I think most people have a love-hate relationship with iTunes. If you’re using it on a Mac, it’s probably love-love, but on Windows there’s a lot more hate. It’s no secret that even though iTunes on the Mac is speedy, elegant, and works really well, iTunes in Windows is generally slow, bulky, loaded with bloat and services that really don’t need to run in the background sucking down system resources, and sluggish to use.

Still, if you have an iPod or an iPhone and a Windows PC, iTunes can be a necessary evil in many cases, especially when it comes to downloading updates and apps, not just managing your music. So what if you want iTunes on your Windows PC but you don’t want the fluff that Apple packages it with? Lifehacker has the answer for you, thanks to ZDNet, where there’s a how-to guide on installing iTunes with only the components you really need to make the app work for you.

Also included in the walkthrough are the components you’ll need for the model of iPod or iPhone you might have, and what you can leave out if you’re not doing certain things with your home network, for example. If you’ve always wanted to like iTunes but just couldn’t get over the bloat and added junk that comes with it in Windows, this is the walkthrough for you.

[ Lifehacker :: Install iTunes 10 Without the Extra Bloatware ]