Good morning! I trust you slept well last night, right after you ordered an iMac, Mac Pro, and several of those cutting-edge, multi-touch Apple Magic Mice. Got your coffee? Seated comfortably? Good. You may now commence screaming, because Apple has announced updates to the iMac and Mac Pro lines, along with the release of a new multi-touch “Magic Trackpad.”

Let’s break this down:

iMac tech specs

• The processors come in several flavors, starting with the Intel Core i3 for both the 21.5 inch low and medium iMacs, as well as 27 incher (clock speeds vary, of course, from 3.06 GHz to 3.2). At the top tier, however, you can get a 2.8 GHz Quad-core i5 processor, or drop $200 for a 2.9 GHz Quad-core i7 processor.
• 4GB of RAM standard on all models
• 500 GB of hard disk on the low end, 1 TB for everyone else
• 8x double-layer DVD Superdrives (natch)
• ATI Radeon graphics cards, starting with the ATI Radeon HD 4670 with 256MB on the low end and ATI Radeon HD 5750 with 1GB on the high
• Shipping now

Mac Pro tech specs

• This is where it gets fun, because you can get either a single quad-core processor up to 3.2 GHz or a “Westmere” series, which comes in quad-core and 6-core versions. Here’s the kicker. The Mac Pro can support either one or two processors. “Which means,” as Apple tells us, “that you can have a 6-core Mac Pro at 3.33GHz, an 8-core system at 2.4GHz, or, to max out your performance, a 12-core system at up to 2.93GHz.”
• Graphically, the Mac Pro comes with ATI Radeon HD 5770 with 1GB of GDDR5 memory, which can be upgraded to an ATI Radeon HD 5870 with 1GB of GDDR5 memory
• Available in August

But what everyone’s going to be talking about is probably the Magic Trackpad, which gives you, well, a laptop trackpad for your desktop computer. It supports gestures, of course, along with mouse control, and the entire surface (made of the same material as a trackpad) is a button, so you can click anywhere. It uses Bluetooth to communicate with the computer: no USB option at all. It’s $69, but isn’t shipping standard with any Mac.

Products [iMac, Mac Pro, Magic Trackpad]

Full Story » | Written by Bill Stiteler for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

As many of us here at Appletell can attest to, Apple’s wireless peripherals (keyboard, Magic Mouse, Magic Trackpad, and counting) eat through those AA batteries like nobody’s business. The one thing about Apple is that it does not pass up the opportunity to generate more revenue—it’s not the most valuable tech company for no reason, you know. And perhaps those two things together explain the announcement of Apple’s own rechargeable batteries and wall outlet charger.

Perhaps lost in its bigger product updates (iMac, Mac Pro, Magic Trackpad) is this curious gem. For $29, fanboys one can save a trip by simply buying everything they need at the Apple Store itself.  In the package comes a wall outlet charger and six NiMH batteries.  Why would you pick the Apple branded recharger over anything else?  Apple says that, “... based on designed cycle life and anticipated user scenario,” the batteries have a ten year service life, and if left to sit in a drawer for a year, will retain 80 percent of their original charge.  Additionally, the charger is optimized for the batteries, so charging is probably done at an optimal rate.  The charger also reduces its power consumption to 30 milliwatts (mW) after batteries are done charging, as opposed to (what Apple says is) the industry standard of 315 mW.  No more, “vampire draw,” as Apple cutely puts it.

But of course, the best selling point is probably the most illogical one: they just look so damn good.

The charger and six batteries are available now.

Product [Apple Rechargeable Batteries]

Full Story » | Written by Indraneel Purohit for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Well, it seems the rumors of new iMacs were, in fact, true. But who doubted them, anyway?

The new iMacs sport the Intel Core i3, i5, and i7 processors, meaning the archaic, low-end Core 2 Duo model is now history—the new low-end iMac has the Core i3 chip.  Also, the iMac line now sports new graphics cards, all of which are dedicated GPUs. Done away with is NVIDIA, with Apple instead opting to put two flavors of the ATI Radeon HD GPU—the 4670 and 5670—in the iMacs. And if the processor and GPU difference wasn’t enough for you, Apple has thrown in IPS panels into the iMacs (yes, like the iPhone and iPad) as well as SD card readers that can handle the SDXC format.  If you have a couple hundred dollars laying around, you can even put an HDD and an SDD into your desktop…for $750, at least.

