External Hard Drive crashed with all songs on it. HELP!!!

Hello. My kids have used my work PC as their itunes playground for over the past year. I added a Lacie external hard drive to help them save thier music and had itunes on it, as well as my pc. The external hard drive crashed and won't communicate with the pc at all so when we bring up itunes on the pc it shows exclamation marks next to almost all of the songs and won't play them. I still have almost all of our music on my ipod, except about 170 songs that they purchased since I last plugged in my ipod, they have their own mini's. I want to know how to get the songs back to my computer. I am afraid if I connect the 60GB ipod to the pc all of our songs will be wiped out since my ipod is on autosync. Can anyone give me a reliable way to get everything back to normal? PLEASE!!!!

Connect your iPod to your computer. If it is set to update automatically you'll get a message that it is linked to a different library and asking if you want to link to this one and replace all your songs etc, press "Cancel". Pressing "Erase and Sync" will irretrievably remove all songs from your iPod. Your iPod should appear in the iTunes source list from where you can change the update setting to manual and use your iPod without the risk of accidentally erasing it. Also when using a lot of the utilities your iPod needs to be enabled for disc use, changing to manual update will do this by default. Check the "manually manage music and videos" box in Summary then press the Apply button: Managing content manually on iPod
Once you are safely connected there are a few things you can do to restore your iTunes from the iPod. If you have any iTMS purchases the transfer of purchased content from the iPod to authorised computers has been introduced with iTunes 7. A paragraph on it has been added to this article:: Transfer iTunes Store purchases using iPod
The transfer of non iTMS content such as songs imported from CD is designed by default to be one way from iTunes to iPod. However there's a manual method of copying songs from your iPod to your Mac. The procedure is a bit involved but if you're interested it's available at this link: Two-way Street: Moving Music Off the iPod
If you prefer something more automated there are a number of third party utilities that you can use to retrieve music files and playlists from your iPod, this is just a selection. I use Senuti but have a look at the web pages and documentation for the others too, you'll find that they have varying degrees of functionality and some will transfer movies, videos, photos and games as well. You can also read reviews of some of them here: Wired News - Rescue Your Stranded Tunes
Senuti Mac Only
iPodRip Mac Only
PodWorks Mac Only
PodView Mac Only
iPodAccess Mac & Windows
YamiPod Mac & Windows
PodUtil Mac & Windows
iPodCopy Mac & Windows
Keep your iPod in manual mode until you have reloaded your iTunes and you are happy with your playlists etc then it will be safe to return it auto-sync.

Similar Messages

External Hard drive crash - lost all music

The external hard drive where I store all of my iTunes music crashed today and the only other copy of it is on my iPod. Is there any way I can set up my iPod to transfer the music back to my hard drive without losing it? My iPod is set to sync automatically and I'm afraid it will erase everything if I hook it up to my computer. I've poured over the help topics on the Apple site, but nothing addresses my particular problem. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

