hands
on 2002
I want to tune in, too
Fred Teo
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Music makes the world go round and Apple's iTunes 2 leads the way. Here's
how.
By Fred Teo, February 27, 2002
Everybody loves music. From a senior citizen sitting in the coffee shop
to the office worker typing on his keyboard to teenagers on the MRT trains.
MP3, which has superseded the cassette tape and compact disc (CD), is
a digital format that allows us to download, store, manage and listen
to music on Macintoshes or the new iPod, Apple's MP3 player with a 5-GB
hard disk.
The MP3 music jukebox for Mac users is the free iTunes 2 available at
www.apple.com/itunes
Here's how you can use iTunes 2, or if you are already using iTunes 1,
you can upgrade to this version. Ear pleasing is what iTunes 2 is, offering
listeners quality sounds.
After downloading and installing iTunes 2, I was surprised to find that
my MP3 files and Playlists were intact and I could still import songs
from CDs just by inserting a CD and clicking the Import button. But on
closer inspection, I noticed more improvements.
Equalizer
Most significant of all is the addition of an equalizer. Simply click
on the equalizer button at the lower right hand corner of iTunes 2. It
has a total of 22 presets ranging from Acoustic, Dance and Rock to Vocal
Booster with the provision of saving more. One can really hear a difference
in sound fidelity while playing music through an external speaker system
or headphones.
To customise:
1. Open the Equalizer and set the various frequency bands by positioning
the sliders to suit your taste.
2. Click on the Equalization Preset tab (Manual should currently be displayed),
and select Make Preset.
3. A Make Preset window will appear. Type a name and click OK.
If you dislike some of the default presets or want to rename them, select
Edit Presets instead of Make Preset in step 2 and the Edit Presets window
will appear.
Select the appropriate preset and click Rename or Delete as desired.
Fade in and out
In iTunes 2 Preferences (select iTunes, then Preferences from the menu
bar or keyboard shortcut [Command + Y]), click on the Effects tab and
you'll notice there is a Crossfade Playback and a Sound Enhancer checkbox.
Crossfade Playback allows songs to fade in and out during playback. This
can be set by sliding the slider to the desired duration up to 12 seconds.
Crossfade Playback eliminates the silent transition while playing music
continuously. Also, the Sound Enhancer livens up and adds depth to the
music during playback, though I find the default setting to be most pleasing
to my ear.
iTunes 2 not only supports burning of CDs (if you have a compatible CD-RW
drive), it can also burn MP3 CDs. This can be a real plus for users who
own an MP3- CD car audio or a portable player. To enable this option,
click on the CD Burning tab in iTunes Preferences and select MP3 CD under
Disc Format.
The Internet Radio Tuner has also been beefed up with more streams. Double
clicking on a stream reveals a list of stations. Users with a broadband
connection will be able to enjoy high quality music coming from stations
at a high bit rate.
If you know of a website that is streaming MP3 music but is not listed,
click Advanced>Open Stream from the menu bar or keyboard shortcut [Command
+ U].
Once an Open Stream window pops up, type in the URL and click OK. iTunes
2 will search for the server, buffer and playback the music stream when
found. But, you can't save these Internet musical streams into MP3. No
piracy allowed.
iTunes 2 also fully supports a wide range of MP3 players including the
Apple designed iPod MP3 player. With iPod,
Playlist and MP3 files on the Mac can be synchronised automatically through
FireWire in plug and play style.
Key shortcuts
* Create New Playlist: Command + N
* Display iTune window: Command + 1
* Display Equalizer window: Command + 2
* Eject CD: Command + E
* Hide iTunes: Command + H
Fred Teo is from the Mac Users Group of Singapore. Its website is at www.macuser.org.sg