But seemingly superfluous items aside, Apple has finally updated their once-flagship, now-neglected product line.  Here’s a quick breakdown of your standard options, with these new iMacs, broken down by Price, Screen Size, Processor, RAM, HDD and GPU:

• $1199, 21.5”, 3.06GHz Core i3, 4GB, 500MB, ATI Radeon HD 4670
• $1499, 21.5”, 3.20GHz Core i3, 4GB, 1TB, ATI Radeon HD 5670
• $1699 27”, 3.20GHz Core i3, 4GB, 1TB, ATI Radeon HD 5670
• $1999 27”, 2.8GHz Quad-Core Core i5, 4GB, 1TB, ATI Radeon HD 5750

Via [Apple]

Full Story » | Written by Indraneel Purohit for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Concluding the day’s desktop Mac theme, Apple announced this morning a new 27-inch Cinema Display. The new display sports a 2560 x 1440 resolution, and, because of its size, has an actual 16:9 ratio (no more letterboxing when watching widescreen DVDs!).  Like its 24-inch sibling, the display is targeted at MacBook and MacBook Pro users, with a built in three-in-one cable: a MagSafe power adapter, USB plug, and Mini DisplayPort.  Also like the 24 incher, the new display has a built-in iSight camera, microphone, speakers and 3 USB ports—kind of like an iMac, just without the actual computer guts.

According toTechCrunch, down the road, this will be the only model Apple Cinema Display that will be sold.

So, if you want to boost your productivity and your Mac has the requisite Mini DisplayPort, or if you buy the necessary adaptor, the 27-inch monitor may just be for you.  The new Cinema Display will ship in September, at a price of $999. The 24 inch Cinema Display has dropped to $799 from $899.

Product [Apple 27” Cinema Display]

Full Story » | Written by Indraneel Purohit for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Haven’t caught all of the Appletell news this week?  Here’s your chance to catch up on this week’s top 10 articles!

• Appletell giveaway: Fusion of Ideas Stealth Armor iPhone 4 skin
  ” Apple loves their customers so much that they’re giving away Bumpers to all iPhone 4 owners. Know who else loves Apple’s customers? Fusion of Ideas, which is why they’re giving away free…” MORE »
• How to enable automatic data erasing on your iPad
  “The idea of having your iPad stolen is rage inducing. After all, you paid a lot of money for that device. Loss of the physic device, however, should not be your real concern; it’s loss of your personal data that should keep you up tossing and turning at night. Think…” MORE »
• iPhone Appidemic: Real Flashlight for iPhone 4
  “Real Flashlight for iPhone 4 is just like any other flashlight app you could imagine. The interface consists of an on and off button and, when on, the LED flash on the iPhone lights up.…” MORE »
• How to help iOS 4 run faster on an iPhone 3G
  “Before I got my iPhone 4, I was running iOS 4.0 on my iPhone 3G, and I hated it. Even without multitasking and a background image, my iPhone 3G ran slower than I could stand for day to day tasks as mundane…” MORE »
• Apple updates Mac Pro, iMac lines, releases “Magic Trackpad”
  ” Good morning! I trust you slept well last night, right after you ordered an iMac, Mac Pro, and several of those cutting-edge, multi-touch Apple Magic Mice. Got your coffee? Seated comfortably? Good. You may…” MORE »
• iPhone Appidemic: MonotoriCam
  “MonotoriCam is an application designed to bring an easy depth of field effect to the iPhone. It allows you to take new photos with this effect or add the effect to existing photos on your device. What is it? This application is…” MORE »
• Appletell reviews GelaSkins and MusicSkins for iPhone 4
  “More and more, I’m becoming a fan of skins for my iDevices. I like that they protect the products without adding extra bulk, I like that I can still use them with cases and holsters when necessary, and I like that they provide numerous options for me to customize my…” MORE »
• Apple releases its own batteries, charger
  ” As many of us here at Appletell can attest to, Apple’s wireless peripherals (keyboard, Magic Mouse, Magic Trackpad, and counting) eat through those AA batteries like nobody’s business. The one thing about Apple is that it does not pass…” MORE »
• Apple Magic Trackpad is official
  “In a rather quiet manner this morning, Apple has launched one of (I think) their neatest little products yet: the new Magic Trackpad. Selling for $69.00, this is basically the trackpad you’d find in any MacBook Pro removed from the enclosure…” MORE »
• Appletell reviews the Coveroo HardCandy Shell customizable iPhone 4 case
  “Provides: Customizable iPhone 4 protection Colors: Black, ivory, blue, green, or pink Developer: Coveroo Minimum Requirements: iPhone 4 Price: $29.95 (+$5 for color vs engraving of design, +$5 for custom text up to 15 characters) Availability: Now The HardCandy Shell case from…” MORE »