*Is there any way I can set up my iPod to transfer the music back to my hard drive without losing it? My iPod is set to sync automatically and I'm afraid it will erase everything if I hook it up to my computer.*
If your iPod is set to update automatically you need to take care connecting to an empty iTunes. You can use a keyboard command to prevent your iPod auto-syncing with iTunes. While connecting the iPod to the computer on Windows with iTunes 7.3 or later installed hold down the Shift + Ctrl keys together. This will stop the iPod from auto-syncing with iTunes and the iPod will appear in the source list. Wait until you are sure the iPod has mounted, and that it will not auto sync and then you can let the keys go. This may take between 20 to 30 seconds depending on your computer: iTunes - Keyboard Shortcuts for Windows
When your iPod appears in the iTunes source list change the update setting to manual, that way you can continue to use your iPod without the risk of accidentally erasing it. Also when using most of the utilities listed below your iPod needs to be enabled for disc use, changing to manual update will do this by default: Managing content manually on iPod and iPhone
Once you are safely connected there are a few things you can do to restore your iTunes from the iPod. If you have any iTunes Music Store purchases the transfer of purchased content from the iPod to authorised computers was introduced with iTunes 7. You'll find details in this article: Copying iTunes Store purchases from your iPod or iPhone to a computer
The transfer of content from sources such as songs imported from CD is designed by default to be one way from iTunes to iPod. However there are a number of third party utilities that you can use to retrieve the music files and playlists from your iPod. You'll find that they have varying degrees of functionality and some will transfer movies, videos, photos, podcasts and games as well. Have a look at the web pages and documentation, this is just a small selection of what's available, they are generally quite straightforward. You can read reviews and comparisons of some of them here:
Wired News - Rescue Your Stranded Tunes
Comparison of iPod managers
TuneJack Windows Only (iPhone and iPod Touch compatible)
iPod2PC Windows Only
iDump Windows Only
SharePod Windows Only
iPodRip Mac & Windows
YamiPod Mac and Windows
Music Rescue Mac & Windows
iPod Music Liberator Mac & Windows
Floola Mac & Windows
iGadget Mac & Windows (iPhone and iPod Touch compatible)
iRepo Mac & Windows (iPhone and iPod Touch compatible)
iPod Access Mac & Windows (iPhone and iPod Touch compatible)
TouchCopy Mac & Windows (iPhone and iPod Touch compatible)
There's also a manual method of copying songs from your iPod to a Mac or PC. The procedure is a bit involved and won't recover playlists but if you're interested it's available on page 2 at this link: Copying Content from your iPod to your Computer - The Definitive Guide
Whichever of these retrieval methods you choose, keep your iPod in manual mode until you have reloaded your iTunes and you are happy with your playlists etc then it will be safe to return it auto-sync.

External Hard Drive Crashed - Lost my songs

I was storing all my songs on any external hard drive which recently crashed - I lost everything. I can't figure out how to get my songs off my iPod and back on to my computer or new hard drive. Anyone know how to do this?

Welcome to Apple Discussions!
You can't directly sync or drag music from your iPod to iTunes library.
If your iTunes is set for "Automatic" in "Preferences -> iPod" (the default setting), connecting your iPod to iTunes now would automatically delete all the content off your iPod. This action cannot be reversed.
Instead, hold the "Shift" and "Ctrl" keys together for about 20-30 seconds as soon as your iPod displays “do not disconnect” to prevent this automatic syncing from happening.
Now, onto the transferring. There are a couple of ways to copy the songs over to your computer.
You can try the method of manually copying songs from your iPod to your computer by accessing your iPod's hard drive.
See this link for the details:
MacMuse - Transferring iPod songs to iTunes
If you would like a program to do this for you in a more automatic way, then select one you'd like to use from this list.
iPod Access Mac and Windows Versions
YamiPod Mac and Windows Versions
PodUtil Mac and Windows Versions
iPodCopy Mac and Windows Versions
PodPlayer Windows Only
iGadget Windows Only
I hope this helps you,
-Kylene
If any post helps or solves your issue, please mark it that way accordingly. Thank you for helping the boards!

Huge number of duplicate files in iTunes music library, every song twice! Can I just uplug my external hard drive and clear all songs, then resync?

iTunes seems to have a duplicate listing of every song that is on my removeable external USB hard drive. Is there an easy way to remove these? Every song is listed twice, but one of the listings gives an error when you try to access it.
I haven't tried this yet, but can I just unplug the HD, then delete all of those songs, then plug it back in and let iTunes "find" them again?

Try iTunes Folder Watch with its option to scan for dead tracks on startup. Alternatively...
Lost & Found
Create a playlist called Found, select everything in Music and drag it into the Found playlist. Create a smart playlist called Lost matching All the rules Playlist is Music and Playlist is not Found. Your "missing" tracks will be in this playlist. If it suits your purposes you can select them all with Ctrl-A then delete them with Ctrl-Shift-Delete.
tt2

All of my imovie events are stored on an external hard drive. How do I backup this external hard drive? If the external hard drive crashes, how do retrieve the imovie events?

I have all of my imovie events stored on an external hard drive in order to save space on my MacBook Pro's internal drive. I currently back up both my MacBook Pro and the external hard drive using a second external hard drive via Time Machine. I have a few questions:
1. How can I be sure that the external drive is actually being backed up.
2. How do I retrieve the imovie events if the 1st external hard drive crashes?
Thank for your help!

