I Hate iTunes Part 2

I’m can’t decide if it’s iTunes or Apple I hate!

I updated my iPhone to the latest software release yesterday.  The first issue is iTunes updates, which seem to load the whole software of 100MB+ every bloody time, except it doesn’t always complete the download or complete the update, so I burn several hundred MB attempting to update iTunes several times.  If only iTunes updated through a browser just like every other bit of software that actually does work.  But, NO, Steve knows best.

And then we have the actual iPhone update software which is 200MB+.  I didn’t have time to download all of the update, so I paused it.  Dream on. Why bother pausing a software download when it won’t let me complete the download, but keeps starting from the beginning.

Next complaint.  You’re never quite sure what iTunes is doing, or if it’s doing anything.  There’s complete confusion and inconsistency with feedback on what’s happening.  Sometimes it in the grey window at the top, sometime it’s a pop-up, and sometimes not at all.  And iTunes is so damn slow.  I’m never quite sure if clicking on the menu options  on the left column is actually achieving anything.

And then to cap it all, whilst updating my iPhone, the phone froze.  That pathetic screen with iTunes and a USB cable.  No matter what I tried, nothing would work.  iTunes wouldn’t recognise the iPhone, my laptops wouldn’t recognise the iPhone, and the iPhone was completely locked and wouldn’t restore.

Called Vodafone. They just got me to try what I’d already tried.  They told me to go to a Vodafone store.  Went there, and bizarrely my laptop suddenly decided to recognise the iPhone, but couldn’t revive it.  So I was sent to the Apple Store.  Daunting.  100+ sheep all fingering various white objects in some kind of hypnotised marketing trance!  If you’re going to buy a PC, laptop, Mac, or bike, I think you probably need to take the thing home for a week.  Fingering the keyboard, clicking a mouse, or staring at a screen doesn’t quite cut it for my road test.  It’s a bit like buyers who squeeze the brakes in a bike shop, to get the measure of the bike they’re buying!!

In spite of the 100+ people I was guided to my Apple queue, and after a short while my iPhone was plugged in and reset.  The great thing about queuing is meeting someone there with exactly the same problem i.e iTunes took several times to update, iTunes froze the iPhone so it wouldn’t work, the only solution is to queue at the Apple store. I wasn’t alone.

The good bits are, Chris at the Apple store got my iPhone working again, and though I lost all my data, iTunes did manage to upload everything back to normal.

Jeez Steve Jobs, if iTunes is a measure of what Apple and Macs are like, then I’m not going there.  Software can be messy, so I don’t need an application to pretend it isn’t messy by telling me what to do all time, or not telling me anything that’s happening.  Most of the iPhone users are PC and not Mac aren’t they?  So I for one am losing confidence with Apple, even though I love my iPhone.  I really dread the next software upgrade on my iPhone.

Now, having said all that, the iPhone freeze might have been my fault.  I started the iPhone upload and popped out for 20mins.  My laptop might have gone into standby, which stuffed the Synch.  So I wonder if Bill could get his software to recognise something more than a keyboard or mouse movement, before going to sleep.  You’d think a software upload or a sync would count as keeping the laptop awake. No.

Comments

[RobiNZ]

I share your iPhone/iTunes love/hate.

While it seems to ok for now I fear the dreaded "Another iPhone has been synced..." message. I just wish iTunes would acknowledge I don't have another iPhone because I don't!

I have an old Sony Net Minidisc Player that was a lovely bit of hardware crippled by rubbish software. I thought no software could match SonicStage for crappyness but iIunes has managed it!

[LesterBenita]

I strictly recommend not to hold back until you earn big sum of cash to order all you need! You should get the business loans or just financial loan and feel yourself comfortable

[Eli]

I just linked this article on my facebook account. it’s an interesting read for everyone.

[Air Jordan]

I do not know what I may appear to the world; but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.

[Pretreatment]

I do not know what I may appear to the world; but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now