Full Story » | Written by NEWS for Appletell. | Comment on this Article »

Looks like Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer has woken up to smell the same coffee I'm smelling -- that Apple is chasing HP to become the world's biggest PC maker, and now the MSFT top man has said he's gunning for the tablet market.

As the world waits for Ballmer's words to materialize as something with somewhat more than Zune's 1 percent marketshare, and iMac maker Quanta confirms it will make twice as many iMacs as it will make all-in-on PCs for HP, let's look at Ballmers wordage...

On Apple's storming uber-succesful iPad, Ballmer said, with great grace, "Apple has done an interesting job of putting together a product -- they've certainly sold more than I'd like them to sell."

Enchantee. Also enchanting is Microsoft's determination that Windows 7 tablets will become relevant once the company delivers a credible machine (assuming it can get hold of the components).

"They'll be shipping as soon as they are ready," Ballmer said. "It is job one urgency. No one is sleeping at the switch."

"We have got to make things happen. Just like we had to make things happen on netbooks, we have to with Windows 7 on slates. We're in the process of doing that as we speak."

Translation: Now Apple's shown us how, we're firing up the photocopiers. Or is that unfair?

On Monday, Apple updated its entire line of iMac and Mac Pro systems. And while the new Mac Pro models won't be available until sometime in August, the new iMacs are in the Macworld Lab right now.

TUAWMicrosoft previews Office for Mac 2011 originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 28 Jul 2010 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

TUAWGrab some lemonade, sit near the pool, and watch TUAW TV Live originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 28 Jul 2010 16:55:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

With this weeks refresh of the iMac and Mac Pro line, Apple chose ATI graphics cards, no longer offering even an option of NVIDIA graphic chips. There's a lot of rumors as to why Apple made the switch to ATI-exclusive graphics, but new speculation leads to believe that Apple was able to achieve a larger graphics performance boost from the ATI cards instead of NVIDIA cards.

According to AppleInsider, who actually got in touch with ATI for comment, Apple placed a ATI Radeon HD 5770, with 1GB of GDDR5 memory card as the default option for the Mac Pro. This is a huge performance boost as Apple normally places a lower-end card in the base models of Mac Pros.

"This round they actually moved that up (and chose the 5770), so the default is actually a very, very capable product on its own," said David Baumann, product manager for AMD's graphics division.

The ATI 5770 is the equivalent to the previous years' high-end model graphics card.

On the iMac side of things, the default card is the ATI Radeon HD 4670 with 256MB of GDDR3 SDRAM. This means that all of the iMacs now have discrete graphics, instead of an integrated solution.

Icrontic doesn't believe that NVIDIA cards are gone forever, though. They believe that we could see the cards reappear in the default configurations in 2012, when it is time for product refreshes again.

Follow this article's author, Cory Bohon on Twitter.

Apple's popular iPad is available in branches of John Lewis and online from today, 60 days after the tablet device launched in the UK.

Apple on Tuesday refreshed its iMac line for the first time since October 2009 by adopting Intel's Core i3, i5 and i7 processors across the board and abandoning NVidia's integrated graphics chipset for ATI-branded graphics processors.

