iTunes

Joined
May 16, 2011
Messages
289
Reaction score
1
Points
18
Location
Belize, Central America
I run a MBP and now also an iPad. On my MBP I have a large amount of videos and of music. I want to move some of both to the iPad.

Somehow last week I managed to get some videos and some music in Mac-friendly formats onto the iPad, and they work fine. I just wanted to add some more videos, and could find no way to get anything to move onto the iPad without accepting the "Synch" box. Nothing else did anything. But as soon as I hit that box everything already on my iPad was deleted, videos and music (even though I was only in the videos area), and it started to try to put ALL my videos and music from my MBP onto the iPad. This of course is impossible, but it transferred an awful lot of stuff I don't want before it fell over.

How can I store ONLY the music and videos that I select on my iPad?
 

Slydude

Well-known member
Staff member
Moderator
Joined
Nov 15, 2009
Messages
17,596
Reaction score
1,072
Points
113
Location
North Louisiana, USA
Your Mac's Specs
M1 MacMini 16 GB - Ventura, iPhone 14 Pro Max, 2015 iMac 16 GB Monterey
Basically you connect the device and launch iTunes if it does not autolaunch. Across the top of iTunes just below where track titles appear you will see links for the various types of content. Click one and in the tab that appears check whether to synch all or just certain selected ones. iTunes 11 for Mac: Set up syncing for iPod, iPhone, or iPad
 

bobtomay

,
Retired Staff
Joined
Dec 22, 2006
Messages
26,561
Reaction score
677
Points
113
Location
Texas, where else?
Your Mac's Specs
15" MBP '06 2.33 C2D 4GB 10.7; 13" MBA '14 1.8 i7 8GB 10.11; 21" iMac '13 2.9 i5 8GB 10.11; 6S
You can also just drag and drop individual items from iTunes to your iDevice.
 

Slydude

Well-known member
Staff member
Moderator
Joined
Nov 15, 2009
Messages
17,596
Reaction score
1,072
Points
113
Location
North Louisiana, USA
Your Mac's Specs
M1 MacMini 16 GB - Ventura, iPhone 14 Pro Max, 2015 iMac 16 GB Monterey
OP
P
Joined
May 16, 2011
Messages
289
Reaction score
1
Points
18
Location
Belize, Central America
I never had the opportunity. I connected the two devices and all movies and music on the iPad vanished. I was not best pleased.

I have asked several people what "sync" means in Apple terms; I have received several different answers, none of which seems to tally with my experience. Years ago I tried iTunes on Windows and quickly decided I didn't understand it, for gratuitously arbitrary reasons. One of the first things I did when I got my MBP was uninstall iTunes, as I don't feel safe using it. Now unfortunately I have no option but to use it, as nothing else will communicate with the iPad. So far my reservations have been fully justified. Apple seem to want people to see their software as a "black box" which need not and indeed cannot be questioned. Bill Gates wants MS software to move the same way. I am most uneasy when confronted with software I can't trace all the way through.
 
C

chas_m

Guest
What part of "sync" are you having trouble with?

1. Connect iPad to iTunes.
2. Tell iTunes what content you want synced to the iPad*
3. Hit sync.

This is how it normally works for hundreds of millions of users. No mystery, no "black box" -- just a central point of syncing so people can actually get it done easily.

*content must be in a format supported by iTunes

It sounds to me like what you'd be happier with is a streaming solution that converts on-the-fly. This avoids the problem of a) having to convert formats and b) having to keep content on the limited space of the iPad. Check out things like Air Server or Serve to Me (both Mac) and their $3 iOS apps.
 
OP
P
Joined
May 16, 2011
Messages
289
Reaction score
1
Points
18
Location
Belize, Central America
I understand the instructions, but there are two difficulties. The first is that iTunes has default settings which you need to override before connecting an external device, as they're implemented automatically and their significance to a new user is far from obvious.

The second is that "sync" has a number of different and mutually exclusive meanings - it is not a closely defined word. The best description of this that I've seen is within the Windows package Beyond Compare, where they explain the significance of each option and allow the user to make an informed choice. Some of the major options are:-

1) make both sides identical by adding files found on one side but not the other; delete nothing
2) write into side 2 anything found in side 1 and not already present; delete nothing
3) delete files found in side 2 not found in side 1
4) treat different generations of the same file as distinct files to be dealt with as above
5) treat different generations of the same file as options, and overwrite other versions with the desired version (as specified in parameters)

There are several more choices. The effect of each of these is profoundly different from the effect of the other choices, and extreme care needs to be taken to avoid unintended loss of data.

My difficulty is that I can't tell what Apple mean by "sync", and if I guess wrongly I shall irrevocably lose data - as happened to me recently. What I want done is for the iPad to have added to it files I select on the computer, with later versions overwriting earlier versions, and nothing deleted from either side. What happened to me was that the iPad was first stripped of data, which I then found was irreversible. I was also surprised and annoyed that I was working in Videos only, so rather assumed that any decisions I made would affect just videos. Not so - all music on the iPad was deleted even though I had no intent to do that.

The various definitions I've been given of Apple's "sync" are different from each other, and so far as I can tell none corresponds to what actually happens. So so far as I am concerned and until I learn otherwise, "sync" is dangerous software that I want nothing to do with, and much the same goes for iTunes in general. The data on the iPad is stored in directories just as on OSX and Windows - why can't they simply allow you direct access to those directories as with those other systems? Why do they force people to use this package iTunes? The iPad would perhaps be greatly improved by a third-party OS that changed these things to operate according to industry norms.


I meant to add. The dictionary meaning of "synchronise" is (roughly) "to make equal" - to change both sides so that they become the same (without specifying precisely how). That is patently inappropriate to updating portable devices from computers, as they have so much less storage. So right from the start they've chosen the wrong word. Now many people these days are happy to accept whatever jargon use of words is presented to them (witness "status" in Facebook). Other people still try to relate new uses of words to their generally accepted meanings, and I confess to being one of those people.
 

Shop Amazon


Shop for your Apple, Mac, iPhone and other computer products on Amazon.
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon and affiliated sites.
Top