How to Make ITunes and IPod into Your Own Personal Jukebox

The ever-increasing capacities of iPods these days has allowed folks to carry more and more music in their pockets. But there are still many among us who have iPods with limited capacity and who must often make decisions on what music they will take with them and what music they will have to leave behind. Furthermore over time we all end up with songs in our iTunes libraries that we simply do not listen to or do not listen to much.

I would like to introduce you to my system of iPod music management that will allow you to turn your iPod (and iTunes) into a virtual jukebox that only plays music you like and also rotates out that music automatically so that other music you like but may not have heard recently will get rotation on your iPod.

Song Rating: The First Step

This method uses the rating system in iTunes and the ability to create Smart Playlists to create a rotation of music that is only what you want and enjoy. So of course the first step is to rate your music. You can rate a song in iTunes by selecting the song in the list, right-click (or control-click), going to Rating and selecting one, two, three, four, or five stars. Now for this to work your ratings have to have real meaning. So this is the approach I take:

One star= for tracks that I do not ever care to hear. These may be ones that are specific to Christmas or other holidays or audiobooks.

Two Stars= music that I like sometimes, but do not want as part of my regular iPod music rotation.

Three Starts= tracks that I enjoy and want on my iPod sometimes but can get old if heard too often

Four Stars= Songs that I can enjoy pretty much any time.

Five Stars= These are for my absolute favorite tunes that I can listen to and enjoy over and over and I never grow tired of them. I want these on my iPod all of the time.

Depending on the size of your Library it may take quite sometime to think about and set all of these ratings but once you have completed it you will have accomplished the hardest part of this process.

Smart Playlists: The Next Step in the Process

Now using your ratings we will created a group of Smart Playlists that will combine to create your personal jukebox. A smart playlist is one in which you create specific rules that govern what will be added to that playlist and when and you can even determine how large the playlist is allowed to be.

All-time Favorites

This first smart playlist will be for the tracks you rated with five stars. These are the songs you love most. You can title the playlist anything you want but I will be calling it All-time Favorites. Create it by going to New Smart Playlist under the File pull-down menu in iTunes. You will only need one rule for this playlist. First selec the box that says "Match All of the following rules". The rule will be "Rating Is Five Stars" Below that click the bos that says "Limit to" box and change the fields to be "25 items selected by "least recently played". Twenty-five is a good figure for my 2GB iPod Nano, but if you have a larger iPod you may can increase this amount. The "least recently played" parameter tells the playlist to remove songs you have heard recently and replace them with other five-star songs that you have not heard as recently. This provides you with an ever changing rotation of music. Be sure to select the "Live Updating" box at this time as well.

Newest

This playlist will consist of the newest songs that have been added to your collection so that you can always have the newest additions to your music library added to your iPod. Go to New Smart Playlist and enter the following rules:

Match all of the following rules:

Rating is in the range of four stars to five stars (you may also include three stars here if like)

Genre is not Books & Spoken

Date Added is in the last 2 months (or choose a time frame that suits your habits)

Limit to 40 items selected by most recently added (or change 40 to a figure that suits your iPod's capacity)

Select Live Updating

Random Favorites

This list will be the songs you love but are not in your group of absolute favorites. These will be rotated out as you listen to them. Create a Smart Playlist with the following rules for your Random Favorites:

Match all of the following rules

Rating is in the range of four stars to five stars

Last Played is not in the last 3 days

Genre is not Books & Spoken

Limit to 12 hours selected random (you may make the time parameter of this rule longer or shorter as your circumstances dictate)

Select Live Updating

Master

So far we have created individual smart playlists to control and filter the type of music that will go into your final mix. Now we will create a master playlist that will tie all of these together and give you a final mix. So create a new smart playlist called Master with the following rules:

Match ANY of the following rules:

Playlist is All-time Favorites

Playlist is Newest

Playlist is Random Favorites

Limit to 24 hours selected random

Select Live Updating

Get them to your iPod: The Final Step

In order for all of these to come together on your iPod you will need to tell iTunes to synchronize all of these playlists with your iPod. Connect your iPod to your computer and select it in the iTunes source list. Under the Music tab select the Sync music check box (this will remove any music you currently have on the iPod). Then in the list of playlists below that click the box next to the names of the playlists we have just created. All four must be selected for this system to work. Now click Sync. These playlists will be moved to your iPod and once completed you can now disconnect it from your computer.

Navigate to your playlists on your iPod and you can play any of the playlists individually or where the real magic happens is when you go to your Master playlist. This pulls together all of the music specified within the other playlists. Now you can hit Play, set it to shuffle, and rock out knowing that everything you are going to hear will be exactly what you want.

You can also change ratings right on the iPod by pressing the center of the click wheel two times. Whenever you connect it to your computer again, the iPod will tell iTunes of your rating changes and iTunes will adjust accordingly. You never have to do a think. You can still create other playlists and select them to be synchronized to your iPod along with these without compromising the system you have just created.

I hope this has been helpful to you and that this system will go a long way in helping you satisfactorily manage your iTunes and iPod music. Good luck!