[MightySlugMan]

Anyone else underwhelmed at the update? The grid view is sort of "meh" and I'm still waiting for the Genius thing to sort through my library (while I watch it eat system resources like crazy). Anyways, in the browser view, I used to be able to remove the Genre section. It now seems to be permanently there with no preference to remove it. Have I just not found it? Why would they remove this preference? Browser view is the only view I use and would like to remove useless (to my uses) Genre field.

The new visualizer is pretty sweet though

[Sneaky Snake]

I won't ever use any of the new features. The new grid system just feels awkward to use all the time. I might have liked it if when you clicked on the album, etc. it went to list view, not the gay view that it uses right now.

Oh ya, the new visualizer is pretty slick, except I never use the visualizer


-Snake

[AussieMacGamer]

I cant find the update
Meh, i can just grab it off the website.

[charmin]

Sneaky Snake, on September 9th 2008, 11:04 PM, said:

not the gay view

I must have missed THAT announcement...

[Sneaky Snake]

AussieMacGamer, on September 9th 2008, 06:13 PM, said:

I cant find the update

I found it under the "iPod+iTunes" section of the apple site, didn't even check the "downloads" page

charmin, on September 9th 2008, 06:17 PM, said:

I must have missed THAT announcement... bucktooth.gif

it was a fairly big one next to the new nanos

-Snake

[Dark_Archon]

MightySlugMan, on September 9th 2008, 04:53 PM, said:

Anyways, in the browser view, I used to be able to remove the Genre section. It now seems to be permanently there with no preference to remove it. Have I just not found it?

defaults write com.apple.itunes show-genre-when-browsing  -bool FALSE

[Sneaky Snake]

Let me rephrase what I said earlier. What I should've said was this: "it looks real gay if you have more then one album for an artist" (which is the only view I'll be in). I might have been a tad harsh at 1st

[MightySlugMan]

Thanks Dark Archon! Still, it's perplexing why they would get rid of that preference.

[teflon]

When viewing my entire library I will forever only be in list mode with the full browser at the top. that way I can very quickly navigate to the artist or album that I want.

Having said that, the grid view when using Artists instead of Albums or whatever isnt all that ba. double click your artist and you have all of their albums in alphabetical order. Not much different to in list mode.

even so, I wont be using it.

also, occasionally, when I have album art turned on in list mode (this is why I turn it off) an album gets split into 3 or 4 randomly sized entities. This happened in iTunes 7 too. Any idea what causes it?
I believe that almost all of the time these albums lack album art. perhaps that?

[Dark_Archon]

teflon, on September 9th 2008, 07:35 PM, said:

When viewing my entire library I will forever only be in list mode with the full browser at the top. that way I can very quickly navigate to the artist or album that I want.

I agree. Grid view doesn't add anything from a usability standpoint.

The genius feature is kinda nice though, and iTunes feels a little more responsive. Not quite "teh snappy," but not too bad.

[teflon]

Oh, BTW, if you go onto the iTunes store and check out the HD TV shows, you can get a fair few episodes for free, presumably to check quality. Most of them are the first episodes of the seasons, but will definitely give you a good impression of what youre getting.

So far Ive spotted:
BSG season 4 episode 1
Monk Season 7 episode 1
30 Rock Season 2 episode 8
Heroes Season 2 Episode 1
In Plain Sight S1E1 (I hadnt heard of this one before, but I quite like Mary McCormack, so Ill grab the free pilot!)
etc. etc. etc.

also, the season pass pricing doesnt seem all that bad really. $37 for season 4 of Lost in HD is a good deal compared to the BR release which is $67 on Amazon. Thats around 2/3rds the price. Admittedly, lost quality, only 720p, and only playable on Apple devices. But you get it the next day and as the season rolls by instead of waiting and waiting.

Personally though, itll be BR all the way for me. Its a physical copy, I have a PS3 and not an ATV, I want the best quality I can get, I dont have to deal with finding space on an already cluttered HDD (shelf space is easier to find)... oh, and Im in the UK (though theres ways around that *nudge nudge wink wink*).

