Using iTunes match on my iPhone - SLOW

[Crotonmark]

I apologize if this has been covered but I am going kinda crazy. I turned on Match and it synced fine to my iPhone 3GS. The problem is that I listen on the train and the download/streaming speed is so slow under AT&T 3G that it can take over 1-2-3 minutes to go from song to song. It makes listening to music close to impossible.

So - it there anything to do that can speed up this process? Honestly, even the songs that AREN'T in the cloud are slow to start (but faster of course).


Also - and this is just weird - for some reason certain songs on both my phone and my Mac have been duplicated. One version says matched and one says either purchased or uploaded. The dups. were not there before.

TIA

Mark

 

[Icculus]

I apologize if this has been covered but I am going kinda crazy. I turned on Match and it synced fine to my iPhone 3GS. The problem is that I listen on the train and the download/streaming speed is so slow under AT&T 3G that it can take over 1-2-3 minutes to go from song to song. It makes listening to music close to impossible.

So - it there anything to do that can speed up this process? Honestly, even the songs that AREN'T in the cloud are slow to start (but faster of course).


Also - and this is just weird - for some reason certain songs on both my phone and my Mac have been duplicated. One version says matched and one says either purchased or uploaded. The dups. were not there before.

TIA

Mark

Have you tried running the app speedtest.net on the 3G connection on the train? At least that will give you an idea if thats the bottleneck, I live in Frisco, TX and I get like 1mb down around my house so playing/switching songs is about 10-15 seconds at its worst. 1-3 minutes is WAY too long to switch between songs. First, run a speedtest and let me know what you are getting and I will try to help you figure this out.

For the songs not in the cloud, how long are those taking? Mine are instant...MAYBE 1 or 2 seconds delayed, but pretty much instant. I will double check that tomorrow when I take the kids to school.

Maybe the phone needs to be restored...got mucked up software maybe? I dunno, but this is not normal and I will gladly help you try to figure this out.

As for the duplicates...no idea on that one. I suppose if they are matched to the cloud you can delete the other ones locally and from the cloud. I am not sure though as this is your music so I would hate to say "DO THIS!" and then have you lose some of your music.

 

[RedRallyeZ]

I've noticed the same thing about slower songs. But so far I've chalked it up to a slow DSL connection at home along with being in a hole for 3G speeds. I get much better wifi speeds at work so ill see what happens there.

In all honestly though, Im not expecting the songs to react like they were when they were all stored locally, I'm fine with some slow changing, just not having to wait the length of the song to actually begin playing.

As for the duplicates, I had that too. There were maybe 5 tracks in my 4K song library that did it, so I can't complain too much. The more interesting oddity however, is that my AC/DC collection is showing that it was matched, even though those songs are not available in the iTunes store. And I've already checked to make sure they are not the tribute band. THAT is weird.

 

[Crotonmark]

Icculus - I will run it and report back later today

RedrallyeZ - your story is very weird!

Mark

 

[Crotonmark]

Ok *I ran the test. I get between 0.55 and 1.55 mbps. *
What does that tell you ?

Have you tried running the app speedtest.net on the 3G connection on the train? At least that will give you an idea if thats the bottleneck, I live in Frisco, TX and I get like 1mb down around my house so playing/switching songs is about 10-15 seconds at its worst. 1-3 minutes is WAY too long to switch between songs. First, run a speedtest and let me know what you are getting and I will try to help you figure this out.

For the songs not in the cloud, how long are those taking? Mine are instant...MAYBE 1 or 2 seconds delayed, but pretty much instant. I will double check that tomorrow when I take the kids to school.

Maybe the phone needs to be restored...got mucked up software maybe? I dunno, but this is not normal and I will gladly help you try to figure this out.

As for the duplicates...no idea on that one. I suppose if they are matched to the cloud you can delete the other ones locally and from the cloud. I am not sure though as this is your music so I would hate to say "DO THIS!" and then have you lose some of your music.

 

[Icculus]

Ok *I ran the test. I get between 0.55 and 1.55 mbps. *
What does that tell you ?

Something is just not adding up because thats not the best speed but its actually about average I would say. The next step I would try is reset network settings.

Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings

Let me know...

 

[Crotonmark]

Ok - I reset the network settings as you recommended. I also turned iTunes Match off on the iPhone and turned it back on. I'm not on the train but around Manhattan with a limited test base it SEEMS to be running better.

