Apple= Evil

afterburnt

Of course everyone should know this being that their logo is the symbol for original sin but I digress. I got this ipad to run my Auralic so I figured I might as well get the Yamaha app to conrol my AVR with the ipad. It tells me that I have to "buy" the same app that I got for free on my Android devices. I am not buying crap from them, although I am pretty sure that I am going to burn in hell for buying an Apple product. At least I can save some money even if I can't save my soul.

gmcman

I drew the line with them when they believed their products were worth about $10 per gb. Not that difficult to add removable storage...ie, sd card.

Their newer phones offer alot more storage but I like to save to a card, remove and load onto a PC.

gudnoyez

Get a Samsung tablet 8A that's what I've been using for Oppo, Tidal, and Spotify, along with my Google Chrome works like a charm on all apps even my Onkyo Apps. Simple and your not selling your soul

afterburnt

DSkip wrote: »

The app price isn't set by Apple. That's yamaha's doing. Are you sure it's the exact same app? You shouldn't have to pay for an app to control their products since it's exclusive to them so maybe reaching out to Yamaha about it would be a good idea?

No big deal i was probably going to hell anyway for singing along with NWA

AsSiMiLaTeD

What an idiotic post...

rooftop59

Yea I run all apple products and have a Yamaha avr and the app was free, works great.

It's called user error Bruce

afterburnt

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

What an idiotic post...

Ah another that has made the Faustian deal

AsSiMiLaTeD

Nah there are plenty of reasons one could conclude they are evil, you just picked one that is a) not correct and b) even if it were correct wouldn't be a good reason since they don't control the pricing of third party apps.

That being said I do work for them so I'm biased...and evil (obviously)

afterburnt

quite

Paradoxex

So what is the point of this thread?

BlueFox

LOL. Threads need a point?

txcoastal1

He's just venting guys....chill

We've all been there done that....LOL

Electronics sucke some times

rpf65

Always thought pork rinds were evil.

txcoastal1

rpf65 wrote: »

Always thought pork rinds were evil.

https://dougwils.com/books/speaking-evil-of-your-pork-rinds.html

tonyb

Evil is better defined by my x-wife. Apple doesn't hold a candle to her.

tophatjohnny

I so appreciate my Android! LG V20 loving it!!

AsSiMiLaTeD

Is that V20 the one with the good-for-a-mobile-device DAC and headphone out?

tophatjohnny

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

Is that V20 the one with the good-for-a-mobile-device DAC and headphone out?

And up to 2 TB strorage!

Gatecrasher

All devices are "demonic".

If you're not selling your soul to Apple you will be bursting into flames with Samsung!

scubalab

My blood pressure goes up every time I have to try to find a way to free up storage on my daughter's iPhone. There's no easy way to do it. I've tried iTunes and, sorry, but that has got to be the most user-UNfriendly program. Using Windows Explorer, Apple only lets you see content in the "DCIM" folder, and since the iPhone seems to store pics/videos in countless different folders (Shared, Photo Stream, Camera Roll, Favorites, People, Places, Videos, Selfies, Panoramas, Bursts, Screenshots, Recently Deleted, etc.), you can never manage ALL your photos & videos at once.

I consider myself fairly intelligent, but Apple products make me feel fairly dumb.

*Disclaimer... just venting here!

Mikey081057

Has anyone seen these..

Cheap and functional... One of my associates has 1 and it works fine.

http://bluproducts.com/home/

AsSiMiLaTeD

I'm going to post a couple things that I hope will help, first a direct response to your issues above and second a general guide I put together a while back for my friends and family.

Before I jump in a quick commentary. Although not technically an employee I do app development and a lot of contract work for Apple, so my opinions are naturally biased but I also think I'm open minded enough to be fair. I also see enough of the inside to know what some of the challenges and true issues are. One big shift that you've seen in the company from when Jobs passed the torch to Tim Cook is the introduction of more choice and a somewhat more open approach, don't get me wrong it's still a closed system but you see things now like the ability of apps to access parts of the file system that you never saw under the Jobs era. For better or worse, Jobs and team wanted things as simple as possible, users get little choice but the idea is anyone can pick up an iPhone and operate it. But the market has changed and people are more tech savvy and now want more options and control over their devices, and the Tim Cook era has moved more in that direction. The problem when you introduce choice the side effect of that increased complexity, the trick is getting the balance of choice and simplicity and that's a much more difficult task than most people realize. You guys wouldn't believe how much we obsess over something as simple as the order of options in the Settings menu, for example. You're never going to create something that works equally for everyone, Apple is no exception to that. That are areas where improvement is still clearly needed and they're being worked on is all I can say.