Let me give you some thoughts. I can tell you my plan, but ultimately you will need your own plan that makes sense for you.
I do not think that your idea of having two separate Time Machine destinations will work. You can have two external drives as Time Machine volumes, but they will both back up the same data set. You cannot dedicate one to iMovie and one to everything else. They will both have everything, so you may still have a space problem.
One way to overcome this is to back up the iMovie volume by using a tool like SuperDuper! or Carbon Copy Cloner. The good news is that your Event files should be pretty stable and there is no need to back them up every 15 minutes. So something like SuperDuper, which you can set to automatically backup once a day, for example, is probably fine. I am pretty sure that this would work if you kept the Projects on the same external drive. As long as Projects and Events are on the same drive, then the cloning stragy should work (but you should always test.)
Because projects change more often than events, and projects can become corrupted, I would definitely back up the Project Library to Time Machine. You can do this even though it is on an external drive. (And even though you may be periodically backing up the entire drive that contains the projects.)
Here are some thoughts on how I approach backup, copied from an earlier answer...
============================================================
Great question. I think the issue of backup is a important one, and one I always worry about since I have a lot of video footage that is irreplaceable.
For back-up, it is helpful to define the risk you are trying to protect from.
For example,
1) risk of corruption in iMovie --> I use Time Machine
2) risk of hard drive failure --> I use SuperDuper! nightly for bootable backup) and Time Machine all the time
3) Risk of theft or fire --> offsite backup
Here is what I do...
1) I back up my boot disk with SuperDuper automatically each night so I always have a bootable system.
2) I back up my original video files. For my Motion JPEG, VHS-->AIC, DV, and 8MM to DV, the EVENT is the copy I back up. (I keep the tapes, but I never want to have to import the tapes again.)
For my AVCHD high def video, I back up the camera archive of the AVCHD, but I am not currently backing up the Event files, because I would need from 4 to 8 TB to back up these events depending on whether I made one copy or two. I can always re-create the Event from the camera archive.
3) I use CrashPlan for my offsite backup. It costs less than $4 per month, and I seeded the initial backup to an external drive to minimize having to transfer video files over the Internet. I currently have over 2TB of data backed up to CrashPlan, which includes my entire boot drive, and the files described in #2.
4) All of the above is automated, so I don't have to think about it too much. If I have to manually do stuff, I tend to get behind.
You have to consider the value of total multiple redundancy vs. the likelihood that 2 or three unlikely events would all happen at once. For example, CrashPlan could lose my data. My hard disk could fail. I could lose everything in a fire. But it is unlikely that they would all happen at once, except in nuclear war, in which case, who cares?

Post external hard drive crash, imovie6 files no longer open despite all data being present

my external hard drive crashed.
Thanks to ontrack, I recovered most if not all of the data, and this included the iMovies, I was told, but not one iMovie will open.
The data size is the same as when they were functional. Yet, when clicking on the icon for the movie, it opens and then I see a prompt that says, "A project file is missing..." If I ignore all, the movie never opens. I dont ignore all, the movie does not open.
My questions:
(1) can I fix these files myself? If so, how?
(2) If this is too hard for a novice, is there a company who can look at priceless imovie files and fix themquestion
(3) is this a lost cause?
I've lost upwards of 15 imovies (and the countless hours and love put into each). I'm willing to go to some lengths to fix them, including paying someone.
Thoughts/advice/suggestions?
Thanks.
Damon

