iTunes 7: First Impressions – Better and Worse
This morning, Apple released iTunes 7, bringing the interface elements first seen in Mail.app into their media player; borderless sidebar, flatter buttons & scrollbars, smoother, more defined lines.
The application as a whole is far more readable after this refresh. There’s more vertical space between the elements in the left-hand ‘Sources’ column, in-fact the ‘Sources’ label is gone, leaving only the components.
Of all the features Apple introduced in this version; browse by album art (CoverFlow view) and movie downloads, the biggest one for me is the ability to turn off things.
In fact, I did a search for ‘hiding sources in iTunes’ right before I upgraded. It came up empty, but in the new iTunes, I can uncheck Movies, TV Shows, Podcasts, Audiobooks, iPod Games, Radio, and Shuffle to hide all the bits I’ll never use and don’t want to see. If only I could do the same with the iTunes Store.
The next nice improvement is the silly radioactive Burn Disc icon is gone – reduced to a simple, clear, non-scary ‘Burn Disc’ button.
Thanks Apple.
On the downside, more DRM-ed stuff.
I’m with Wil.
Also, the new iPod Shuffles are this fall’s hippest fashion accessory, look for your neighborhood fashion victims sporting 3 or 4, mashing up into a single pair of white earbuds.
5 Comments
Don’t like the new scroll bars in iTunes. They’re flat and Windowsy, oddly blurry around the edges, and have a little 1+1=3 noise going on.
Ah, it’s late 2006 and those darn DRM issues continue to haunt us…
Get used to it, Mark. The public hasn’t bitten hard enough to care (yet).
Er, I meant “the public hasn’t been bitten.”
Paul, I’m not even sure what you mean…the public at large will never care…so far, there has always been a way around DRM, legal or illegal, for better or worse.