Quick Scan
The first, best use of iTunes is to get all your music into it and make playlists to create custom blocks of music.
Download PDF Cheat Sheet to view or print when you use iTunes.
iTunes Cheat Sheet
Categories: Getting Started
If you haven't spent much time using iTunes, we'll give you the essentials to get you off and running. This is the first in our Cheat Sheet series where we provide a visual graphic you can print or save to keep with your Mac that explains all the important basics to get started.
You can use iTunes to manage, purchase and play most of your media files as well as manage your iPod or iPhone syncing. Music has been the primary media in iTunes, but you can now also manage and play movies, TV shows, podcasts and internet radio stations. But the key thing that changes your lifestyle is getting all your music onto your Mac and then using iTunes to create playlists that you listen to in Shuffle mode. If you haven't done it yet, you'll find that once you do, you will have created a personal radio station and you'll rediscover the music you love all over again. That's really the greatest part.
This Cheat Sheet concentrates on playing music in iTunes, but the same principles will apply to the other media. The main difference is that you can easily import your music CDs into iTunes, whereas there are too many hoops to get TV shows and movies into iTunes without buying them at the iTunes Store. See Rip All Your CDs into iTunes (Almost) Automatically to learn how to import your CDs easily.
You can click on this image to get a large PDF version to either print or save for viewing later. Below that is the image in parts to view on this page.
The elements of iTunes: Player Controls (upper left)
Display (upper right)
Manage all your stuff (left side)
Adding Playlists and controling order of play (lower left)
The music tracks (main area)
Do these Cheat Sheets help explain the iTunes basics? Do you have anything to add that will help get a new user started with iTunes? Give us your feedback below!