I'd like to amend my original post... This should be helpful to anyone out there...
my external hard drive crashed.
I DID NOT have documents backed up properly.
....I KNOW....
sigh...
Thanks to Ontrack, I recovered most if not all of the data, and this included the iMovies, I was told. Yet, when trying to open each file, none will open.
I've tried almost everything, including:
(1) show package contents (and trying to drag and drop "TimelineMovie.mov from cache to new iMovie)(nothing happens when dropping it into the new iMovie--quicktime opens but then nothing)
(2) show package contents (and clicking on the backup copy with ~ in the file name)(again, nothing happens)
What I know is the following:
(1) The data size is the same as when they were functional.
(2) Yet, when clicking on the icon for the movie, it opens and then I see a prompt that says, "A project file is missing..." If I click "ignore all", the movie never opens... i see it loading, loading, loading, and then it stops about 3/4 in.
(3) If I dont "ignore all", the process is the same.
(4) when I go into the media file, i see that all of the data is there
(5) while my new external hard drive(S)...lol... have plenty of space, my current macbook pro is maxed out and I operate with just under 1gb of available memory
My questions:
(1) do I have any hope here?
(2) If so, how do I fix these priceless files myself? I know, if priceless, why not backed up? again, sigh...
(3) If too hard for a novice, is there a company who can look at priceless imovie files and fixes them?
Again, I've lost MANY imovies (and the countless hours and love put into each). I'm willing to go to some lengths to fix them, including paying someone.
Thoughts/advice/suggestions?
Thanks.
Damon

Please help me! My MacBook was stolen along with an external hard drive that had all my photos of my children on them. I hadn't backed to iCloud or backed anywhere else. I am distraught. No find my mac either...help...please...

Please help me! My MacBook was stolen along with an external hard drive that had all my photos of my children on them. I hadn't backed to iCloud or backed anywhere else. I am distraught. No find my mac either...help...please... Some programmes are still running like drop of and Skype... Is it all over?!?

Yes, the Old Master file has a folder for each year where I find all photos from that specific year. I am attaching a screen shot of the file.
In the meantime i have managed to download all photos (it did not download any video files though in mpg, avi, 3gp, m4v,mp4 and mov format) to a new iphoto library. Unfortunately the photos are quite mixed and often doubled up. I ma considering to purchase iphoto library which checks all duplicates in iphoto. this will save me a lot of time. What do you think?

Do all external hard drives work with my macbook pro?

I just bought an HP Simplesave external hard drive. On the rear of the package, I noticed its compatible with XP, Vista, and 7, but nothing about Mac. I don't want to open it, but I was under the assumption that all external hard drives work on all systems. I didn't think they were operating system specific.
Anyone know about this specific hard drive, and about hard drives in general if my assumption is correct?

The drive should work fine once you've reformatted it for the Mac, but whatever small portion of the purchase price went to cover the included software will be wasted, because HP will only have included Windoze software with it. And in the unlikely event that you ever need to call HP tech support, they'll be clueless about anything involving a Mac. These are the two reason why DP suggests avoiding drives whose makers don't mention anything about use with Macs.

I have imported and processed photo's in Lightroom 2 and kept stored files on external hard drive. External hard drive crashed....how do I export photo's from Lightroom when it says 'file not found'?

Folders with photo files are lost due to external hard drive crashing. Processed photo's are still in LR. How can I export from LR to a file (any file) that no longer exists? Help!!!

Well, no backups, the technical term for that is "a problem". I think from this point forward, you need to commit yourself to making regular automated backups of all of your photos and catalog file to different physical disks, no excuses.
Your photos are not stored in Lightroom. However, Lightroom does create "previews", this is what you are seeing, but these are usually smaller and low-quality compared to the originals. There are plug-ins that can extract the previews from Lightroom. One such plug-in is here robcole.com - PreviewExporter

External Hard Drive Compatible with Mac and Windows?

So my old laptop is a Dell Latitude and I bought a Western Digital external hard drive and put all my files/pics/music on it. The information the WD came with said its compatible with Mac and Windows, but when I plug it into my brand spankin new Macbook, it doesn't register with the computer and won't show up. What's going on?
Message was edited by: philliesphan

I recently ran into that problem. In order to have the hard drive compatible for both PC and Mac it must be in a FAT32 format. In order to do this though all your files will be deleted (in order to reformat). You can do this by plugging in the hard drive into you mac and going under disk utility and there you will find your hard drive and under erase change the format to FAT32 and then you press erase (all will be deleted off the external drive though)

Is a WD My Book Studio Desktop 3TB Hard Drive - FW 400/800, USB 2.0, Apple Time Machine Ready external hard drive bootable with my Powerbook G4 12" PPC 10.5.8?

