Apple released version 10 of iTunes last week, and there are quite a few changes. Ping is the marquee new feature, and while I haven’t used it much, I like the idea of new ways to discover great music. Some people are upset about some of the changes in iTunes 10, such as the removal of the ability to create a ringtone out of music that you own (which I personally don’t care about) and the new vertical red/yellow/green buttons at the top left corner (which I agree looks odd). I’ve even seen people complaining about the new icon.
But one thing that seems to be a definite change for the better is improved iPhone syncing. Syncing an iPhone to iTunes has been a painful experience in some of the prior versions of iTunes. The process sometimes took a long time and you had no sense of how long it would take to finish. In iTunes 10, Apple now displays information that tells you where you are in the five step process of syncing including backing up, installing apps, syncing music and podcasts, syncing photographs, etc.
I’m very happy to see this new feature. Just having additional information about the process makes the syncing process seem to go much faster.
Moreover, it may be the the process actually is faster. The time that it takes to sync always varies based on the amount of information that you have to transfer, but I’ve seen reports online of people finding their syncs to be much faster in iTunes 10. I cannot say that I’ve noticed one way or the other myself, but it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that in each new version of iTunes, Apple looks for way to speed up the syncing process. Apple’s own website identifies as one of the new features of iTunes 10 “Improved syncing. Feed your devices, faster.” although it appears that Apple is referring more to the ability to manage the syncing process as opposed to the time it takes to actually perform a sync.
I’m not positive, but what appears to be changed about ringtones is the ability to make them from songs purchased through the itunes store.
There’s another method that may be still available, where you copy a song that isn’t itunes purchased, set it to play only the seconds, save it to the desktop, delete the copy and change the extension to end in “r” (making it a ringtone, then reimport to itunes (this is much simpler than it sounds). Reading on MacLife, it’s not clear that this method is gone.
I like using it because i have a variety of rings that tell me whose calling (my children, who both live in New Orleans, ring with different versions of “Tipitina”), and, on the rare occasions I forget to turn my phone off, the musical instrumental rings don’t make people think with annoyance “Whose phone is that?”– they look puzzled and think “where is the music coming from?” Also, I know it’s my phone not someone else’s, and just prefer the music to any canned rings.
I’ve got rings from Jelly Roll Morton, Howlin’ Wolf, Mississippi John Hurt, and others. For some reason, the one that most often has someone comment is a bit from Texas Swing band Milton Brown.