Apple Music-All information provided here

Mimikyu · 01-07-2015 10:44am

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keith_d99 · 01-07-2015 11:34am

Is there a Cross-Fade option/feature? ... very handy in Spotify for playlists

Don't want to kick-off my 3 month trial to find out there is not!

Mimikyu · 01-07-2015 11:38am

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Sad Professor · 01-07-2015 11:46am

Captain Morgan wrote: »

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iTunes Match is more or less built into Apple Music. The only difference is the matched files you download for offline listening are DRM'd. You can still opt for an iTunes Match subscription for 25 a year, but if you plan to stay with Apple Music there's not much reason to keep both.

iCloud Music Library has to be enabled on all your devices for library syncing, which is pretty much borked at the moment tbh. Apple seem to have built library syncing on the iTunes Match backend, which never worked properly to begin with.

keith_d99 · 01-07-2015 11:49am

Captain Morgan wrote: »

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Thanks look like no cross-fade so .... Spotify Premium still winning for me

Higher bit-rate too

320k Vs 256k

miralize · 01-07-2015 11:52am

256 kbps AAC. http://9to5mac.com/2015/06/09/apple-music-quality/

keith_d99 · 01-07-2015 11:57am

miralize wrote: »

256 kbps AAC. http://9to5mac.com/2015/06/09/apple-music-quality/

Plenty of debate there ... Apparently Spotify don't use MP3, they use Vorbis

Sharp2012 · 01-07-2015 11:59am

Absolutely loving apple music, hell of a lot better than spotify

Sad Professor · 01-07-2015 12:00pm

256 AAC used by Apple is superior to 320 MP3. I don’t know about the Ogg/Vorbis codec used by Spotify. I think it might have an advantage at lower bitrates.

keith_d99 · 01-07-2015 12:01pm

Sharp2012 wrote: »

Absolutely loving apple music, hell of a lot better than spotify

Why?
Anybody willing to do a "comparison" review?

Apple Music Vs Spotify Premium

banquo · 01-07-2015 12:08pm

At launch: Looks too complicated.

First look: Hmm, could have been better.

After two hours of use: Take my money, this is extremely well executed.

Mimikyu · 01-07-2015 12:08pm

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Sad Professor · 01-07-2015 12:17pm

Captain Morgan wrote: »

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You might need to disable and re-enable iCloud Music Library on everything (choose merge not replace - and if it fails, keep trying). Matching and uploading tracks on your main library might take a while and can permanently stall.

lee_baby_simms · 01-07-2015 12:19pm

Not near enough diversity on Beats 1. There's far too much emphasis on saccharine R&B/HipHop/pop. Also theres far too much talking over the beginning and end of songs from DJs and constant "BEATS 1" id's running through songs, one of the reasons I don't listen to broadcast radio. I'll be sticking with KEXP.org

That said, the streaming service seems excellent. Hats off to apple from a technical point of view, its worked flawlessly for me since yesterday evening. Impressive considering it was a worldwide launch.

miralize · 01-07-2015 12:21pm

lee_baby_simms wrote: »

Not near enough diversity on Beats 1. There's far too much emphasis on saccharine R&B/HipHop/pop. Also theres far too much talking over the beginning and end of songs from DJs and constant "BEATS 1" id's running through songs, one of the reasons I don't listen to broadcast radio. I'll be sticking with KEXP.org

That said, the streaming service seems excellent. Hats off to apple from a technical point of view, its worked flawlessly for me since yesterday evening. Impressive considering it was a worldwide launch.

I'm going to tune in with Zane whenever I can though. Excellent taste & variety

lee_baby_simms · 01-07-2015 12:30pm

miralize wrote: »

I'm going to tune in with Zane whenever I can though. Excellent taste & variety

Yeah true, it'll be interesting to see where Beats 1 will be in 6 months. I'm definitely not writing it off.