If you look at your configure options on the new high end iMac, you see that you have options for HDDs, SSDs and combinations there of.  That means there are two places for hard drives in the new models, one likely being a smaller 2.5-inch SSD bay. 

That also means that if you buy a new iMac with just one drive, you can install another aftermarket drive (SSD/HDD opposite) inside.

 Thanks JoeR!

• Mac Pros Now Have Up to 12 Cores
• Apple's LED Cinema Display Now Comes In 27" Size
• Faster New iMacs Can Run Both SSD and HDDs at Once
• Apple's Battery Charger Has the Lowest Vampire Draw In Its Class
• Apple's Magic Trackpad Is Here
• A Driver Update For Apple's Magic Trackpad Is Now Available

It might be the hardest-working app in show business, but iTunes can rock a lot harder when you tune it up with add-ons and AppleScripts--and learn how Smart Playlists bring more of your favorite songs to center stage.

iTunes started out as a smart, simple music player, but over the years, it’s evolved into one of Apple’s most important applications. Although it’s still used for managing and playing your music collection, iTunes now also stores apps, films, TV shows, podcasts, ringtones, and books--maybe “iStuff” would be a better name?--and of course, it’s the sole Apple-approved method for syncing content with iPods, iPhones, iPads, and Apple TVs.

But that doesn’t mean you should take it at face value. Like many of Apple’s applications, iTunes is multilayered. Underneath its simple, straightforward hood, it’s surprisingly feature-rich, offering many powerful configuration options. And it’s time to make that power work for you with our guide to tapping into iTunes’ lesser-known but highly useful features. We also delve into the add-ons that expand the iTunes experience, including the very best third-party applications and highly useful scripts. So fire up iTunes 9.1 or later (it’s currently at 9.2), and get ready to rock!

iTunes 9.2's Greatest Hits

If iTunes were a rock band, it’d only play stadiums. Besides storing and managing your music, the application has to deal with video, books, apps, ringtones, and more. To Apple’s credit, iTunes remains pretty usable, and much of its complexity is kept hidden under the hood. But don’t forget about these useful features.

Library Sources

Uncheck any media types you don't want cluttering up your sidebar.

To change the default media types shown in the Library section of the sidebar, use the checkboxes in iTunes > Preferences > General. If any sources are grayed out in that menu, they’re probably disabled via parental controls. Those settings can be adjusted in the Parental section of the Preferences window.

Import Settings

Set the import format here.

By default, iTunes imports audio using the AAC Encoder set to 256kbps, which is how iTunes Store music is sold. AAC is fine for iPods, but if you use a non-Apple player, you might prefer MP3--head to iTunes > Preferences > General, and click Import Settings. If you’ve got tons of storage, Apple Lossless is the best encoder, and iTunes 9.1 and later can automatically convert songs to space-saving 128kbps AAC when you sync an iDevice (in the device’s settings pane).

Multiple Windows

Open sesame.

Although primarily designed as a single-window app, iTunes lets you open most sidebar components (Music and Connected Devices being exceptions) in their own windows by Control- or right-clicking and selecting “Open in New Window.” If you’ve got a large monitor, it can be handy, for example, to view your music library and the iTunes Store simultaneously.

Sound Enhancement

Pump up the bass, yo!

The often-overlooked Equalizer (Window > Equalizer, or Command-Option-2) has sliders you can fiddle with to adjust the sound, along with presets in the drop-down menu. iTunes can save your custom settings if you choose Make Preset from the drop-down menu.

Keyboard Shortcuts

View Menu

As List - Command-Option-3
As Grid - Command-Option-4
As Cover Flow - Command-Option-5
Show/Hide Column Browser - Command-B
Show Artwork Column - Command-G
Show Genius Sidebar - Command-Shift-G
Switch to/from Mini Player - Command-Shift-M

Controls

Pause - [Space]
Next - Command–right arrow
Previous - Command–left arrow
Eject - Command-E

Store Menu

Back - Command-[
Forward - Command-]
Home - Command-Shift-H

Next page: Smarter iTunes Playlists >>

Smarter iTunes Playlists

Power up your iTunes playlists with minimal effort

Technology moves pretty fast. People used to spend entire Saturdays happily compiling a “mix tape” by carefully recording favorite tracks on a cheap cassette deck, but once digital music hit its stride, such endeavors were seen as a startling waste of time. With a music collection sitting on your hard drive, mixes could be made quickly thanks to the magic of drag and drop.