Fingers crossed and will revert if I have any more info!!

thanks so much

Mark

Something is just not adding up because thats not the best speed but its actually about average I would say. The next step I would try is reset network settings.

Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings

Let me know...

 

[Icculus]

Ok - I reset the network settings as you recommended. I also turned iTunes Match off on the iPhone and turned it back on. I'm not on the train but around Manhattan with a limited test base it SEEMS to be running better.

Fingers crossed and will revert if I have any more info!!

thanks so much

Mark

Good to hear man! I hope it stays that way, let me know how it does on the train...

Are local songs playing pretty much instant now?

 

[Crotonmark]

Good to hear man! I hope it stays that way, let me know how it does on the train...

Are local songs playing pretty much instant now?

yes local songs are pretty much instant.
Of course this is a small sample but I am looking forward to the train tonight!

The turning on and turning off SEEMS to have removed some dups from the account also.

Now if only I could get all of the album art to download....

 

[Spooky73]

Check out this thread:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1276465/

 

[Crotonmark]

Check out this thread:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1276465/

Spooky73

The solutions from earlier in this thread (above) have worked for me (so far). Running the speed test was a very cool eyeopener.
Have you tried all of the above suggestions?

Mark

 

[Icculus]

yes local songs are pretty much instant.
Of course this is a small sample but I am looking forward to the train tonight!

The turning on and turning off SEEMS to have removed some dups from the account also.

Now if only I could get all of the album art to download....

Sweet man...I really hope this is a good sign of things to come. I understand everyone's frustrations with this service and believe me I have had my own (replacing 90% of my hi-res artwork with junk scans...THANKS!), but I really want to help as many people as possible because I almost lost ALL my marbles dealing with that artwork fiasco.

As for Album Art to download from the cloud to your iOS device, yeah I got nothing on that. iTunes changed most of my artwork SEVERAL times even after I changed it. What I did for my local library was disable iTunes Match and embed the artwork into the file itself with help through dougscripts. Now my local library is perfect with all hi-res scans (http://www.albumartexchange.com for your artwork needs FYI) but the cloud still shows my old artwork or the ones that iTunes Match changed. Not sure how to get my new artwork up...but if I change a song title from is Crap to Is Crap i see the change happen instantly almost but album art...thats one for ancient aliens...sorry history channel addict.

 

[Crotonmark]

Michael

Ok. I'm on the train. Sweet! Maybe 10 secs. Between cloud tracks!!

 

[Icculus]

Michael

Ok. I'm on the train. Sweet! Maybe 10 secs. Between cloud tracks!!

AWESOME MAN!!! Glad to hear it!

 

[Crotonmark]

Playlists

Michael

Maybe you can also help with this frustration:

The top 25 Playlist on my iPhone is about 2K songs. The recently played playlist adds new songs to the bottom of the list.

Do you know what is making smart playlists act so wacky? I thought that Match was supposed to carry over the play counts and other meta data from iTunes on the desktop.

Am I missing a setting?

thanks

Mark

 

[Icculus]

Michael

Maybe you can also help with this frustration:

The top 25 Playlist on my iPhone is about 2K songs. The recently played playlist adds new songs to the bottom of the list.

Do you know what is making smart playlists act so wacky? I thought that Match was supposed to carry over the play counts and other meta data from iTunes on the desktop.

Am I missing a setting?

thanks

Mark

Playlists are all out of whack for me. I cannot figure it out, I will add songs to a playlist and then they don't show up on the iPhone. You can try running update iTunes match inside iTunes to see if that helps, but smart playlists are even stranger. Lots of threads about people having issues, not sure what to say man except wait for Apple to fix that and the artwork fiasco.

 

[Crotonmark]

Playlists are all out of whack for me. I cannot figure it out, I will add songs to a playlist and then they don't show up on the iPhone. You can try running update iTunes match inside iTunes to see if that helps, but smart playlists are even stranger. Lots of threads about people having issues, not sure what to say man except wait for Apple to fix that and the artwork fiasco.

Yea. I'm just waiting it out.
I love match tho.

 

[Icculus]

Yea. I'm just waiting it out.
I love match tho.

