Apple iTunes 7

One compelling reason why the iPod is way ahead of its competitors is simply iTunes. Users love it for the simplicity, looks, and the embedded online music store. With just a couple of clicks, you can seamlessly purchase and download music for your iPod.

Apple recently released version 7 along with the new matchbox sized Shuffle, the updated (and more colorful) Nano, and the improved version of the iPod (with Video). Now that the software is in its 7th iteration, what else can Apple possibly offer?


Cover Flow

One of the most impressive element of version 7 (visual-wise) is what they call, Cover Flow. It's actually just a neat way of presenting the albums in your music library. Other music management software also lets you view and search for specific albums in the music library, but I guess iTunes made this simple functionality a whole lot cooler.

Here's my music library in the "Cover Flow" view:

In addition, iTunes updates your songs' album art for you. However, you need to have an account with the iTunes Music Store. Still a good feature nevertheless, since it's free.


Updated Source Panel

Another aspect that I liked about version 7 is the source panel. Previously, everything is simply cluttered under one heading. Now, there are distinct categories – Library, Devices, Store and Playlists. It's a whole lot easier to digest as in one glance, I can figure out how to navigate around the software.

The source panel in version 6. Notice how everything is cluttered together:
And here's the panel in version 7, with the headings:



Download Manager and Gapless Playback

Apple must have somewhat got inspired by Bit Torrent clients by adding the download manager into iTunes. The Download Manager gives a nice summary of the download status of your music, videos and podcasts. As you can see from the screenshot, it tells you how much more is there to download, as well as the approximate time needed to complete the download. It's not the most original feature, but it's a nice and thoughtful one to have, just like the Gapless Playback feature.

Gapless Playback, also available in Creative MediaSource and Windows Media Player

Download Manager, also available in most BT clients

Conclusion

You can read up the rest of iTunes 7's features here. I'd recommend iTunes 7 for its nice visuals, great user experience and overall feel-good factor. Having said that, I still feel that the way podcasts are displayed can be better, as it can be quite messy if you've subscribed to tons of podcast channel. But as a music library and media acquisition software, it's really a class above the rest.

Download it for free here.

CE