Many questions regarding Apple Music...

vesperdem

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I've been attempting to use Apple Music since the day after launch. For the most part, it appears to be working. However, I feel that there are many bugs that need to be addressed before I would feel comfortable using it regularly.

My first question has to do with initially turning on Apple Music. I had about 3GB's of music on my phone when I switched on the trial. I had about 500MB's of memory free at that time. Over the next few days, I had added a couple of apps to the phone and was warned of low memory.

I launched iTunes and attached my phone to the computer only to find that I couldn't "remove" the 3GB's of songs I had previously synced. I ultimately had to turn off Apple Music so that I could once again sync music with my iPhone. I was then able to tell iTunes not to sync any music to my phone.

That solution worked, but it seems that this is not the most ideal way to deal with this. I have to assume that 90% (if not more) of iPhone users are not going to remove synced music before enabling Apple Music.

When I look at music that is on my phone (not downloaded for offline access) and tap the "...", the menu shows that I can download the song for offline access. This is weird since the song is already on my phone and can be played "offline". (This is probably a bug, but I though I should state that I have seen it)

Another question... Is there a way to tell iOS to not stream music from the service when on a cellular network as opposed to WiFi? It's difficult to tell when a song is being played from the device or being pulled from Apple Music's servers. Sure there is that little gray iPhone symbol after downloading a track for offline. However, I have asked that a playlist be downloaded for offline playback and found that the tracks in that playlist are still being pulled down instead of playing from the device. The gray iPhone symbol is present on the playlist thumbnail, but not on the individual tracks.

I have had issues in the past with music being pulled from my iCloud library pushing my data plan over the 300MB limit and being charged a lot of money for going over. I didn't notice right away since I was otherwise occupied cutting grass.

I don't have a problem downloaded music ahead of time to make sure that no streaming happens when away from my WiFi.

That's good for now. I still have many more questions. I'll ask them in a bit in this thread after these two have been discussed.
 

vesperdem

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Is that your answer to every post here? I have read the posts listed in under "Apple Music". They helped me to get at least a basic understanding as to how to use Apple Music. If you had actually read the questions I posted here, you would have seen that those questions were not addressed in those posts.

As for "And remember...Apple Music is a work in progress." is a great cookie cutter response to pretty much every question here. Not very helpful, but an easy post. A more helpful response would have been either a link to a thread that actually addresses the questions or some suggested workarounds, etc...
 
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Ledsteplin

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Is that your answer to every post here? I have read the posts listed in under "Apple Music". They helped me to get at least a basic understanding as to how to use Apple Music. If you had actually read the questions I posted here, you would have seen that those questions were not addressed in those posts.

As for "And remember...Apple Music is a work in progress." is a great cookie cutter response to pretty much every question here. Not very helpful, but an easy post. A more helpful response would have been either a link to a thread that actually addresses the questions or some suggested workarounds, etc...

I've seen some articles with a lot of tips for Music. I'll look for them. I didn't save them because I don't use Music. I'll see what I can find. Music has been very confusing for many users. It's too complicated for most people.
 

kch50428

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

If you had actually read the questions I posted here, you would have seen that those questions were not addressed in those posts.
The iMore blog folks are constantly updating the FAQ, and writing additional articles - so something not there now may be there later today, or later this week. Stay tuned.
 

Ledsteplin

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Maybe you can find your answers in these.
If not, unless someone who knows chimes in, you may need to contact Apple Support. There's a few here who seem knowledgeable about Music. Hopefully they'll chime in asap.

http://www.idigitaltimes.com/apple-...ncing-playlists-icloud-library-offline-455939

http://www.techradar.com/us/news/software/applications/5-issues-we-want-apple-music-to-fix-1298125

http://www.gottabemobile.com/2015/07/02/apple-music-problems-5-things-you-need-to-know/
 

Tartarus

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

I launched iTunes and attached my phone to the computer only to find that I couldn't "remove" the 3GB's of songs I had previously synced. I ultimately had to turn off Apple Music so that I could once again sync music with my iPhone. I was then able to tell iTunes not to sync any music to my phone..
That's right. Since all songs are made available offline in Music, you need to 'remove download' for each song or just disable iCloud Music Library and delete them from your phone. You can also go to settings > General > Storage and iCloud Usage > music and delete all songs from there.

