iTunes

Steve wants to know how to make a ring tone. Leo says there are two ways he does it - first use Garage Band to make it and then export it out as an m4r file. You may need to save it as an m4a file and then just rename it. It has to be no more than 40 seconds. The second thing is to use iTunes. Import it into iTunes or Music if you're using a current Mac. In Windows, though, it's still iTunes. Import your clip and select the 40-second clip. Then save it as an m4r file and move it into the TONES folder. Then sync it to your phone via USB. Not iCloud.

Kevin is starting a new podcast and wants to know how to post updates on his website and then have that go to all the podcast aggregators. Leo says that there's a plugin for WordPress called PodPress that can help. But you can also put it up on iTunes and let it handle it through the RSS feed. There's another one called Seriously Simple Podcasting, amongst others. There's a list here - https://www.podcastinsights.com/best-wordpress-plugins/

Trip has a huge collection of CDs that were gifted to him. He wants to digitize them. Is iTunes the best way to do it? Leo says that yes, iTunes has a good digitizer and converts it to AAC. Apple Lossless is even better. It'll take more disk space, but hard drives are cheap. Don't skim with MP3. Go with Apple Lossless. He also may want to use a FLAC Ripper. It's more standard. 

Beverly says that after the last iOS 13.4.1 update on her iPhone, she has to reboot her phone to run any app. Leo suspects that the update was corrupted when downloaded. He recommends backing up your phone and then wipe it and reset your phone. Connect the phone to your PC via USB and then use iTunes to run the encrypted backup and wipe it. Erase all the content and everything. See if that solves the problem. If it does, then you can restore that backup.

Bonnie wants to get a fun ringtone and download it to her phone. How can she get it from Zedge? Leo says that it's silly to buy ringtones anymore because anyone can make them easily. Once a user has an MP3 of the sound, then he/she can convert it to a ringtone using iTunes. They can then change the m4a file to an m4r just by renaming it and sync it to the phone. That's the concept. Here's how -https://www.media.io/nl/convert/mp3-to-aac.html.

Tom got a message from his iPhone 11 Pro that his phone was almost full. So he's been moving stuff off. But how does he back up his playlists? Leo says you can do it wirelessly. Go into settings and look in "about" to see what's taking up all the room. Then, you can go into the Music app and delete the music artist by artist. But in Catalina, you can still sync in the music app as you used to with iTunes. Select Sync check songs only.

George is being billed hundreds of dollars by Apple that he didn't authorize. He tried changing the credit card, and they just resubmit the bill. But he doesn't get an email from Apple letting him know the charge is being made. Leo advises going to your iTunes store account settings and look at your purchase history. It will also show subscriptions. The itemized purchase history, though, will enable you to track down where the charges are coming from. It may also be in-app purchases that are causing it and you can remove those.

Todd has bought a music track from iTunes and has to edit it and convert it to MP3. Leo says that he can go into Garage Band and edit it. If it has copy protection, pick it up from another source like Amazon Music. Then import into Garage Band.