Select any track in your library, click the Start Genius button, and presto, you have a unique playlist!

iTunes easily creates static playlists, and always has. Click the invitingly large Plus button at the lower left of the main iTunes window (or go to File > New Playlist), name your playlist, and then drag in tracks from your library. Tracks can be reordered, and you can also drag songs from one playlist to another; note that the track also remains in the playlist it was dragged from--it isn’t removed. It’s also worth noting, in case you’re concerned, that playlists contain “shortcuts” to the original tracks. Delete a playlist or an item from a playlist, and the original track remains in your library. 

An Automated Approach

With iTunes 8, Apple introduced its Genius technology, which tries to predict listening habits based on the collections of millions of iTunes users. This lets you create a playlist of tracks based on a favorite song. Select a track in your library, then click Start Genius at the bottom right of the iTunes window (or Control-click and select Start Genius). iTunes will create a 25-item playlist containing that track and similar songs. By using the controls above the playlist, you can extend it to 50, 75, or 100 items; refresh it; or save it.

Saved Genius playlists appear in the sidebar’s Genius section, but Genius Mixes are included by default. Select this to access mixes that are genre-based, randomized, and sealed. You can’t access Genius Mixes to see which tracks are up next, nor can you view a full list of albums and artists, but they’re still a handy “personalized radio” for those days when even starting up a Genius playlist seems a bit too much like hard work.

Smart Playlists

Introduced in iTunes 3, smart playlists are dynamic; they’re based on user-defined criteria. This same idea is used elsewhere on your Mac--smart folders in the Finder, smart mailboxes in Mail--although the iTunes implementation is the most advanced and flexible at the time of this writing.

File > New Playlist Folder adds a handy folder to the sidebar, into which you can drop static and smart playlists for easy access.

To create a new smart playlist, go to File > New Smart Playlist or use the keyboard shortcut Command-Option-N. This brings up the Smart Playlist dialog. To create a basic smart playlist, leave all the settings alone, but add your favorite artist to the empty field, and then click OK. Your new playlist will be added to the sidebar and highlighted. In the main iTunes view area, you should see a list of tracks from your specified artist.

An example of a nested playlist­--these can be as simple or as complex as you like, so go crazy!

Since they’re dynamic, smart playlists can be updated with new settings. Select your playlist and go to File > Edit Smart Playlist (or Control- or right-click it and select Edit Smart Playlist). Click the Plus button to add a new rule. The left-most menu includes many criteria you can pick from. Add as many rules as you like, and define specific values for them. The Match menu lets you choose whether the playlist includes tracks determined by all of the rules or any of them. The former could be used to create a playlist of tracks by your favorite band, not including that one lame album (Album > is not > [album name]), and only from the 1990s onwards (Year > is greater than > 1989). To remove a rule, click the adjacent Minus button, although be aware there’s no undo.

Advanced Rules

The Smart Playlist dialog has a few options that can further refine your playlists. The Limit checkbox enables you to set a specific track count and also a selection criterion (random, recently played, and so on). If the Live Updating box is checked, relevant tracks subsequently added to iTunes will be added to the playlist without you having to do anything.

With iTunes 9, Apple finally added a change that smart-playlist gurus had demanded for years: nested playlists. Before iTunes 9, complex playlists of the form “A and (B or C)” required you to make the “B or C” playlist first and then a second playlist to work with its output. Now, however, you can use the “…” (ellipses) button to create nested rule groups and therefore playlists with complex logic.

If this concept sounds tricky in the abstract, here’s a practical application for nested smart playlists. Say you want to create a playlist comprising tracks from 10 of your favorite bands, only using songs rated above four stars and that have not been played in over a month. Previously, this would have required two playlists, because the bands are an “any” match, whereas the other rules are an “all” match. With iTunes 9, you set up a single match-all smart playlist with the time and ratings rules, and nest a match-any set that deals with the band names. An example is shown above, but the sky really is the limit with smart playlists, and once you’ve set a few up, you can let iTunes do all the hard work of adding tracks. It’s a long way from waiting for a cassette to run out of tape!