That solution worked, but it seems that this is not the most ideal way to deal with this. I have to assume that 90% (if not more) of iPhone users are not going to remove synced music before enabling Apple Music.
They won't and don't have to

When I look at music that is on my phone (not downloaded for offline access) and tap the "...", the menu shows that I can download the song for offline access. This is weird since the song is already on my phone and can be played "offline". (This is probably a bug, but I though I should state that I have seen it)
Since you synced those songs using iTunes, those songs won't get the downloaded for offline tag individually, but will be available offline anyway.
It's inconvenient but nothing more than that.

Another question... Is there a way to tell iOS to not stream music from the service when on a cellular network as opposed to WiFi?
Yes, you can toggle data usage for Music off in Settings > Music. That way only offline songs will be played
ImageUploadedByTapatalk1438029282.716532.jpg

It's difficult to tell when a song is being played from the device or being pulled from Apple Music's servers. Sure there is that little gray iPhone symbol after downloading a track for offline. However, I have asked that a playlist be downloaded for offline playback and found that the tracks in that playlist are still being pulled down instead of playing from the device. The gray iPhone symbol is present on the playlist thumbnail, but not on the individual tracks.
If you mark a playlist for Available Offline, all underlying songs will be downloaded to your iDevice. But only the playlist will get the gray phone symbol and not the individual songs

How can you tell if songs are pulled from the servers anyway?

I have had issues in the past with music being pulled from my iCloud library pushing my data plan over the 300MB limit and being charged a lot of money for going over. I didn't notice right away since I was otherwise occupied cutting grass.

I don't have a problem downloaded music ahead of time to make sure that no streaming happens when away from my WiFi.

That's good for now. I still have many more questions. I'll ask them in a bit in this thread after these two have been discussed.

Please do, we're here for you
 

vesperdem

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Yes, you can toggle data usage for Music off in Settings > Music. That way only offline songs will be played

I take it that you are using iOS 9.0 Beta. My Settings page for Music doesn't have the "Playback & Downloads" section that you have. It's good to see that Apple at least thought of that.


If you mark a playlist for Available Offline, all underlying songs will be downloaded to your iDevice. But only the playlist will get the gray phone symbol and not the individual songs

How can you tell if songs are pulled from the servers anyway?

When I tap on a song that is stored in my iPhone, it starts playing and there is no "network activity indicator". (The little spinny dots just right of the WiFi signal strength indicator. When I tap on a song that isn't on my phone and doesn't have the gray iPhone icon that indicates a song that was downloaded for offline playback, the "network activity indicator" spins for a half second or so.

That playlist that I told to download for offline playback has this setup of tracks.

My main concern here is that if I am listening to this playlist away from my WiFi and the tracks are not on my iPhone, I'll be downloading/streaming the songs over the cellular network and make me run out of my data.

I've been checking out Spotify since they decided to give new users a chance to try it out for 3 months at 99?. I have to say that Spotify is a lot easier to work with than Apple Music so far. Since I lost all the music I had stored on my computer to a HDD crash a couple of months ago (I do have a full backup on Amazon's Cloud player service), I decided to start checking out streaming services. I would have been a little more locked into Apple's service if I still had all my music, but since I don't and Amazon's player really sucks...

Thanks for the real reply! Getting information about Apple Music has been really difficult and of course, as usual, Apple doesn't feel the need to write documentation for their software.
 

Tartarus

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I take it that you are using iOS 9.0 Beta. My Settings page for Music doesn't have the "Playback & Downloads" section that you have. It's good to see that Apple at least thought of that.




When I tap on a song that is stored in my iPhone, it starts playing and there is no "network activity indicator". (The little spinny dots just right of the WiFi signal strength indicator. When I tap on a song that isn't on my phone and doesn't have the gray iPhone icon that indicates a song that was downloaded for offline playback, the "network activity indicator" spins for a half second or so.

That playlist that I told to download for offline playback has this setup of tracks.

