Secrets of the iPod and iTunes (Fifth Edition) [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

Put It on Your iPod

You may recall that this book is also about the iPod. Given the subject matter of this volume, maybe it's appropriate to discuss the partnership between The Store and the iPod.

Requirements

As I said in the early part of this chapter, there's no limit to the number of iPods on which you can play purchased music. If, for example, you've pungled up for every iPod made by Applethe original 5 GB iPod; the second-generation 5, 10, and 20 GB models; the updated second-generation 10, 15, and 30 GB iPods; the 15, 20, and 40 GB third-generation iPods; and today's iPod mini, the 40 and the 60 GB iPod Photos, the iPod Special Edition: U2, or the 20 and 40 GB fourth-generation iPodsyou can play a single purchased song on all 16 iPods (19, if you count the three iPod models made exclusively for Windows). You must update these iPods with a computer that has been authorized, of course. If you attempt to copy purchased music to an iPod from an unauthorized Mac or PC, you'll be told that the operation cannot proceed.

The only other requirement for using your iPod with purchased music is that your iPod must be running version 1.3 or later of the iPod software. If you have a third- or fourth-generation iPod, an iPod Photo, or an iPod mini, you're set. These iPods ship with version 2.0 or later of the iPod software. If you have a first- or second-generation iPod, you must download the iPod Updater 2004-07-15 (or later, if a newer version has been released) and update your iPod. This updater includes installers for all iPod models and updates first- and second-generation iPods to version 1.4. You can find links to the latest iPod software at [www.apple.com/ipod].

Moving Music to Your iPod

Considering the number of pages I've devoted to The Store, I wish I could finish the chapter by revealing a series of convoluted steps for adding purchased music to your iPod, but the truth is, augmenting your iPod with these tunes is no more complicated than transferring any other kind of music file. If your iPod is configured to auto-update when it's plugged into your computer (and that computer is authorized to play purchased music), any music you've purchased will be moved to your iPod automatically. That music will appear in a Purchased Music playlist (Figure 4.26), as well as in any playlists you've created that contain purchased music.

If you've purchased Kate Bush's "Wuthering Heights" and added it to a playlist on your computer for songs inspired by the works of the Brontë sisters, it will appear on your iPod in both the Purchased Music and Brontë playlists. And just like other music files you've transferred, it appears in the Song, Album, and Artists sections of the iPod.

If you've chosen to update your iPod manually, you can copy purchased music from your iTunes library in the same way that you copy other kinds of music. Just select the songs or albums you want to copy and then drag them to the iPod icon in the Source list, or click the triangle next to the iPod's icon to reveal the playlists on the iPod and then drag the songs or albums into one of the playlists. (Remember, as I mentioned in Chapter 2, you can't drag music into a Smart Playlistonly into a playlist you've created.)

Chapter 6 of this book to transfer music from your iPod to your computer, you still won't be able to play purchased music files that were on your iPod unless your computer is authorized to play this variety of file.

About Album Art

One nice feature of The Store is that when you purchase a song or album, you also get a picture of the album cover. To view that cover in iTunes, select a song you've purchased and click the Artwork button in the bottom-left corner of the iTunes window.

If you listen to music primarily on your iPod, this album art does you no good unless you have an iPod Photoyou can't view the covers on iPods other than the iPod Photoand it may actually be doing some harm. You see, the album art is included within each song you purchase from The Store, and that art makes those song files bigger. How much bigger depends on the complexity of the art. I've found that some songs are just 15 KB heavier with included album art, whereas others balloon by nearly 135 KB. On average, let's say that album art adds 80 KB to each purchased song. If you have 1,000 songs on your iPod that include album art, you've wasted 80 MB of spaceenough for 20 four-minute songs.

The slow, painful way to remove album artwork is to select a song, press Command-I to bring up the song's info window, click the Artwork tab, click the album cover, and then click the Delete button (Figure 4.27).

If you're a Mac user, you have a more efficient way. Travel to