Now, on to the specific issues mentioned above...

First, iTunes is required to manage the music on your device, you cannot manage music directly using a file manager. At first it seems odd, but after years of doing I find it much more efficient to manage that in iTunes than manually dragging files in file manager. The trick is using a playlist in iTunes to manage the music you want to sync. To do this create a playlist called something like iPhone Sync and add the music to that you want on the phone, then connect the phone and set the options under "Music" to sync that single playlist. Then going forward you just manage the playlist (remove and add songs as you wish) and when you sync the phone that stuff gets updated automatically. You can also set this sync to occur over Wifi so that you don't have to plug the phone into the computer, when you charge your phone overnight any changes get automatically synced.

Second, in regards to the photos, there are essentially two types of photos...local and shared. The DCIM folder you see in explorer contains all your local photos (this includes photos in most of the folders you've listed above minus the Shared and Photo Stream). That folder has nothing to do with the photos in your photo stream or iCloud Photo Library...those are photos that are stored in the cloud.

AsSiMiLaTeD

Options for storing photos
You have three options when it comes to how your photos are managed - you can go local files only, you can do local files with the last few pictures stored in the cloud, or you can go with iCloud Photo Library. All of these are managed in the settings app, go to Settings > Photos and Camera.

If you want nothing to do with the cloud make sure that "iCloud Photo Library" and "Upload to Photo Stream" are both turned off. This is fine for people who don't want anything to do with the cloud but has two big disadvantages - you use a lot more local storage this way so your phone runs out of space quicker and there is no backup so if you lose your phone your pictures are gone forever. I personally do not recommend this option for most people. If you're paranoid enough to fear the cloud then you probably shouldn't be using a smartphone to begin with.

The second option keeps the files locally on your device but keeps the last 1000 photos you took in the cloud, to enable this turn on the "Upload to Photo Stream" section. This is actually an older system Apple put in place before iCloud was launched and they've elected to leave it in place for those people who don't wish to set up a full iCloud account. The way it works is that files are still stored locally and also get uploaded to Photo Stream automatically when you connect to WiFi, the issue I have is the these uploads are NOT full resolution pictures. This was not designed as a backup solution but more as a way to quickly share photos you'd taken. I do not recommend this option because it still uses as much local storage on the phone and the photos uploaded are not full resolution and it only keeps the most recent 1000, but it is better than no backup option at all.

The third option is what I recommend for most people, iCloud Photo Library. The way this works is photos you take are immediately uploaded to iCloud as long as your phone has a connection to the internet, the original full resolution image is uploaded and there is no limit on the number of photos it keeps. Once you enable this you have two options for optimizing local storage, you can either keep the originals on the device or you can keep files that are smaller than the originals to free up storage. If space is an issue I'd recommend the latter for sure, the phone keeps a lower resolution version of the file but the originals are always in iCloud, when browsing through your photos you can always download the original at any time by just selecting the image. There are several advantages of the iCloud approach - saving space on your phone, always having a backup of your photos, the ability to view your photos on any computing device or Apple TV, and having the ability to manage your photos from any device. That last one is nice, you delete the photo on your phone, iPad or a computer and it gets deleted across the board, no more deleting photos in one place only to discover it needs to be deleted elsewhere.


Managing storage on an iOS device
So choosing the iCloud Photo Library option above along with the "Optimize iPhone Storage" option is the best way to keep photos from hogging up space on the device. Beyond that, go in to Settings > General > Storage and iCloud Usage > Manage Storage (under Storage, the iCloud option below is how you mange the stuff out in the ether). From there you can see what's taking up space on your phone, they are sorted with the largest up top.

The one that surprises most people is the "Messages" entry, why should text messages take up so much space? It's because the photos that you receive and send via texts are kept in there, and this is managed completely outside of your Photos app. This is so that photos embedded inside a text string are still visible regardless of what you do within that other app. So if your Messages are taking up a bunch of space it's because you've got lots of photos in there. To delete those you go into a text thread and click the icon in the upper right and you can scroll down through all the photos, to delete multiple photos at a time press and hold on one of them and select "more" and from there you'll have the ability to select multiple photos which you can either then save to your Photos app or delete altogether. After deleting a bunch of photos it'll take your phone some time to recover the space but it will happen. There needs to be an easier way to manage these photos and the messages threads in general, that's one thing Apple needs to improve and nobody over there would disagree with that.


