iPod: The Missing Manual, Seventh Edition Sneak Preview: J.D. Biersdorfer's Tips
Meet the Genius: Your Personalized Playlist Maker
Geniuses don't just hang out at the Apple Store. With iTunes 8, you get your very own music-mixing expert. Once activated, the new Genius Playlists feature whips up instant song lists in your iTunes library that, well, play nice together. You select a song and the Genius pulls together other tunes that it thinks groove well together.
To use it, click the "Turn On Genius" button on the right side of the iTunes window, or choose Store→Turn On Genius. Be prepared to type in your iTunes account name and password, though, because Apple needs to "gather information" about your iTunes library before making Genius work for you. Once Apple's finished analyzing your collection, click a song title in your library and then click the Genius button down at the bottom of the iTunes window. In a flash, iTunes rounds up at least 25 songs it thinks would sound great with the one you clicked. You can change the number of songs in the playlist and save it for posterity by clicking the buttons at the top of the window. These new playlists now sit alongside all your other lists on the left side of iTunes.
Buy, Buy, Baby!
Having to log into the iTunes Store and get your music collection analyzed makes perfect sense when you see what else the Genius can do. In the Genius Sidebar on the right side of the window, you also get cheerful recommendations of other songs and albums for sale in the iTunes Store that Apple thinks would sound just great on your playlists. If you have an Internet connection, this list changes each time your current song does. Each track has a convenient "Buy" button next to it; if you're prone to impulse shopping but don't want to max out your credit card, close the Genius Sidebar by clicking the small square icon underneath it at the bottom of the iTunes window.
On the Grid
The new Grid view in iTunes 8 turns the main window into a catalog of album covers that you can look at and sort by Album, Artist, Genre, and Composer. Whereas Cover Flow lets you "flip" from one album to the next, Grid view gives you a nice birds-eye view of a much larger assortment of your music. (Activate this view by clicking the box-of-6-squares icon, to the left of the Search box.) Click a cover in a particular view and then click the Play Album (or Artists, Genre, or Composer) icon that appears on the cover. Your music starts up, pronto. And if you find those album covers too large or too small, make them just right by moving the slider at the top of the Grid panel to resize 'em.
Revisit the Visualizer
If you feel like you've seen all the hippie, trippy patterns in the Visualizer already after years of playing iTunes at your desk, check again. The Visualizer option under the View menu now offers an "iTunes Visualizer" submenu with new patterns -- many of which make you feel like you're flying through space while simultaneously burning up the floor at a disco. And if you miss the old laser light show, there's now "Visualizer Classic."
Shake, Rattle, and Rock
Instead of scrolling through menus to mix up your songs with the Shuffle option, just give the new iPod Nano a quick shake to shuffle up your tracks. It's a great way to randomize your music when you don't have time to even look at the iPod's menu. Just keep a tight grip before you shake things up.
Bring Your Game --And Your Movies, Music, and Photos, Too
Thanks to the iTunes App Store and the latest iPod software, the iPod Touch is now a pocket 3-D arcade. The touchscreen and built-in accelerometer let you tap and tilt your way through games so intensely that you may forget that the Touch plays music and movies, too. And you don't need to have headphones plugged in to hear the sound effects -- the new iPod Touch has its own speaker and external volume controls built right in.
