Please help. I'm going bonkers.

R

RedZeppelin

Registered
I've been using a Mac for less than a year now, and there is one aspect of it that is driving me up the wall: online music previewing. I'm praying that one of you will have a solution for me.

I recently started using an online music site called eMusic. Like Amazon and other sites that sell music, they offer short previews of their songs. After previewing a lot of music lately on my Mac, I find I'm running into headaches regardless of which method I use. Here's what I've run into so far:

Option 1: Preview using iTunes. If I open the preview clips in iTunes I get two headaches: 1) I have to go back and delete all of the preview entries in my library when I'm finished, and 2) When a preview finishes playing, iTunes automatically starts playing another track. Both of those problems were annoying the heck out of me, so I switched to...

Option 2: Tell Firefox to open the preview clips in Quicktime. That solved problem number 2 above, because Quicktime will only play one preview then stop until I click another, but it brings up another headache: every preview clip I open via Quicktime leaves a desktop icon. So after previewing a bunch of song clips I have a desktop full of music icons that I have to delete.

I tried using Safari instead of Firefox and I get the same problems.

Please help! Is there a way to fix either of the options above so I can have pain-free music previewing, or is there another option I haven't thought of yet? I just want to be able to preview music quickly and easily with no library or desktop cleanup afterwards.

Thanks.
 
You should find a music site that allows you to preview music without downloading a music file first...

iTunes music store gives you a 30-second preview, and no file downloads for that.

But, you should define what you mean by 'on-line music previewing'.
If you need to listen to the entire song first, and not just a 30-second clip, then I think you get to continue what you are doing...
 
I'd use iTunes if it weren't for the DRM (eMusic has no DRM).

By "on-line music previewing" I mean just playing 30-second previews, just like the ones on Amazon. You left-click on an icon beside the track you want to preview, and you get to listen to 30 seconds of it. I'm not downloading or playing entire clips. There has to be a tidy way to do that.
 
RedZeppelin said:
I have to go back and delete all of the preview entries in my library when I'm finished...
... every preview clip I open via Quicktime leaves a desktop icon. So after previewing a bunch of song clips I have a desktop full of music icons that I have to delete.
... I just want to be able to preview music quickly and easily with no library or desktop cleanup afterwards.
Click to expand...

you shouldn't need to download the clips, should you? If you have to delete files after you play a clip, then you are downloading the clips first. There's no other way for that to happen. Isn't there a choice just to listen, and not download the clip? If the only choice is downloading the preview clips, then you are left with thet clip file when you are done. You could use a smart folder to download that clip, and then use a folder-action to periodically clean out that folder of all preview files.
DRM doesn't affect the quality of the music, does it? I thought you were just trying to solve your 'preview the music' problem. So, preview in iTunes, or some other site that allows streaming previews, then find the same song/album on Amazon for download of that complete song/album, if that's what you need.
 
Thanks, but I must not be making myself clear. I'm not trying to download anything; I'm left-clicking to play the file, not right-click/save as. If I do the exact same thing in Windows the file simply opens and plays -- it does not download, therefore I have no files to clean up.

Thus my question. Is there a way to simply make the file play when I left-click as opposed to leaving icons all over my desktop? Is there a setting in Firefox or Safari somewhere I'm missing?
 
I understand completely what you are saying. When you click on the file to preview, the preview file is also downloaded (on your Mac). I couldn't tell you how to avoid downloading that file. It's probably a difference between doing that preview in Windows, compared to the same function in OS X. Maybe there is some information about that at that music download site.
If you don't want the downloads plastered all over your desktop, then change the download settings in Safari, so your downloads go into your chosen folder, or other location on your hard drive. Then, you can clean out that folder whenever it suits you.
What's preventing you from listening to the preview from the iTunes music store? Nothing will download there, just listen to your preview.
 
Thanks for hanging with me, Delta. Your custom folder idea is a good one; I had thought of that earlier, but I'm convinced there has to be an easier way.

I did discover something interesting just now. I told Firefox to open the preview files with RealPlayer (ick), and now only the first preview file I play gets saved to the desktop. After that I can preview as many songs as I like and nothing is saved to the desktop. As a matter of fact, as long as RP is already open when I click on an audio preview, nothing is saved to the desktop -- the files just open and play, which is how it should work.

With Quicktime, however, every single preview is saved to desktop. Strange. I looked through the Quicktime and RealPlayer prefs and could find nothing that looks like it's related to this issue. As much as I hate RP, until I can find a better answer I guess that's the way to go for easy, mess-free previewing.
 
Just so you know, you aren't alone. I too use emusic and I have the same pet peeve you do about it. I discovered that if you choose to "Open safe files after downloading" in Safari it at least plays them automagically. You still have the clean up, but it at least solves one step.

As far as I know the situation just sucks, but there isn't a fix available at the moment.

Just one bit for the folks who suggested previewing in itunes: The idea is to streamline the effort. If I find music from emusic, its not exactly a benefit to then fire up itunes, search the music store for a preview, and then go back to the emusic site to buy it.

Plus it reeks of that arrogant "iTunes is the bestest" train of thought. We use emusic for a reason. It wouldn't hurt anyone to respect that choice.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top