SpaceTime · 01-07-2015 12:39pm

keith_d99 wrote: »

Plenty of debate there ... Apparently Spotify don't use MP3, they use Vorbis

Ogg Vorbis sounds better at lower bit rates (100kbps or so) as it does not cut off the trebles as harshly as AAC so you might notice it on a poor mobile broadband link.

Once you go above 160kbps they both sound very similar though.

Tidal uses FLAC (Free Lossless Audio codec) so they're claiming to deliver 44 kHz, 16bit, and 1411kbps bitrates.

I've compared to Apple Music and Spotify and there is a noticeable difference. Both sound a little 'tinny' in comparison on good headphones with a good sound card.

But for €19.99 / month it's a bit steep!

A lot depends on your ears, your brain and mostly your hardware - headphones and quality of sound card and ability to stream fast make all the difference.

Lossy codecs rely on your auditory system in your brain to fill in the blanks by basically removing bits of the sound and your brain fills in the blanks. It's a bit like the same (albeit more complicated) concept that allows television our cinema to create the sense of motion by showing you what are in reality a series of rapidly changing still frames. Your brain fills in the blanks automatically.

The issue is that some people will find low quality lossy encoding tiring to listen to or annoying as your brain has to do more work to hear the music and you get a sense of fatigue.

Some people are just much, much more sensitive to auditory changes than others and will hear the compression. It just depends on your brain and audio cortex's ability to pick out oddities in sound, so it's highly subjective.

For most people what Apple are offering is 'grand'

Also, it seems that there'll be higher bit rates with iOS 9!

iniall · 01-07-2015 12:54pm

keith_d99 wrote: »

Why?
Anybody willing to do a "comparison" review?

Apple Music Vs Spotify Premium

Not exactly in-depth, but it's a start:

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/jul/01/apple-music-spotify-how-do-they-compare

CountingCrows · 01-07-2015 12:58pm

Can't seem to find how to play/create a station based on artists I'm following or songs I marked as 'Loved'. Looking for something similar to Spotify where it'll suggest songs it thinks I'll like. All the suggested playlists seem static.

Zcott · 01-07-2015 1:12pm

CountingCrows wrote: »

Can't seem to find how to play/create a station based on artists I'm following or songs I marked as 'Loved'. Looking for something similar to Spotify where it'll suggest songs it thinks I'll like. All the suggested playlists seem static.

I've been playing the jazz radio playlist and marking the ones I really like with the heart, and it's been gradually refining the stuff it plays.

Also, the playlists it offers in the You tab are pretty good and right up my street.

The other option is to press the three dots in the bottom right and choosing Start Station.

sozbox · 01-07-2015 1:45pm

Captain Morgan wrote: »

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Just tried with the iPhone, works fine, it's the Mac it's not working from alright. Odd feature difference.

Sad Professor · 01-07-2015 2:17pm

One Spotify feature I'm really missing: the built-in remote. I could AirPlay but I find the iPad Music app too unstable. And when it inevitably crashes it takes my Up Next queue with it.

gimmick · 01-07-2015 2:50pm

One question I have is when you are listening to tracks in my music, do they shuffle between what is already in your phone and streaming?

Best to know so I don't destroy my data allowance.

Sad Professor · 01-07-2015 3:01pm

gimmick wrote: »

One question I have is when you are listening to tracks in my music, do they shuffle between what is already in your phone and streaming?

Best to know so I don't destroy my data allowance.

Yes. I don't think there's an option to disable cellular streaming yet, so just make sure to stick to playlists that have been downloaded for offline listening.

baby and crumble · 01-07-2015 3:22pm

Gotta say it's taking quite a long time for my library to upload- but that's fair, I'd say there's some amount of people trying to do the same right now!

One thing I can't seem to see is whether any changes I make to my itunes playlists via my laptop will be reflected in what I get on my phone via apple music. I really hope so. I need to refine them again but don't want to have to go around manually deleting stuff via the app.