Match is awesome...PITA to get it setup right and obviously artwork/playlists are having issues. HOWEVER all in all this service dominates. I used to use streamtome to play music in the car but it would always downgrade the song based on bandwidth and was super annoying. With match I NEVER and mean NEVER get hiccups in songs or degradation in quality...its been incredible. iPod is in the car as a backup but really has not been used at all.

 

[Crotonmark]

Match is awesome...PITA to get it setup right and obviously artwork/playlists are having issues. HOWEVER all in all this service dominates. I used to use streamtome to play music in the car but it would always downgrade the song based on bandwidth and was super annoying. With match I NEVER and mean NEVER get hiccups in songs or degradation in quality...its been incredible. iPod is in the car as a backup but really has not been used at all.

My only issue is the lousy cell service I get on my train commute. The normal 10 second lag between songs in a good cell area really doesn't bother me.

I have really been loading up iTunes to get new Match based songs on my iPhone.

How is your car setup? What do you use to play the music in the car?

Mark

 

[Icculus]

My only issue is the lousy cell service I get on my train commute. The normal 10 second lag between songs in a good cell area really doesn't bother me.

I have really been loading up iTunes to get new Match based songs on my iPhone.

How is your car setup? What do you use to play the music in the car?

Mark

I have NO issue with the lag of playing songs (which is no longer than 10 seconds) because having my entire library (25k) everywhere I go is boss. I am annoyed that there is a 10MB limit per song and will not go over that, I am waiting for the jailbreak community to fix that and then I will happily jailbreak since I am grandfathered in on unlimited plan. I don't suspect I will go over 1-2GB a month but I have a LOT of Phish/Grateful Dead and most of those songs are over 10MB so its kind of useless right now to listen to those bands.

I think my car setup is pimp, but probably not considering the company I am in. We just got a 2010 Honda Pilot and it has an Aux Port + Cigarette lighter for charging and I had a separate plug for audio and a car charger. VERY annoying to have 2 cables constantly plugged in and made it cumbersome to try to switch tracks with wires everywhere. So I simplified everything by getting a Kensington USB cigarette charger (2 ports top port is 2.1amp and bottom is 1amp) and then got a dual purpose sync cable that had a usb/aux port on 1 end and the other end was just the dock connector. So after installing all that I have 1 cable...simple dock connector plugs into my iPhone and in business listening to music. I *REALLY* like this setup...and I am sorta an audio junkie so getting the best audio output was really important to me (yes I am one of the 1% who CAN actually hear the difference between 128/256/lossless). I really wish I couldn't. Anyways that is how the car is setup, AND since it has dual USB I leave the 2.1amp for charging my wife's cell phone as its always dead it feels like so it will charge faster or we charge the iPad 2 with it either one works great! I really don't care that much about charging as I do about simplicity with wires.

If you are interested in this setup its $30 for the parts on Amazon and will send you the links (or anyone reading this thread).

** One thing to note the dock connector fits the iPhone with the NEW BUMPER (the one designed for Verizon/ATT not the first original bumper). It will work with that bumper because that is the one I use, but my wife has the old bumper and it will not fit. Its not 100% perfect with mine but it fits and hasn't come loose once in 3 weeks.

 

[Crotonmark]

I have NO issue with the lag of playing songs (which is no longer than 10 seconds) because having my entire library (25k) everywhere I go is boss. I am annoyed that there is a 10MB limit per song and will not go over that, I am waiting for the jailbreak community to fix that and then I will happily jailbreak since I am grandfathered in on unlimited plan. I don't suspect I will go over 1-2GB a month but I have a LOT of Phish/Grateful Dead and most of those songs are over 10MB so its kind of useless right now to listen to those bands.

I think my car setup is pimp, but probably not considering the company I am in. We just got a 2010 Honda Pilot and it has an Aux Port + Cigarette lighter for charging and I had a separate plug for audio and a car charger. VERY annoying to have 2 cables constantly plugged in and made it cumbersome to try to switch tracks with wires everywhere. So I simplified everything by getting a Kensington USB cigarette charger (2 ports top port is 2.1amp and bottom is 1amp) and then got a dual purpose sync cable that had a usb/aux port on 1 end and the other end was just the dock connector. So after installing all that I have 1 cable...simple dock connector plugs into my iPhone and in business listening to music. I *REALLY* like this setup...and I am sorta an audio junkie so getting the best audio output was really important to me (yes I am one of the 1% who CAN actually hear the difference between 128/256/lossless). I really wish I couldn't. Anyways that is how the car is setup, AND since it has dual USB I leave the 2.1amp for charging my wife's cell phone as its always dead it feels like so it will charge faster or we charge the iPad 2 with it either one works great! I really don't care that much about charging as I do about simplicity with wires.