My main concern here is that if I am listening to this playlist away from my WiFi and the tracks are not on my iPhone, I'll be downloading/streaming the songs over the cellular network and make me run out of my data.

I've been checking out Spotify since they decided to give new users a chance to try it out for 3 months at 99?. I have to say that Spotify is a lot easier to work with than Apple Music so far. Since I lost all the music I had stored on my computer to a HDD crash a couple of months ago (I do have a full backup on Amazon's Cloud player service), I decided to start checking out streaming services. I would have been a little more locked into Apple's service if I still had all my music, but since I don't and Amazon's player really sucks...

Thanks for the real reply! Getting information about Apple Music has been really difficult and of course, as usual, Apple doesn't feel the need to write documentation for their software.

If you go to Settings > Cellular > Music, you can toggle it off. That's the same toggle as in Playback & Music. It disables cellular data usage for Music.

Yes, I'm on iOS 9 beta and I can see Apple is still tweaking the app a little bit in every beta.

Not many people can answer you're questions because of two reasons:
1? They don't use  Music
2? They don't spend too much attention to the underlying technology and the way it works. Those people only care about having music on their phones and don't worry about their cellular data usage. Of course this is only an assumption from my side
And you're welcome.
 
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Closingracer

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Is that your answer to every post here? I have read the posts listed in under "Apple Music". They helped me to get at least a basic understanding as to how to use Apple Music. If you had actually read the questions I posted here, you would have seen that those questions were not addressed in those posts.

As for "And remember...Apple Music is a work in progress." is a great cookie cutter response to pretty much every question here. Not very helpful, but an easy post. A more helpful response would have been either a link to a thread that actually addresses the questions or some suggested workarounds, etc...

It seems to be his answer for everything ...That or Google it. There is a reason why forums exist and one of them isn't to "Google it"
 

Tartarus

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Guys, be reasonable here. I do understand your point of view regarding standard answers but understand that he is trying to make everybody welcome and letting them know their post is noticed. This is his way of doing so.
 

vesperdem

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Guys, be reasonable here. I do understand your point of view regarding standard answers but understand that he is trying to make everybody welcome and letting them know their post is noticed. This is his way of doing so.

That may be, but it "sounds" like he thinks that we don't actually read iMore.com and that we realize that this free three months is Apple's Beta test.

Plus, when I post a question here, I'm expecting folks that have been through learning how to use Apple Music to help out others that are asking questions.
 

Tartarus

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

People are still getting used to it. Let's just assume we all will know a lot more soon than we know now
 

BreakingKayfabe

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

As for "And remember...Apple Music is a work in progress." is a great cookie cutter response to pretty much every question here.

That isn't a cookie cutter response at all. That's us telling you it's pretty much in beta.

I honestly don't think it's worth your time trying to figure all this stuff out when it comes to this service because I personally think it's half-baked and not that great, so far. I turned it off completely a couple of weeks ago.
 

iEd

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

It seems to be his answer for everything ...That or Google it. There is a reason why forums exist and one of them isn't to "Google it"

Folks here didn't go to iMore University. They get information from not only experience but research and a big part of that research is Google.
I've helped quite a few people because I Goggled it and chose to pass the information along.
There's a wealth of information in Apple literature and on there support pages. The answers are out there one just has to take the time to look for them.



Sent from my iPhone 6 Plus using Tapatalk
 

vesperdem

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

That isn't a cookie cutter response at all. That's us telling you it's pretty much in beta.

My point was that I am well aware that Apple is "Beta testing" Apple Music during this 3 month "Free" trail.


... I turned it off completely a couple of weeks ago.

I'm almost there myself. I've been checking out Spotify since they also have a "nearly" free 3 month trail going on now. So far, I'm much happier with Spotify than I am with Apple Music. It's easier to use, much easier to determine if it's going to stream the music or play it in "Offline" mode, etc...
 

Closingracer

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Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Folks here didn't go to iMore University. They get information from not only experience but research and a big part of that research is Google.
I've helped quite a few people because I Goggled it and chose to pass the information along.
There's a wealth of information in Apple literature and on there support pages. The answers are out there one just has to take the time to look for them.



Sent from my iPhone 6 Plus using Tapatalk



Then he doesn't need to respond? He comes out as rude a lot of the times IMHO.