EDIT:
as spotted with the lack of removing the genres from browsing, I hate how Apple gets Vista-itis every time they do a major release and shuffle how everything is organised in iTunes. Last time it was closing the mini-store, which got hidden in a menu. This time its removing genres, and shifting the import settings from Advanced to General, next to "When you insert a CD". I mean, whats the point of doing this? I could understand if the interface was completely baffling, but its not.

[MightySlugMan]

It's as if Apple feels they're under pressure to come up with a regular release/update and have some radical change with each one. However, they seem to have run out of ideas on what to do, so to look like they're doing something, they move stuff around and try to make it look prettier. It's like they're to "fix" what isn't, and was never, broken (or they're "fixing" the wrong things, how about fixing bugs and improving performance. everybody loves those results even if they don't see them).

[AussieMacGamer]

Sneaky Snake, on September 10th 2008, 08:27 AM, said:

Let me rephrase what I said earlier. What I should've said was this: "it looks real gay if you have more then one album for an artist" (which is the only view I'll be in). I might have been a tad harsh at 1st

What you should have said is, it looks really popsnizzle/bad/ugly. "Gay" is the wrong term to speak your negatives on a subject (itunes in particular). It indicates that you think it may be same sex attracted, rather than you think it bad.

[charmin]

^ That's what I said. (Just longer.)

[AussieMacGamer]

Pretty much. Different tone though i guess

[Sneaky Snake]

AussieMacGamer, on September 10th 2008, 03:27 AM, said:

What you should have said is, it looks really popsnizzle/bad/ugly. "Gay" is the wrong term to speak your negatives on a subject (itunes in particular). It indicates that you think it may be same sex attracted, rather than you think it bad.

it could also mean that i think it looks quite happy

[Dark_Archon]

I'd be totally willing to purchase every TV show I watch through iTunes if they were all available at 720p at the $1.99 price point. $3 per episode is ridiculous.

[teflon]

Get the season pass and its not quite as bad. The real question is if youd be paying for TV at the same time. if you cancel any HD cable/satellite subscription you have, then you could feasibly save a small sum of money, depending on how many series youre following at any one time.

Having sampled the HD version of BSG's season opener (only on my MBP screen though), I have to say the quality is very very good. Despite the content, which was filmed with an intentional amount of noise and is generally quite dark, the colours (that there are) are vibrant, there is 99.9% no blocking, motion is very smooth and this is one of the best episodes to see that with. Its opening space fights, in my opinion, can rival the opening to Star Wars Episode 3 in terms of quality.

Quite simply, the transfer from the original source to the iTunes version is the best there is. Considering that its H.264, and encoded very well, the file size, at 1.38Gb, is plenty big enough, even though the bit rate is 4.5Mbps. MS' xbox media store goes at around 7Mbps, but I reckon that this would be better quality, and even rivals or betters the stuff they show direct on your TV.

[bobbob]

teflon, on September 10th 2008, 04:52 PM, said:

Get the season pass and its not quite as bad. The real question is if youd be paying for TV at the same time. if you cancel any HD cable/satellite subscription you have, then you could feasibly save a small sum of money, depending on how many series youre following at any one time.

I've never paid for TV, and get a few shows OTA and the good ones on DVD. Even the season passes are about 1.5-2x what I pay for shows on DVD, and lower quality there last I checked.

Edit: the HD ones are slightly better than DVD, but I'd need to get a Mini or something to play them, and they're still twice as much. Meh.

[teflon]

I personally find the HD ones to be much better than DVD. But that really depends on the content and what its doing.
Also, as I said, the prices are much reduced from BR, but Id still get BR over these downloads.
And as for comparing the prices to DVDs, compared to this country theyre still much cheaper. I dont know how much the price will jump from the US store to the UK store.

Youre dead on about needing a Mini or ATV in order to play them on your TV, and then theres data storage when you fill up your HDD with 2-3 full seasons of the shows, thats 100Gb gone. Year on year thatd mount up, specially if following more TV shows.

I still think that in many instances, the pricing is competitive, a decent sized file and the quality is very good. The drawbacks are that its digital only, and many people wont have the hardware to play it back on their TV, whereas everyone can play DVDs, and some people can play back Blu Ray. Both of which will generally be the preferred option.