Base Your Playlists on Ratings

This simple smart playlist finds favorite tracks you haven’t heard recently.

The best smart playlists are often the simple ones: If you rate your tracks, create a smart playlist where track ratings are greater than 3 and call it “4+ tracks.” For your very best tracks, create a smart playlist with tracks rated 5. If you’re always forgetting what music you’ve added over the past couple of months, create a smart playlist with the rule: Date Added > is in the last > 60 days, and where Media Kind is Music. Create a similar playlist, but change 60 days to 12 months to include songs you’ve added over the past year. Or if you’d like to unearth lost favorites, create a playlist called “4+ neglecteds” and set rules based around track ratings (Rating > is greater than > ***) and when the tracks were last played (Last Played > is not in the last > 30 days).

Target Your iPods

Unless you have a 120GB iPod classic, your Apple music player has a relatively limited capacity. That’s fine if your music collection is small, but if it isn’t, you can always create a playlist with nested rules to fill it full of favorite tracks.

In the example below, the Time rule dispenses with very short (under 40 seconds) and very long tracks (over 5 minutes), classical music, and anything with a very high bit rate (although you can automatically “downsample” audio during syncing in iTunes 9.1). The Media Kind rule restricts the playlist to music, filtering out spoken audio and the like.

If you’ve got an iPod shuffle, fill it with highly rated, short-ish tracks.

Our nested rules follow this logic: Tracks are only added to the playlist if they’re rated over 3--unless they’ve been added within the previous 14 days and don’t have a rating of 1. This means that you always get recent tracks (including all unrated ones) unless you’ve already decided to mark them as rubbish, but older tracks are filtered by your rating.

Next page: The Best iTunes Add-Ons >>

The Best iTunes Add-Ons

iTunes gets even better with one (or all) of these apps as its backup singers

I Love Stars

Once you set the preferences, the app stays in your menu bar.

Even if your library is modest, rating all your tracks can seem daunting. But a rated collection gives you more possibilities for smart playlists, and I Love Stars lets you rate as you go. The app sits in the menu bar and shows the currently playing track’s rating. To change the rating, click on the relevant star. Control-click to access the preferences and define systemwide keyboard shortcuts for rating tracks. I Love Stars can even alert you (optionally) when an unrated song is almost done playing.

iTunes Preference Pane

Tinker with these additional settings when iTunes isn’t running.

As with Mac OS X itself, Apple hides a number of iTunes preferences, not making them accessible via a graphical user interface. iTunes Preference Pane installs into System Preferences and provides options for tweaking iTunes. Perhaps the most useful setting is Invert Library Links, which turns the library arrows into links to your own library rather than the iTunes Store (Option-click for the default functionality). The ability to apply half-star ratings will benefit anyone who considers Apple’s default system too restrictive. Note: Make changes to the settings only when iTunes isn’t running.

iTunesMenu

iTunesMenu stays out of your way.

Plenty of iTunes-notification apps exist, but most take up valuable space on your screen, or get hidden by other windows. iTunesMenu uses your menu bar to display the name of the song currently playing in iTunes, along with other information, such as the artist and album. The drop-down menu also provides access to basic iTunes controls, although we recommend your Mac’s keyboard for those.

Bowtie

Bowtie has a few looks, and you can download more.

Bowtie is similar to iTunesMenu, but instead of displaying the current track’s name in text, it displays the album artwork. Preferences let you define the artwork window’s depth (Desktop level, normal, or always on top). Bowtie includes two alternate themes: one purely text-based, and one with a tiny vinyl record poking out from the artwork. Additional themes can be downloaded (search Google for “bowtie theme”), or if you have knowledge of HTML and CSS, you can make your own.

Lounge

Lounge resembles the Now Playing screen on Apple TV.

