Filed under: iTS, Software, iTunes
iTunes 7.4 is available
After a brief delay, iTunes 7.4 is finally available for download. We knew this version would include ringtones, but here's the official word from Apple:"With iTunes 7.4, sync your favorite music and more with the new iPod nano (third generation), iPod classic, and iPod touch, plus create custom ringtones exclusively for iPhone with many of your favorite songs purchased from the iTunes Store. You can now also play purchased videos with closed captioning (when available), easily rate your favorite albums from one to five stars, and watch videos at a larger size inside the iTunes window."
Go and get it, music fans!
Update: Several readers are unable to get Apple's ringtone feature working. Also, people have had varying success with their own ringtones. What has your experience been?

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Josh said 8:28AM on 9-06-2007
Still no ringtones. You can list them in the music store as one of the columns, but there's no 'Ringtones' tab.
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WickDC said 8:34AM on 9-06-2007
A post on iPhoneAlley says:
"Songs not purchased on the iTunes Store cannot be used as ringtones. Ringtones placed on an iPhone using software such as iToner are removed after syncing with iTunes 4.7."
I've placed ringtones not with iToner, but directly copying the files into the Ringtones folder per Erica's original discussion on how to add them. I'm guessing these will probably be wiped too, so I'm holding off on upgrading. Thoughts? Confirmation? Would be pretty horrible if the ONLY way they allowed ringtones were ones purchased by them. I have MIDI ones which I love (which I purchased ages ago for my old phone) and converted nicely with QuickTime into MP4s.
http://www.iphonealley.com/news/briefly-itunes-7-4-available
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Aaron Berk said 8:49AM on 9-06-2007
I have no idea, but it would seem that if someone were to reverse-engineer the ringtone format and find where they are stored, one could create a ringtone that will sync "legitimately" with iTunes.
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ben c said 9:00AM on 9-06-2007
@2:
"I've placed ringtones not with iToner, but directly copying the files into the Ringtones folder per Erica's original discussion on how to add them. I'm guessing these will probably be wiped too, so I'm holding off on upgrading. Thoughts? Confirmation?"
I just upgraded to iTunes 7.4 and synced. I had songs in my ringtones folder placed there both by iToner and Erica's SongSender. The iToner ringtones were deleted; the SongSender ringtone was not. This could be coincidence, as the only active ringtone was the only SongSender ringtone on the phone, but I think it means those ringtones are (for the moment) safe.
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John Hopper said 9:14AM on 9-06-2007
Quic, now someone hack iTunes to allow ringtones made from any song with no charge!
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Rae Whitlock said 9:15AM on 9-06-2007
I think that Album Ratings might be the least lame feature in this point release.
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Brent said 9:32AM on 9-06-2007
Maybe I'm a moron but I can't figure out how to get the ringtones in iTunes 7.4. I browse for music and added the ringtone column to my listings, but I don't see any actually listed as a ringtone. How do I find one?
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Scott Conklin said 9:28AM on 9-06-2007
Just keep a copy of old iTunes 7.3. If 7.4 wipes out ringtones then go back to the old one and resync. Part of this trick though is to remove the current itunes library file and replace it with the old one, which Apple so kindly backs up for you in the music folder of your library. I've kept a copy of every iTunes since the days of iTunes 6 when the internet sharing feature suddenly "disappeared".
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Scott Conklin said 9:37AM on 9-06-2007
Ok. I just tried it with my ringtones which were all added with send song or by sshing into the ringtones folder in the library and they all survived. I stopped using iFuntastic as it installs in the system portion of the disk which is limited to about 110MB of free disk space. I also tried syncing with the "Sync Ringtones" box both checked and unchecked in iTunes and the results were the same. They are still all there.
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WickDC said 9:44AM on 9-06-2007
@9: Confirmed, thanks!!
My ringtones added via SFTP/SSH survived. (But of course they don't show up in iTunes.) Also, I unchecked the Ringtones syncing as I won't be paying for any of those.
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David Chartier said 10:22AM on 9-06-2007
While they aren't being very clear about it, Apple buried a statement in the Wi-Fi press release that the Ringtones and Wi-Fi store are coming "later this month":
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2007/09/05itunes.html
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avixe said 10:11AM on 9-06-2007
Recall, they did say yesterday that ringtones won't work until next week.
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rcl said 10:12AM on 9-06-2007
In the keynote Steve said the Ringtones would be turned on next week. Dont freak out its just not working yet...
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Galley said 10:27AM on 9-06-2007
The ability to rate albums independently of its tracks is a nice feature, but I would've rather seen that space used for "average rating" and "average number of plays" data.
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kch said 10:30AM on 9-06-2007
i had ringtones added through ifuntastic 2.5 (3.0.3 is NOT an improvement), and i synced my iphone with itunes 7.4 without having ringtones deleted. of course, i made sure to uncheck the "sync ringtones" box before syncing...
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mentalsticks said 10:35AM on 9-06-2007
7.4 is resyncing part of my AppleTV... why, I ask...
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Patrick Sikorski said 11:53AM on 9-06-2007
Where is the 64-bit support?
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sectionz said 12:05PM on 9-06-2007
not working? its not there at all.
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Jericon said 12:41PM on 9-06-2007
I installed several ringtones with iFuntastic 3 after a full restore. They are still present after a sync with iTunes 7.4.
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OwlBoy said 1:12PM on 9-06-2007
Good job freaking out everyone… they said Ringtones would be turned on next week.
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