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"Preview All" added to albums in iTunes

Apple has made iTunes a bit more useful for surveying entire albums. A TUAW reader directed our attention to the addition of a 'Preview All' button for albums on the iTunes Store.

The store has always given prospective buyers the ability to preview individual tracks. While 30 seconds of sound may not be an adequate representation of an entire song, it is at least enough to make sure that the song you're buying is the one that's been stuck in your head for days.

For previewing entire albums, however, AmazonMP3.com has, since its launch, provided a better solution for previewing entire albums. TUAW's own first look at Amazon's would-be iTunes killer in September of 2007 noted the convenience of the site's 'preview all' button versus the need on iTunes to select each track to preview individually.

Why it's taken a bit over two years for iTunes to catch up remains a mystery, but let it. Hit the 'Preview All' button and let the music play (in 30-second increments).

Thanks pisbonanza for the tip!

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iTS

Apple has made iTunes a bit more useful for surveying entire albums. A TUAW reader directed our attention to the addition of a 'Preview...
 

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Ryan Gray

A feature that's missing in iTunes 9 with the new store is that in the old store, you could use the media keys for the song previews since the song list views were iTunes list views.

Come to think of it, you could also drag songs from the store into a playlist and play the preview from there. I guess the wishlist replaces that though.

December 09 2009 at 12:37 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
someToast

While previewing all from an album in the main window, open a pop-up for a second album (from the "info" button in the corner of one of the "Listeners Also Bought" albums) and start "Preview All" on the second one.

iTunes rapidly flips between the two albums, playing split-second snippets of each in order.

I'm glad to see them add this in, though. The Applescript to do it broke with version 9!

December 08 2009 at 6:42 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Chris Caswell

That was super weird... I was listening to Massive Attack when I clicked this article.

December 07 2009 at 5:39 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
kaslings

I still prefer the old iTS over this current slow and ugly monstrosity.

December 07 2009 at 4:32 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Martin

I just used it today. Did not know it was not there in the past. Made sense that I could use it and walk away while previewing the album.

December 07 2009 at 4:16 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
wheels

This site should change its name to The Unofficial Apple Webflog.

December 07 2009 at 3:24 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Michael Bushnell

Great album in that picture.

December 07 2009 at 3:07 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Nick Park

"Perspective buyers"? I think you mean "prospective buyers".

December 07 2009 at 2:47 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Nick Park's comment
Ken Ray

Got it... and thanks.

December 07 2009 at 3:03 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Josh

This has also been in place in the Zune marketplace since at least 2007, if not 2006.

This is also a good example of a robust webkit background. Rather than require a new update to enable this, Apple can simply code the button in. Cool.

December 07 2009 at 2:43 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Josh's comment
cole

indeed! minor feature add's don't need dot releases anymore. excited to see what else they'll sneak in!

December 07 2009 at 10:18 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
hunglyka

Knowing Amazon.com, they probably have this patented.

December 07 2009 at 2:36 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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