Sad Professor · 01-07-2015 3:36pm

baby and crumble wrote: »

One thing I can't seem to see is whether any changes I make to my itunes playlists via my laptop will be reflected in what I get on my phone via apple music. I really hope so. I need to refine them again but don't want to have to go around manually deleting stuff via the app.

In theory, yes, everything will sync. But it’s finicky at the moment. Even adding songs to playlists on the same device sometimes doesn’t work.

lee_baby_simms · 01-07-2015 3:36pm

Sad Professor wrote: »

Yes. I don't think there's an option to disable cellular streaming yet, so just make sure to stick to playlists that have been downloaded for offline listening.

There is but its not ideal,

goto: - settings - itunes & appstore - disable 'use mobile data'

Problem is that this option also disables cellular data for updates and automatic downloads. They're all treated as one.

mdwexford · 01-07-2015 4:07pm

Keeps being unresponsive and crashing on my iPad Air 2.

Not impressed so far.

Syferus · 01-07-2015 4:41pm

Beat 1 probably the best thing of the lot. Even if I'm not a subscriber I can see myself listening to it.

TherapyBoy · 01-07-2015 4:45pm

Sad Professor wrote: »

Maybe somebody with iTunes Match who hasn't signed up to Apple Music yet can confirm if they have access to iTunes Radio?

I haven't signed up to Apple Music but am using iTunes Match. I can listen to some of the radio stations (worldwide, bbc world service) but most of them tell me 'Unable to start station'.

A new problem I'm having since the update is lots of my music through iTunes Match is disorganised & messed up. Was surprised to find I now had 4 MGMT albums, including their gangsta-rap classic "Tha Doggfather", lots of album art messed up, some albums I bought from iTunes are filed correctly but have 'unknown artist' on them & all music/songs on compilations or anything by Various Artists are all over the place. Not happy if I'm going to have to go through it all & reorganise it manually.

Sad Professor · 01-07-2015 5:18pm

iTunes Match has been disorganised like that for a couple of weeks. I was under the impression 8.4 fixed it but maybe not.

brianon · 01-07-2015 5:21pm

Very disappointed so far. Navigation seems confusing. Also seems like allot of content is missing.

Was looking forward to listening to Pulps early stuff remastered. It's there on the iTunes store but not there in Apple Music !?

Sad Professor · 01-07-2015 5:27pm

Some of the indie labels haven’t signed up yet. If it’s on Spotify it’ll probably turn up eventually.

fifi28 · 01-07-2015 6:10pm

Didnt really pay much attention when this was announced, havnt used spotify or anything before. Was curious yesterday so jumped on board and have to say im loving it!!!
Before this was using just my own playlists from itunes (mostly imported cds) and itube til it stopped working but easily got fed up listening to the same stuff over and over. As a music fan clearly I was missing out

Will most likely keep it after the trial period - no more buying songs on itunes and getting fed up with them after a few too many times listening to them

jakdublin · 01-07-2015 7:16pm

Wasn't expecting much from this and was happy enough with Deezer and Spotify but thought I'd dive in anyway. Have to say I'm very impressed. Impressed enough to forgive the iTunes cloud mis-matches, for now at least. I can see myself paying for this.

Im_No_Superman · 01-07-2015 7:29pm

Quite like it so far except for one gripe, if there is a song playing by maybe an artist Im not familiar with its not easy to click into that artist to see their other songs/albums etc, unless Im missing something very obvious.

Itssoeasy · 01-07-2015 7:30pm

Using it again now and it just seems to good to be true. I assume that if you don't use it past the free trial and have songs made available offline that does songs will vanish from your library ? I

Eugene Norman · 01-07-2015 7:32pm

siri is the killer feature though. I played some Hungarian folk today. 'Twas good.

The curated lists are excellent too.