A lot of stuff can be Googled but your point? I sometimes rather have a true users point of view over an editor or etc.



One of my questions is which one of the LG tones are best and his response was Google. I already Googled, YouTube and whatever else and I got no answer prior to asking the question. Even if I did I would love to have other people's point of view and real ones not the fake biased ones from say CNET, technobuffalo and etc


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

crankerchick

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

I think a good many of these have been addressed, but I'll try to answer too. Forgive if I repeat answers.

When I look at music that is on my phone (not downloaded for offline access) and tap the "...", the menu shows that I can download the song for offline access. This is weird since the song is already on my phone and can be played "offline". (This is probably a bug, but I though I should state that I have seen it)
This has happened to me when the music app didn't realize the music was already downloaded. For some people it happens because music that was synced to the phone before Apple Music didn't get removed but the app doesn't realize it's there. It happened to me after the Music app crashed so bad once and I had to turn Apple Music off and back on to get my library to come back. All downloaded music wasn't being recognized as such and I had to plug into iTunes just to get the app to realize the music was there. You don't actually sync music back and forth through iTunes when using iCloud library, so I don't know why this worked, but it somehow made the app realize the music was there. The last way I've seen it happen isn't "real." As was previously said, if you download an individual song, the little phone icon will show next to the song. However, if you download an album or a playlist, the icon shows next to the album or playlist, but not the songs in that album or playlist. The option will also be there to download the song when you tap the "..." even though the song is already downloaded. This happened when iTunes Match first came out too. They eventually fixed the bug. Sad to see it is here again now, but they will fix it at some point.

Another question... Is there a way to tell iOS to not stream music from the service when on a cellular network as opposed to WiFi? It's difficult to tell when a song is being played from the device or being pulled from Apple Music's servers. Sure there is that little gray iPhone symbol after downloading a track for offline. However, I have asked that a playlist be downloaded for offline playback and found that the tracks in that playlist are still being pulled down instead of playing from the device. The gray iPhone symbol is present on the playlist thumbnail, but not on the individual tracks.

I think it was stated how to tell the app not to use cellular. To address your issue with knowing what is saved locally and what isn't, you can go to the "Playlists" or "My Music" sections and tap the "Playlists" (or "Artists," "Albums," or "Songs") headings in red at the top of the list, just below "Recently Added" thumbnails and toggle "Show Music Available Offline" to on. This will show you what the app recognizes as being downloaded to the device. That is, as long as you haven't hosed up the app where it doesn't recognize music has been downloaded. You can also go to Settings > General > Usage and choose "Manage Storage" under the storage section and see what is stored locally (again, as long as you haven't hosed up the app like I've done before). You can also delete content by artist, album, or individual song here. You can delete from the app too but due to the pesky bug mentioned previously with the location of where the phone icon shows up depending on how you downloaded (by playlist, artist, album, or individual song), doing it in the app may not work for you. For example if you downloaded the playlist but then want to remove the download of a particular song, trying to delete in the app will be annoying because you'll have to choose to download the song (even though it's already downloaded) and then remove the download.

Hope that helps. I probably missed some of the questions you asked.
 

vesperdem

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Re: Many questions reguarding Apple Music...

Hope that helps. I probably missed some of the questions you asked.

It does help. I just got sick of not knowing what was already on my phone (before Apple Music) and what was downloaded for offline playback so I just turned Apple Music off, told iTunes to not sync any music and sync'd the phone to remove all the music it could. Strangely, there are still tracks listed in the music section of the iPhone that doesn't appear anywhere at all. I even used a program to look at the phone's storage and couldn't find the tracks. I'm sure it's an iTunes bug, but it bugs me.

I removed all the tracks since I figured I would add and remove music via Apple Music instead of iTunes.

My main concern now is that I can't setup a playlist on my desktop computer so that I can play it on my iPhone. I assume this is also a bug since that would make the most sense and is the way other subscription services work like Spotify.

I have to say that as I explore both, I'm finding Spotify much easier to use than Apple Music. Let's hope that Apple get's it's Apple Music act together before the end of September, else I'll have to pass on the service.
 

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