Overview of iCloud
iCloud is what it sounds like, a cloud platform that serves as a backup for all your information, or more specifically the information you choose to back up there. Once you set up the account you'll have the option of backing up different stuff out there. The photos option is explained above, another really nice option is the ability to back up your complete phone or tablet out there. This means that if you lose your phone or upgrade to a new one all you have to do is restore the new device from the iCloud backup and everything (apps, settings, text messages, voicemails, and even the layout of your apps on the screens) gets restored to that new phone, it's like you never changed phones at all. These backups take some space so the initial backup will take some time to upload, but after that initial backup they are differential so they typically take a few minutes. Once you enable this your phone gets backed up overnight when you charge it. If for some reason you don't want the full phone backup you can leave that turned off and back up individual apps instead, all these options are in Settings > iCloud.

iCloud is what my family uses and everyone I know uses, it's really the way to go. You get 5GB of storage for free but you can add more for cheap. I pay .99 cents a month (as in less than one dollar) for 50GB of storage and it's plenty for us but you can add 200GB for $3 and there are even higher level plans for those who want to store the whole internet. iCloud is not free, but my argument has always been that if I can't afford a dollar a month then I'm in no position to own a smartphone to begin with.

I hesitate to bring this up but if I don't someone will. Google is quick to point out that their platform is free while iCloud is technically a paid service (if you use over 5GB), and here's where my bias likely kicks in, but iCloud is not an ad supported platform whereas the vast majority of Google services are. Apple does not scan your emails or collect data and tailor advertising content to you, Google does. I'm not going to say one approach is better than the other because there is no "right" answer, the Apple approach just happens to better align with how I like things personally but everybody is different and it's up to each individual to determine what they're comfortable with.

afterburnt

I hope that you cutted and pasted that

AsSiMiLaTeD

The first post was a direct response and attempt to help scuba, second post was a copy and paste of something I put together for family and friends a while back, which if you'd read the first sentence of the first post you'd know that...:-)

AsSiMiLaTeD

Mikey081057 wrote: »

Has anyone seen these..

Cheap and functional... One of my associates has 1 and it works fine.

http://bluproducts.com/home/

That one looks nice, there is lots of competition in that price range now. OnePlus should probably get credit for proving that you can make a really nice phone that happens to be inexpensive, most of the big companies have something similar now. The Blu isn't quite as nice in person as it is in those photos but I think you'd be hard pressed to find anything better at the price. For a little more may want to look at the newer Oneplus stuff

afterburnt

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

The first post was a direct response and attempt to help scuba, second post was a copy and paste of something I put together for family and friends a while back, which if you'd read the first sentence of the first post you'd know that...:-)

Any tips on how I can save my soul?

tonyb

afterburnt wrote: »

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

The first post was a direct response and attempt to help scuba, second post was a copy and paste of something I put together for family and friends a while back, which if you'd read the first sentence of the first post you'd know that...:-)

Any tips on how I can save my soul?

go back to analog/physical media and forget you ever heard the word digital.

scubalab

Hey Danny - Thanks for taking the time to post all of that info. It is much appreciated. And Bruce, I apologize if I've mucked up your thread... but I'm with you man... I'm venting against Apple.

Again, sincere gratitude to you Danny for trying to clarify some things for me. I wish I could take you out and buy you a drink and continue this conversation (perhaps a PM or new thread is in order). You are correct - messages are the cause of a LOT of storage issues. And, I'm not faulting Apple for giving options. I just get frustrated that when I delete a photo in one place, I often find it later in another! OR when I think I've deleted all the photos (and don't see them any more in any of the folders listed above), that for some reason they are still somewhere on the phone taking up valuable storage.

Call me 'old fashioned', but there was nothing easier than when you filled up storage on an android device or digital camera, to drag the files off the device's internal memory (or memory card) to a PC, create a second backup, and have a 'clean' hard drive (or memory card) on the device! I seriously could use a 'managing storage on IOS 101' class!

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

First, iTunes is required to manage the music on your device, you cannot manage music directly using a file manager. At first it seems odd, but after years of doing I find it much more efficient to manage that in iTunes than manually dragging files in file manager.

Since we don't use our phones for music other than streaming, perhaps we don't take advantage of what iTunes supposedly excels at doing well. Although, you probably didn't mean it this way, I read your one sentence above as meaning iTunes is an "odd" system that takes "years" to understand - that's exactly how I feel...

mhardy6647

afterburnt wrote: »

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

The first post was a direct response and attempt to help scuba, second post was a copy and paste of something I put together for family and friends a while back, which if you'd read the first sentence of the first post you'd know that...:-)

Any tips on how I can save my soul?

https://youtu.be/xvBb8oUd_hE

Unknown

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