Dave Greenbaum opened the meeting by declaring it “officially a standing-room only meeting.” Because of the confusion about last month’s meeting, we have set a policy to only cancel meetings if and when USD 497 cancels classes. Next were introductions from those in the room. Participants were asked to relate whether Santa had brought them an iPod or other technology gift.
There was no new Apple product information because the meeting was only a week away from the MacWorld Expo in San Francisco where new product announcements are made. Dave would be going to the convention and promised to send reports by email to the club.
Matt Kappenman began tonight’s main topic discussing myths about iTunes. You can use music from any source. It doesn’t, necessarily, have to be purchased from the Apple Music Store. Music can come from your CD collection and, even vinyl records and audio tapes. Matt suggests that you change your import settings using the iTunes preferences(use the iTunes menu > preferences selection). This is done under the advanced >importing tabs in the preferences box. Change the “Import using:” field to “MP3 Encoder” and use a setting of around 160 kbps. This allows for good dynamic range but still makes the file small enough to fit many songs on your hard drive or iPod. One of the most useful features of iTunes is the ability to organize your music into playlists.
Another interesting way to enhance your listening experience on iTunes/iPods is with podcasts which are like radio shows on the internet. Virtually all podcasts are free to receive and are updated daily, weekly. Matt also described the process to buy songs from the Apple Music Store. This involves using iTunes to create an account with a credit card. You can download individual songs or whole albums. These songs are limited to five computers but can be burned to a CD.
The Apple Music Store also has narrated books for sale. If you find yourself buying narrated books on a regular basis, you should consider a subscription to audible.com. These books can be loaded on your iPod and are bookmarkable. That means that you can stop listening anytime and pick up, later, where you left off. An audible.com subscription also allows you to download the book as often as you need or if you just need another copy.
The newest thing from the Apple Music Store is video content. These videos can be stored and viewed on the new video iPods as well as iTunes. Programs available include shows on ABC, NBC, USA, Sci-Fi, etc TV programs are $2 per episode. Software is available to convert DVDs to iPod-ready video files. This process may take several hours for full-length movies. Another way to download video content is bittorrent.com which is a peer-to-peer network similar to Napster.
Another capability of late-model (4th gen.plus) iPods are for presentations. If you travel and do presentations, you can put them on your iPod can be used to arrange JPEG images into a slide show before loading onto the iPod. The slides can then be played directly from the iPod.
Additional third-party applications are available for the iPod including one that converts text to notes that can be viewed on the iPod. The iPod can also be used as an external hard drive to transport or backup files and as a boot drive to start your Mac if you are experiencing internal hard drive problems.
A myriad of accessories exists for the iPods. One good source is drbott.com. Make sure to identify which iPod you have (model, size, generation, etc.) before ordering accessories. Accessories include cases, FM modulators (to listen to your iPod on your car radio like the iTrip), car stereo conversion kits, audio cassette deck adapters and high quality head- phones. Any set of headphones will work on any iPod.
One brand that is highly recommended is Etymotic. These are earplug style headphones that deliver high quality audio and block environmental sounds. A pair of Etymotic head-phones was donated to the club and given as a door prize.
Any iPod can be used to play back on your home stereo system. The necessary cable can be found at your local Radio Shack. Many companies make “iPod stereos” that vary in cost and quality, and some are very good. Apples Airtunes software in conjunction with an Airport Express device can be used to stream music to a home stereo or other audio device.
Many iPod malfunctions can be corrected with a utility that comes with every Mac called iPod Software Restore found in the folder: Applications > Utilities > iPod Software Updater. This application allows you to reinstall your iPod software (caution: this will erase your iPod) as well as to update your iPod software. A utility is available that allows you to copy songs from your iPod to your Mac (this capability does not come with iTunes) called iPodRip. This program can be found on versiontracker.com. www.ipodresq.com is a company based in Olathe, KS that repairs iPods (as well as notebooks) at their location or via overnight shipping. The Linux operating system can be installed on an iPod to give you other capabilities such as professional grade audio recording.
The meeting continued with questions from participants. The iPod can be used as an audio recording device. The stock audio quality is fairly low but is useful for dictation, voice memos and recording lectures and meetings. These recordings can be synced back into iTunes to be emailed, burn to CD, etc….A question was posed about using USB-based iPods with older Macs and whether anyone makes FireWire to USB2.0 adapters. The best solution is to install a USB2.0 in your Mac tower if you have one. One often asked question is, “why does iTunes automatically erase the music that you put on your iPod using someone else’s computer?” This is because your iPod is set to auto sync mode which is the factory default. This can be changed in the iTunes preferences, iPod tab. If you set this to “manual” you can drag your music to the iPod and decide which songs are loaded on it. This setting change should be made on your home computer while connected to your iPod. Another question is, “how can one get music off of an iPod onto their Mac?” As mentioned before,a program such as iPodRip allows you to copy music from your iPod to your Mac. iTunes music is played as separate files which causes a break between tracks of albums that were intended to be a continuous piece of music. This is due to the nature of the system and cannot be remedied. Classical music pieces can sometime be confusing because of the artist/composer issues and how the piece appears on the iTunes library list. Similar issues occur on narrated books. Artist info can be changed on individual or a selected group of tracks. iPod Shuffles can only hold one play list at a time, set the Shuffle to “repeat” instead of “shuffle” to play a list. The best solution to putting multiple play lists on a Shuffle is to make multiple play lists in iTunes and load a specific list before going to workout, etc….The group discussed the potential hazards of listening to loud music on headphones and concluded that moderation was the best policy. A question was asked about the care of iPod batteries. Lithium Ion batteries don’t need to be discharged periodically as did earlier rechargeable batteries. Batteries can be replaced by the consumer, by Apple, or by third-party vendors such as ipodresq.com.
A good resource for new Mac users can be found on the Apple site as tutorials and many books can be found at local bookstores. Robin Williams and David Pogue are well-respected authors in the field of Apple Computer products.