Clem H Fandango · 01-07-2015 7:38pm

Im_No_Superman wrote: »

Quite like it so far except for one gripe, if there is a song playing by maybe an artist Im not familiar with its not easy to click into that artist to see their other songs/albums etc, unless Im missing something very obvious.

On the now playing screen (with the giant artwork), press the 3 dots in the bottom right corner, above Start station is the name of the song and artist. Thats actually a button even though it looks like its just a header. Pressing it gives the artist page with more songs and albums.

Im_No_Superman · 01-07-2015 7:43pm

Clem H Fandango wrote: »

On the now playing screen (with the giant artwork), press the 3 dots in the bottom right corner, above Start station is the name of the song and artist. Thats actually a button even though it looks like its just a header. Pressing it gives the artist page with more songs and albums.

Excellent, thanks.

nokia211 · 01-07-2015 9:45pm

As the person who started this thread I really don't appreciate people saying so much for this fella with his two weeks etc. That's what I was told my apple and I was just given people the information as at that time there was nothing, it didn't even show music on the Irish site.
Of course I am delighted that it was released yesterday but please stop with that nonsense.

Eugene Norman · 01-07-2015 9:48pm

nokia211 wrote: »

As the person who started this thread I really don't appreciate people saying so much for this fella with his two weeks etc. That's what I was told my apple and I was just given people the information as at that time there was nothing, it didn't even show music on the Irish site.
Of course I am delighted that it was released yesterday but please stop with that nonsense.

To your credit you started a good thread.

Eugene Norman · 01-07-2015 9:49pm

I am amazed how good the For You options are after just by day.

nokia211 · 01-07-2015 9:50pm

Eugene Norman wrote: »

To your credit you started a good thread.

Thank you!!

bertie4evr · 01-07-2015 10:32pm

So is there anyway to do this with iTunes? I can't see anyway to access the playlists of previously played songs.

murpho999 · 01-07-2015 10:41pm

nokia211 wrote: »

As the person who started this thread I really don't appreciate people saying so much for this fella with his two weeks etc. That's what I was told my apple and I was just given people the information as at that time there was nothing, it didn't even show music on the Irish site.
Of course I am delighted that it was released yesterday but please stop with that nonsense.

Well that was me who said that and I think you are taking it far too personal.

No doubt you meant well but even reading your post again it does come across that you felt you had inside knowledge and you state categorically that it will be 2 weeks after launch.

My feeling at the time that e-mailing some customer service front liner does not mean they know anything as information like that would not be shared with them immediately. Somewhat like when you hear posters saying that they spoke to Vodafone about the release of the next iPhone.

Anyhow the app is up and running for us all now, so happy days and I do agree you started a very good and useful thread.

danger mouse · 01-07-2015 11:19pm

Using it since launch. It's bloody amazing!!!! Cancelled my spotify and deleted it today. This App is flipping amazing. I was able to share play lists with my friend earlier on and when I add stuff to it theirs gets updated too. Tis awesome. Love everything about Apple music I've found so much new music.

ShaneU · 01-07-2015 11:27pm

Opted to merge my music library with Apple's, big mistake. Some of my songs have been replaced with the wrong songs (live versions). And instead of one artwork for a compilation album, there's 20 different ones for each song! I didn't spend the last 15 years creating this library just for Apple to fúck it up for me. Apple music not designed for the OCD people like me. Hopefully there's a way to reverse it.

guil · 02-07-2015 5:58am

nokia211 wrote: »

As the person who started this thread I really don't appreciate people saying so much for this fella with his two weeks etc. That's what I was told my apple and I was just given people the information as at that time there was nothing, it didn't even show music on the Irish site.
Of course I am delighted that it was released yesterday but please stop with that nonsense.

God you're like an old dog with a bone. You were told something and it was wrong, get over it.
It happens a lot of the time and so what if someone believes what you say or not.

higster · 02-07-2015 7:36am

Lads

Anyone know if it (or will it) work with sonos? Can't find it on sonos app...

Apple Music-All information provided here

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