Jump to content
IGNORED

ITunes and user acounts


rayhil

Recommended Posts

I'm about to start ripping my music collection into ITunes and I'm wondering about employing the following strategy. I have about equal parts of classical and current music. To be able to more effectively categorize and browse without seeing everything, I'm considering leaving my main user account on the machine and creating two more users: Classical and Modern. By doing this I feel I could more easily use the genre field to more effectively categorize the music and decide by choosing which user to log in, I could generally decide which music to listen to at any time.

Any thoughts, comments or warnings about such a strategy?

 

MBP13-128gb ssd using VoiceOver to hear the screen, iTunes, Ayre QB-9, McIntosh mx119 & mc207, Thiel CS2.4

Link to comment

Hi Rayhil,

 

If I understand your strategy and associated question correctly, I do not suggest that you establish multiple iTunes User Accounts.

 

Apple requires you to establish a User Account for various purposes that include purchasing music online and accessing ‘protected’ (DRM) music files. Unless you have instructed iTunes to view separate music libraries (this is uncommon), having multiple and different User Accounts should not restrict your ability to view music files in your iTunes library. However, purchasing music with different User Accounts may restrict access to certain files if they are DRM protected.

 

If you are ripping your CD music collection into iTunes, then you should be able to view and access all music files in iTunes, regardless of how many iTunes User Accounts you have. After you install iTunes, try and get familiar with the sort functions within iTunes. It is a powerful and user-friendly media manager with sort fields that include Genre, Artist and Album titles.

 

If needed, you can create Playlists within iTunes for music that reflects your own interpretation of Genre. For example, you may have certain songs that you consider Modern and iTunes may label such songs as Folk. If you prefer not to amend the prescribed iTunes Genre, you can create Playlists that help you readily access the songs you want. Playlists can be broad: Classical vs Modern. They can also be very specific: holiday Music vs Female Vocals.

 

Experiment...and have some fun exploring Playlists. If you decide that a Playlist is no longer useful, you can always delete it down the road without deleting the content from your main iTunes Library.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Chris

 

 

 

Amarra 3.0.3/iTunes-->AQVOX USB PS-->Acromag USB Isolator-->Ayre QB-9-->Ayre K-5xeMP-->W4S SX-500-->Tyler Acoustics Linbrook Super Towers-->SVS SB12-Plus (L&R). Cables: Nordost, Transparent, LessLoss, Analysis Plus & Pangea. Dedicated line with isolated power conditioning per component: PS Audio & Furman. Late 2012 Mac Mini 2.6GHz Quad-Core i7 (16 GB, 1TB Fusion, 6TB ext via Tbolt). External drives enclosure http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f7-disk-storage-music-library-storage/silent-enclosure-external-hard-drives-7178/

Link to comment

I'd agree with Chris's advice and avoid the multiple user approach. Having multiple users within iTunes merely affects your identity within the iTunes Music Store -- and is used to implement their (I guess no longer?) DRM on trackes purchased from them.

 

Use Playlists. Go wild, and make a lot of them.

 

Also use Browse Mode. I always have browse mode open so I can filter my main list by Genre, Composer, Artist, & Album. I never use cover flow, although it looks sweet, because it just does not give me this kind of filtering.

 

Here's the kind of thing I do constantly in browse mode: 1. select classical genre in the first column, 2. scroll down to composer e.g., Vaughan Williams in the second column, and then 3. either pick out the Flos Campi album in the album column or choose the artist for the specific set I'm looking for from the artist column.

 

Or simply leave it on Vaughan Williams to have an instant sort from multiple albums.. so that you're seeing the Hillary Hahn "The Lark Ascending" along with Stuart Green and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. Then hit play... or if that list is a keeper you now just want you want to pull over to a Playlist -- or the exact parameters to make up a Smart Playlist.

 

2013 MacBook Pro Retina -> {Pure Music | Audirvana} -> {Dragonfly Red v.1} -> AKG K-702 or Sennheiser HD650 headphones.

Link to comment

I had done the same for maintaining lossless compressed and lossy compressed versions of the same set of songs. Though I would agree with the others above, that you need not maintain multiple libraries for multiple genre.

 

There is another way, where you could maintain the multiple libraries in the same account. The library is chosen while invoking the iTunes. Hold alt key for mac and shift key for windows, while invoking the iTunes. This will give you a prompt to switch to an existing library or create a new one.

 

Sanjay

 

Macbook pro 15\" 2.53ghz core 2 duo with Amarra, 1 TB storage, 6 GB memory -> USB locus-design nucleus cable -> EA overdrive DAC -> -> modded parasound JC1 monoblocks -> cadence ARCA loudspeakers + REL studio III

Link to comment

Chris, Flatmap,

 

I think multiple accounts (user ids) on a machine can use the same iTunes account. For DRM purposes, 5 unique "computers" can be authorized with iTunes store user account. Same authorization holds for multiple user accounts on a single machine.

 

Or I might be missing something.

 

 

Sanjay

 

Macbook pro 15\" 2.53ghz core 2 duo with Amarra, 1 TB storage, 6 GB memory -> USB locus-design nucleus cable -> EA overdrive DAC -> -> modded parasound JC1 monoblocks -> cadence ARCA loudspeakers + REL studio III

Link to comment

I agree with the others that Playlists are the way to go for a better user experience. Take the time after ripping to clean up your entire library's ID3 tags to maximize the accuracy of your playlists.

 

Bill

 

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.

Mac Mini->Roon + Tidal->KEF LS50W

Link to comment

Well, given that there's rarely consensus on this site (which is a wonderful thing because it brings us all a variety of opinions), there seems to be one on my question. Despite the fact that I'm doubtful that I'll buy audio from the Apple Store given its quality, I'm going the single library route and will devote time to learning playlists and folders (after good tagging) to maximize my flexibility.

Thanks to all.

 

MBP13-128gb ssd using VoiceOver to hear the screen, iTunes, Ayre QB-9, McIntosh mx119 & mc207, Thiel CS2.4

Link to comment

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now



×
×
  • Create New...