other accounts? I have three Apple ID's, one for the US, one for Japan, and one for Canada, but 99% of my content is from the US store. From the US account I often watch from the Cloud or download past purchases, but I occasionally switch to the Japanese or Canadian store to buy new content that is not in the US store. Would this change in policy affect me in any way? I currently have all my purchases combined in one giant library anyway, since I had to strip the DRM from them to be able to watch them on my Roku box (I can't use an Apple TV since I still don't have an HDTV), but I would still be very sad if I accidentally locked myself out of downloading past purchases on my US account, since that's where almost all of my content is.

That aside, this policy makes little sense to me. Mostly because many computers are multi-user and it makes sense that different users would have their own accounts so... huh?
 
Last edited:
I'm puzzled. I have separate UK and US itunes accounts with apps bought on each of them, and I frequently have to switch between accounts on iTunes on my Mac to update the apps.

I still do this with no problems, why don't I see any 90-day message like mentioned earlier in the thread ?
 
shotts56 said:
I'm puzzled. I have separate UK and US itunes accounts with apps bought on each of them, and I frequently have to switch between accounts on iTunes on my Mac to update the apps.

I still do this with no problems, why don't I see any 90-day message like mentioned earlier in the thread ?
Click to expand...
Because just updating apps does not "associate" the device with an Apple ID. See the support document linked above.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back