Copying old iTunes library onto a new hard drive: special question:

Question

How do i do this when the music in my old iTunes library was not all in the itunes media folder (some was in downloads, shared folder, etc). Should I put these folders in the places where they were on my old hard drive (for example the "shared" folder was on the desktop) or should i just put everything into the iTunes media folder. My main goal here is to recreate my old itunes library with the playlists intact while also having all the songs recognized (none of those exclamation points because it cant locate the file). Sorry to repeat myself but I just want to make it clear because i dont want this to mess up. Should i put all my music into the itunes media folder for it to show up in the old library, or should I keep it in the folders it always was in and just place those folders in the same locations on this hard drive? Thanks for any help

Answer 1

The solution you linked to looks good, but I'm a bit
confused about if it'll work for my situation - I'll
be putting Vista on a new drive (completely clean
install, not an upgrade), which means that iTunes
will be cleanly installed as well. The way I'm
reading it, it seems the solution there needs an
iTunes install that already interacts with the old
library.
Right, and the way you do this is to hold down the shift key while starting iTunes. (Note: this does not mean holding down the shift key while you click on the icon. It means holding it down immediately after that while the program is starting up.) This will bring up a dialog asking what iTunes library you want to use. Point to the old library, and you're in business.
Let me know if this will work: I drag and drop my
whole music folder to the new drive, then in iTunes I
go to File --> Import and import the itl or xml file.
I've heard this might not work because the xml file
has pathways that refer to a specific drive letter
which will be different.
That's correct. You can edit the XML to fix the pathnames, but I wouldn't recommend that unless editing XML is something you do regularly.