Lounge is an interesting mix of screen saver and iTunes kiosk, and it’s perfect either for parties or just as a good-looking screen saver for any Mac. Instead of iTunes-style visualizer pyrotechnics, Lounge displays the current track’s artwork and information. Options let you toggle keyboard controls for skipping tracks and adjusting volume without exiting the screen saver, flip the screen periodically to avoid screen burn, and even choose a screen saver to switch to when a playlist has ended.

Album Artwork Assistant

Match all your albums to their artwork in no time.

Album Artwork Assistant beats its artwork-seeking rivals by being comprehensive and offering plenty of choice regarding potential artwork to import. It also provides a queuing system for when you’d like to work through a bunch of albums, rather than immediately applying new art every time. To use this feature, switch Add Immediately for Add To Queue in our walkthrough below (Step 2), and when you’re done, open the Queue drawer and click Process Queue.

Next page: How to Setup iTunesMenu & How to Find Artwork for Your Albums >>

How to Set Up iTunesMenu

1. Get Started

iTunesMenu communicates with iTunes to find out what the currently playing track is. The track artist is displayed in the menu bar, updating as new songs begin. Click the artist name to access the app’s menu. Choose Preferences to configure the display.

2. Configure the Display

Select General and decide what you want displayed in the menu bar. To show the title and artist, separated by a bullet and with a space afterward, type %Title • %Artist into the Status Menu Order field, then click Save Preferences. (Ensure Scrolling is set to None.)

3. Fonts and Hotkeys

To change the iTunesMenu font, click Select and choose a new one from the Mac OS X Fonts panel. If your Mac keyboard lacks media keys, use iTunesMenu’s Donate section to give $1.99, enter your activation key, and use Hot Keys to define iTunes controls.

How to Find Artwork for Your Albums

1. Install a Script

Quit iTunes and System Preferences. In Album Artwork Assistant, select Install iTunes AppleScript from the Application menu, then click OK. Select a track or album in iTunes to change its artwork. From the Script menu, select Find With Album Artwork Assistant.

2. Select Your Artwork

Album Artwork Assistant will display the tracks to be updated. Below this list, the search string used is displayed, along with image results with a resize slider. To choose new artwork for your tracks, select an image and then click Add Immediately.

3. Find Alternate Artwork

Album Artwork Assistant may not find artwork right away for obscure releases. Try changing the search string. Alternatively, select the Web Search tab to activate the browser area. Once you find artwork to use, Control- or right-click it and select Add Immediately.

Next page: Scripts Make iTunes Sing >>

Scripts Make iTunes Sing

AppleScript is something of an unsung hero. It easily automates repetitive tasks, but few users ever go near it. If you’re an iTunes power user, scripts are a must, but you needn’t hack away in AppleScript Editor--many prebuilt iTunes scripts are available online. All you need to do is download them, plonk them in the iTunes Scripts folder, wait a second or two, and the extra functionality is yours.

If you regularly use a script, apply a keyboard shortcut via Keyboard Shortcuts in System Preferences.

The walkthrough below shows you how to set up and manage scripts, so we’ll concentrate on the best available scripts. All of the scripts mentioned are available for free from the Doug’s AppleScripts for iTunes website (dougscripts.com/itunes).

Track Management

If you’ve got a pretty big music collection, keeping it in good shape can take time--way, way, way too much time. Scripts can assist you with management tasks, taking minutes or seconds to accomplish what might take you hours or more.

One of the best housecleaning scripts is Super Remove Dead Tracks. This finds songs in your library that are no longer available on your Mac. Every 500 tracks, it throws up a dialog to inform you of its progress, and the optional text-based log file at the end tells you which entries have been deleted. On our 13,500-track test library, this entire process took under a minute.

Tracks Without Artwork To Playlist is similar--you select a library, playlist, or an arbitrary bunch of tracks, and the script copies songs without artwork to a new playlist. On activating the script, all you need to do is click Proceed, choose a name for your playlist, and wait for a bit. On our iMac, the script took about 5 minutes to churn through our 13,500 tracks, finding about 1,500 that lacked artwork. With a No Artwork playlist in place, it’s simple to send these tracks to Album Artwork Assistant to grab artwork online.

Another great playlist script is Gather Up The One-Hits. It collects tracks where the artists are each represented in your library by just a single song. Chances are, this will mainly comprise content from compilations, but we found a bunch of one-offs we’d grabbed from the iTunes Store and subsequently forgotten about.

