About Me: My primary mission will be to guide readers in the quest to master their Apple gear. In addition, I’ll be reviewing accessories, gadgets and consumer electronics and providing commentary on the world of consumer technology. I began my career at the Richard Ivey Business School in Canada, transitioned to running the product management team at one of Canada’s largest financial technology companies and finished out office life as a senior research analyst. Along the way I got my Apple certification and began amassing cool gear. For the past decade I have been writing about technology-related subjects, contributing to outlets that include: Wired, InvestorPlace Media, MSN Money, Shaw Media, About.com and a weekly tech column in The Winnipeg Free Press. In addition I am the computing solution editor for Best Buy Canada’s Plug-in blog and one of the original writers for the award-winning GeekDad blog. The author is a Forbes contributor.

The opinions expressed are those of the writer. (Credit: Shutterstock) Yes, Apple Will Deduct Your Apple Music Monthly Subscription From Your iTunes Balance There has been a lot of confusion over Apple Music subscription billing, in particular whether Apple will deduct the monthly fee from an iTunes account balance, or always bill your credit card instead. The definitive answer is yes, if you have iTunes credit, Apple will use that to cover your Apple Music Fee. Here’s how it works.

Once you get beyond your three month free trial, on the anniversary of your start date (which now becomes your Apple Music billing date), Apple will check your iTunes account balance. If there are funds available to cover the monthly fee, it gets deducted from your iTunes account. If not, Apple will bill the credit card you have on file instead. As you can see, my Apple Music family plan monthly fee was deducted from my iTunes Store balance (Credit: screen capture by Brad Moon), if you have sufficient credit in iTunes to partially cover the cost, that gets deducted first and the remaining balance owing gets charged to your credit card.

If you don’t have a sufficient iTunes balance to cover the entire fee and your credit card is no longer valid, it looks as though your Apple Music subscription gets put on hold –only that first three months is free. Also, it doesn’t appear that there’s any way to prevent Apple from hitting that iTunes balance as the first choice for payment, so you can’t force it to always bill a credit card instead.

If you don’t keep an iTunes balance, this is a non-issue, but it might catch some people off guard who added gift cards to their account with the intention of buying apps or movies. RECOMMENDED BY FORBES.

If you buy HomePod and do not have a subscription to either of Apple's streaming services — Apple Music or iTunes Match — you'll be able to use the following audio-based features. Siri requests You can ask Siri to play the following:. Any podcast or episode from Apple's iTunes podcast directory. The news. Any song, album, or audiobook purchased through your Apple ID associated with the device (which you can change at any time in the Home app). Beats 1 and other live radio stations You'll also be able to use Siri to play, pause, skip songs, and the like. And all the other Siri features advertised (HomeKit, timers, weather, traffic, etc) work, too.

Stream other audio via AirPlay Even though HomePod doesn't ship with, it can still receive audio from any device that can AirPlay. That includes your Macs, Apple TV, iPhones, and iPads, along with any third-party apps that support the feature (including and things like ). I want to reiterate, because I've seen a number of people passing around conflicting information: You can stream any audio (including anything from your iTunes library on your Mac) to HomePod via the original AirPlay protocol. When AirPlay 2 launches, you'll be able to stream that audio to multiple AirPlay-compatible speakers, but the AirPlay 2 protocol is not required to stream audio from your Mac or other sources.

What does this all mean in practice if you're not an Apple Music subscriber? Essentially, you'll just have to use one of your devices to AirPlay content to your HomePod instead of using Siri to request it. You'll miss out on a lot of the Siri-specific music features, but it's not the end of the world if you're primarily interested in HomePod as a speaker and for its better privacy implementations than other smart speakers. If you only subscribe to iTunes Match. If you only subscribe to iTunes Match, you'll have full access to your iCloud Music Library (any songs you've uploaded or matched). Siri requests You can ask Siri to play the following:. Any song, album, or playlist from iCloud Music Library.

Any podcast or episode from Apple's iTunes podcast directory. The news.

Any song, album, or audiobook purchased through your Apple ID associated with the device (which you can change at any time in the Home app). Beats 1 and other live radio stations You'll also be able to use Siri to play, pause, skip songs, and the like. And all the other Siri features advertised (HomeKit, timers, weather, traffic, etc) work, too. Stream other audio via AirPlay Like, you'll still be able to AirPlay any song from your Mac, iPhone, or iPad via iTunes or a compatible third-party app. If you subscribe to Apple Music.

If you subscribe to Apple Music, you have access to pretty much all the audio controls that Apple offers for HomePod. That includes Siri requests Any Siri command that works with Apple Music works on HomePod, including asking for specific songs, asking to play music from a certain genre or band, off the charts, programmatic radio, and more. (If you want a more in-depth overview, I'd check Apple's, as the commands are nigh-similar.) Additionally, Apple Music subscribers will be able to access any track or playlist from their iCloud Music Library by requesting it from Siri by asking 'play my music,' or 'play my music from x.'

Can Itunes For Macbook Pro

You can also ask Siri to play the following:. Any podcast or episode from Apple's iTunes podcast directory. The news. Any song, album, or audiobook purchased through your Apple ID associated with the device (which you can change at any time in the Home app). Beats 1 and other live radio stations And you'll be able to use Siri to play, pause, skip songs, and the like; all the other Siri features advertised (HomeKit, timers, weather, traffic, etc) work, too. AirPlay As with, any device or app that supports AirPlay can send that audio to HomePod — you just won't be able to request that connection with your voice.

Why does Apple support FLAC for HomePod when iTunes doesn't stream FLAC files? Despite Apple listing Bluetooth 5.0 as part of HomePod's specifications, I haven't heard anything that would lead me to believe it can be used as a Bluetooth speaker — AirPlay only.

To my knowledge, Bluetooth 5.0 is in there to aid in the setup process, but again, I don't yet have confirmation on this so can't state definitively. Other questions? Let me know below or and I'll try to answer them. Updated January 29 2018: Added confirmation on iCloud Music Library over Siri for Apple Music and iTunes Match subscribers.