When I need something I head there first… enjoy 
This sound like something the Smart playlists could solve without much difficulty. Forgive that I don’t know exactly what differences there are in the Windows vs Mac versions of Itunes since I don’t own a Mac. They shouldn’t be much different besides for those small things. You could make a SP that just has all the GWC podcasts and you could name the playlist anything you want.
I also have a playlist that I keep all my weekly podcasts on. The thing I really like to do with the SP on podcasts (or anything you don’t plan on listening to more than one, usually) is set it to display shows with a playcount of zero. This way once I am done listening it is dropped off of the playlist. This keeps it simple to know what you listened to and haven’t. Now this doesn’t delete it or remove it from anything but the playlist. You can also say, “add all podcast genre” and say, “don’t add this, that and the other”. this way you can make different playlists for comedy, news, tech, TV shows or religion. There is a ton of flexibility with SP and makes a world of difference from dragging and dropping.
Here’s an iTunes question for you iTunes lovers.
As I do love making playlists in iTunes, playing music in iTunes is quite a processor hog. While working in Photoshop and other graphics programs I prefer to use the less-processor-taxing WinAMP. However iTunes doesn’t support m3u playlists as an export (just txt and xml). I tried googling the answer but didn’t come up with anything obvious.
Is there a way I can export an iTunes playlist to a WinAMP playlist?
Guess I gave up on google too soon. I found an easy work around here.
1.) Just select all the tracks in iTunes
2.) drag & drop them into winamp.
3.) Then just save the playlist as desired in Winamp
(apparently this works with other non-iTunes players too.)
Easy as algae pie. Or at least passing one.
I agree that the genre is usually flawed, and that fixing them individually can become a part time job. After struggling with it I finally came up with a solution that has worked well:
Instead of coding by music type in many instances I code the genre by the decade.
For example, there is no difference in genre between Elton John’s “Rocket Man” and “Play that Funky Music”, both are coded “70s”. I have found that this a great way of plugging many holes in my collection. I retain genres that I love (classical, jazz, big band, blues, etc) and for others they get decade stamped.
The “The” problem is one I haven’t encountered. That seems odd to me…Apple is generally better than that. However, the name of the podcast on my Ipod is “Galactica Watercooler” so I don’t understand how the “The” problem is occuring.
I have personally never found the need to organize my podcasts as they are independant entities in my mind. Do you have an example of how organizing them would be useful?
Okay, I got a new computer. And I’ve loaded iTunes on it.
What files do I need to move from my old computer to the new one, so I can use the new computer for synching to my iPod. (I don’t save any music on my computer, so I actually have to move any mp3 files and such.)
To be clear Thot, is your plan on your new computer to house the mp3s on the hard drive, or are you going to continue to sync once and then delete the source? The answer will determine the next steps.
One thing you will want to do before you get rid of your old machine: Boot it up with internet access and “De-authorize” it in Itunes. You’re limited to 5 authorizations per account and I hosed myself when I re-did my old computer. I didn’t de-authorize so now I only have 4 authorizations left on my account!
I think there’s plenty of hard disk space on the new computer, so yes I’m probably gonna keep mp3’s on the new one from now one.
You’re probably wondering why I don’t know how big the hard disk is—The new computer is actually one my work is providing for me. When I first got hired I had just bought myself a new computer, so for the past 5 years I’ve been using that for work until now. But the new work computer is gonna be my primary computer I use, so I might as well store my iTunes stuff on it. (I work from home incidentally).
??
You should be able to de-authorize another machine that’s not hooked up. I remember this being a work-around iTunes’ DRM (i.e., a way to effectively authorize more than five machines at a time by selectively authorizing and deauthorizing them,) but I haven’t tried it myself yet.
Thot, I can’t vouch for this solution, but it does sound easier than my process.
I do worry that if you have created playlists, or ranked songs or depend on how many times you have listened to a song that info will be lost. If these things don’t matter to you, you will have less stress.
Do me one big favor…do not sync your iPod with iTunes until you have thoroughly tested the PC installation. If this is done wrong you will lose all your music. If iTunes comes up and says “we have detected a new iPod, do you want us to sync?” say NO (until you have downloaded all your files, imported them into iTunes and tested.
I second that!
As a general rule, it’s always safer to have your music on some kind of hard disk and not only on your Ipod/MP3 player.
As for YamiPod, I’ve had my share of problems with that program, I’m really looking for an Ipod manager that just provides basic functions and doesn’t have all the nick nack that Itunes comes with, but I haven’t found one that’s really reliable so far. My maybe that’s just me and my machine and my problems with YamiPod.
Nope. I’m not worried about playlists or song rankings or anything like that.
Yeah, that’s what I’m kinda worried about. I’m thinking my new computer’s iTunes will look at my iPod and say “Oh, so you wan’t to synch with me? Well, then since I’ve got nothing, then I assume, Mr. iPod, that you want to be completely blank like me.” and it erases all the songs from my iPod:eek:
Very likely! But aren’t there ways of working around Itunes a little bit, like opening the device with the file manager and just drag and drop them to your hard disk?
Yes. That’s actually the process I documented on the prior first page here. Somehow I think it is still going to be the best process.
Thot, the only trick for you that I didn’t mention in the process is when you plug in your iPod the computer is going to ask, “Oh! Do you want me to sync?” instead of hitting yes or no at this point just leave it alone and proceed to the file manager and follow my process.
I gotta question/problem: I got a new iTouch last night. Installed the new iTouch software successfully and am now trying to sync it with my wife’s music library on our PC. However, whenever it syncs only about 5% of the songs transfers any given time. When I switch to manual most songs won’t transfer; so will after trying to drop them in the iTouch about 3 times. Anyone run into problems like this?
Phil,
I know nothing of the iTouch. However, these resources may help you out:
Apple iTouch Troubleshooting Site Definitely check out “Reset iTouch”, “Reset Settings”, “Restore”…essentially the reboot path which is always good to do.
There are also some links on this discussion group that may point you in the right direction. For whatever reason I can’t open them at work: link
Not sure what you mean by ‘switching to manual.’