Track Info and Playback

Along with rapidly cleaning up your library, scripts can deal with metadata issues, and you don’t have to open a single Get Info window. Quite often, iTunes downloads inaccurate data when you import tracks from CDs by obscure artists--a common error is the artist and track name fields being reversed. The Swap This With That script from the This Tag, That Tag Scripts compilation can handle this. Launch the script, select a tag to swap from and another to swap to, and your songs’ data is amended. However, be aware that there’s no undo. If your metadata issues are subtler, investigate Track Names To Sentence Caps and Track Names To Word Caps (both of which reformat cases in track names) and Remove N Characters From Front or Back. The last of those enables you to remove a specific number of characters from the start (‘front”) or end (“back”) of a selection of song titles. So if some song titles have track numbers at the start or “disc 1” at the end, this script removes that information quickly and easily.

Scripts can also assist with playback controls. Needle Drop enables you to audition a selection of tracks in automated fashion, after defining playback length and an intro point. For example, you can play 10-second bursts from 2 minutes into every track from a specified playlist.

Another favorite script is Make Bookmarkable, which turns the file type of selected AAC tracks into M4B, thereby making them “bookmarkable,” so playback resumes where you left off. Make UN-Bookmarkable reverses the process.

External Considerations

Search Wikipedia and Google Video Search search the web for more information about your music, working in similar ways: You select a script, and a dialog asks whether you want to search based on the currently playing track or the currently selected track. You then select a category to base the search on. For Wikipedia, you can select the artist, album, or composer. For Google Video, you choose between song, artist, and album. The dialogs aren’t pretty, but they get the job done and save time.

Search for an artist or album on Wikipedia directly from within iTunes simply by using a little script.

Another set of scripts enables you to export track information from iTunes. Although this can be done using File > Library > Export Playlist, the resulting text file is complicated, huge, and unwieldy. Instead, we recommend Album-Artist To HTML Table, which exports a list of your artists and albums (and, optionally, associated tracks, although processing that information takes a long time, so we don’t recommend it) to an HTML document that you can open in a web browser. The script has a couple of quirks: you need to reorder your track list to Album By Artist for best results, and don’t let the script open a browser when it’s finished, or you’ll likely get an error. Instead, click Done and then manually open the HTML file it outputs.

Another export option worth a look is Playlist To Papercdcase.com. It lets you export up to 28 tracks from a playlist to papercdcase.com (the site opens in Safari), which cunningly formats the data into a PDF file that can then be turned into a CD case if your origami skills are up to snuff.

Back Up Your iTunes Folder

The add-ons mentioned elsewhere in this feature do relatively little to affect the content of your iTunes library. At most, they add a little data here and there, such as ratings and new artwork, and these things are easy enough to revert or delete at a later date. Scripts in iTunes can be a very different matter, because some of them automate complex and “destructive” processes, including reworking and deleting tracks. We’re not trying to scare you off--iTunes scripts can often be very handy timesavers--but we do suggest that you don’t just start using scripts blindly. Before you work with scripts that do anything major to your iTunes library, ensure that you first back it up. The iTunes folder--including your music, other digital content, and databases--lives in the Music directory inside your user folder.

How to Manage Your Scripts Folder

1. Create a Scripts Folder

If you haven’t installed scripts before, you won’t have a Scripts folder to use. To add one, quit iTunes, use the Finder to access ~/Library/iTunes (the Library folder that’s found inside your user account’s home folder), and if a Scripts folder isn’t present, create a new folder called Scripts.

2. Install and Remove Scripts

Managing scripts is a case of drag and drop. To install a script, drag it into the Scripts folder mentioned in Step 1. To remove one, drag it out of the folder or trash it. It’s best to do such management when iTunes is closed, but iTunes typically tracks script changes well.

3. Check Things in iTunes

Launch iTunes. After installing a script, you’ll see a script icon in the menu bar between the Window and Help menus. This is where you can activate the scripts. Scripts can even have keyboard shortcuts assigned in System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard Shortcuts, just like other menu items.

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