If you are interested in this setup its $30 for the parts on Amazon and will send you the links (or anyone reading this thread).

** One thing to note the dock connector fits the iPhone with the NEW BUMPER (the one designed for Verizon/ATT not the first original bumper). It will work with that bumper because that is the one I use, but my wife has the old bumper and it will not fit. Its not 100% perfect with mine but it fits and hasn't come loose once in 3 weeks.

Sure. Send me the links. I need to see this thing!!

 

[Icculus]

Sure. Send me the links. I need to see this thing!!

Kensington USB Charger:

http://www.amazon.com/Kensington-US...6LFI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323397498&sr=8-1

Dual Audio/Synd Cable:

http://www.amazon.com/Cosmos-iPhone..._1_2?s=wireless&ie=UTF8&qid=1323397548&sr=1-2

I got both of those and my setup is awesome, here is a link to how my car looks now:

http://www.fantasyamazingrace.com/temp/photo1.jpg
http://www.fantasyamazingrace.com/temp/photo2.jpg
http://www.fantasyamazingrace.com/temp/photo3.jpg
http://www.fantasyamazingrace.com/temp/photo4.jpg

Photo1 - Shows the cubby hole where the cigarette lighter / aux port are. You can see I only have 1 cable plugged into the 2 port USB, and it has the aux right next to it. Then I have it tied (comes with the tie) and leading out.

Photo2 -Shows everything closed but you still have access the dock cable.

Photo3 - close up of the cable plugged into the iPod, not sure why i took that one.

photo4 - Now I have both cables plugged in and the one I am holding is the black cable that comes with the kensington charger. That dock connector is a little thicker than the dual audio/sync cable. Both are black (think you can get a white dual/audio sync cable if you want, but kensington pretty sure is black only).

No iPhone 4s' were harmed during this project.

 

[Crotonmark]

Kensington USB Charger:

http://www.amazon.com/Kensington-US...6LFI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323397498&sr=8-1

Dual Audio/Synd Cable:

http://www.amazon.com/Cosmos-iPhone..._1_2?s=wireless&ie=UTF8&qid=1323397548&sr=1-2

I got both of those and my setup is awesome, here is a link to how my car looks now:

http://www.fantasyamazingrace.com/temp/photo1.jpg
http://www.fantasyamazingrace.com/temp/photo2.jpg
http://www.fantasyamazingrace.com/temp/photo3.jpg
http://www.fantasyamazingrace.com/temp/photo4.jpg

Photo1 - Shows the cubby hole where the cigarette lighter / aux port are. You can see I only have 1 cable plugged into the 2 port USB, and it has the aux right next to it. Then I have it tied (comes with the tie) and leading out.

Photo2 -Shows everything closed but you still have access the dock cable.

Photo3 - close up of the cable plugged into the iPod, not sure why i took that one.

photo4 - Now I have both cables plugged in and the one I am holding is the black cable that comes with the kensington charger. That dock connector is a little thicker than the dual audio/sync cable. Both are black (think you can get a white dual/audio sync cable if you want, but kensington pretty sure is black only).

No iPhone 4s' were harmed during this project.

OK I think I understand now. You go thru the AUX to the car's sound system via cable to your iPhone (that is using match). And you have no lag between songs. That is sweet! I gotta get off the train!!
My wife's car has an AUX so I guess I have a project...

 

[Icculus]

OK I think I understand now. You go thru the AUX to the car's sound system via cable to your iPhone (that is using match). And you have no lag between songs. That is sweet! I gotta get off the train!!
My wife's car has an AUX so I guess I have a project...

Very short lag, but yeah for the most part I really never even notice that I am downloading songs from the cloud, etc. Just works..

 

[milo]

Ten second lag? Is that just when manually picking a song or when playing through a playlist? If it's the latter, seems like it should be able to know what the next song will be and start buffering it during the current song.