Sirs or madams,
Is my Powerbook G4 12” PPC 10.5.8 'bootable' with a Western Digital My Book Studio Desktop 3TB Hard Drive - FW 400/800, USB 2.0, Apple Time Machine Ready external hard drive? Western Digital says officially no, but that it MIGHT be. I primarily live in China and bought a datastorage.com.cn Clearlight s400+ external hard drive enclosure with a 320GB disk drive a few years ago in China. My computer 'boots' fine from it, but since I got it in China all the paperwork, etc. is in Chinese; my Chinese isn't quite sufficient enough yet to read it. But there are references to something called "SATA", whatever that is.
My level of computer 'under the hood' knowledge is extremely low. I've been told that SATA has some relationship as to whether or not an external hard drive will boot a computer via the Firewire connection, something relating to 'interface', which I assume is how separate electronic gadgets work, or don't work, with each other.
I frankly don't care much for computers, the internet, or their related gadgets such as all these fancy phones. I longingly reminisce about the days when there were no such things. I use a computer & the internet because I have to, and unfortunately unlike a car where one doesn't have to have 'under the hood' knowledge to operate it, just knowledge of the steering wheel, brake, gas, etc., one seemingly must know a ridiculously great amount of 'under the hood' knowledge, including jargon, to operate computers.
So, please try to respond accordingly; thank you.
If this particular external hard drive won't, for certain, be bootable with my computer, can you advise as to what readily available brand/model would be in the 3TB range for a similar price, roughly $150ish??
Thank you very much.

Mr. BGreg,
Thank you very much. "...under the covers...". I think you meant "under the hood", as in a car. I suppose "under the covers" would be man/woman interfacing, which I am familiar with!
Actually, I'm back in the US now for a few months. I looked at the OWC web site, but only cusorily so far. I'll contact them; they appear knowledgeable about Apple computers.
As to what you wrote about Western Digital's cases, I certainly wouldn't want a poor case. In China I had over time gotten 3 different external drive cases, 3 different Chinese brands, and separately bought Hitachi brand disk drives that 'simply' plugged into the cases. The drives are roughly 80GB 120GB and 320GB. The two larger ones are in cases that have Firewire plugs/jacks, which are bootable with my computer.
So my understanding, as you wrote, has been that my Powerbook will boot from an external hard drive, provided it connects via Firewire, and the disk drive itself is 'normally' formatted with however my computer's own disk drive is formatted, (HFS OS extended (journaled) or some such??). So I was left wondering why Western Digital would indicate that even though their such-and-so external hard drive case/drive was Firewire capable, that they would then say it would not be bootable with my Apple PPC computer......
Well, anyway, since you indicated Western Digital's case quality is suspect, then I'll try OWC and disregard Western Digital.
Naturally, OWC should be able to address this, but your thoughts are also welcome. You mentioned the OWC cases are good with Apples. Would the disk drives OWC supplied with the cases also be of relatively dependable quality?? From my so far only cursory look at their web site they appear to have various options, including case only options where I could insert my own or their own drives. These sorts of options seem preferable, also along with quality components.
My Powerbook has been in use since 2004. In China I put in a 1.25 memory 'chip' in the bottom and installed the 10.5.8 operating system, which I understand are the maximum workable with my Powerbook. When I inquired with Chinese friends if my 1.33 GHz processor could be taken out and a more powerful one put in, they said it wasn't feasible because in my particular computer my processor was, as I recall them saying, soldered/'permanently' connected with the 'motherboard', that it would just be easier to get a new computer.
I would be with them and they would nonchalantly open it completely up showing me all its tightly arranged 'innards' while at least giving it a good internal dust/dirt clean job for cheap lunch and a beer (& so much dirt/dust/lint there was!)...these are the same folks who build the things of course...fast moving hands with tiny screws flying everywhere, but everything 100% all back in place when finished.
My Chinese friends also said that nowadays Apples are not as well built as when my Powerbook was built, that nowadays an Apple's life expectancy was considerably lower, so I fear that when I get a new computer that, though it will be more up-to-date and powerful, etc., it most probably won't last near as long as my Powerbook has. They also said that in an older computer the fan was often the first component to go bad, and if a new one couldn't be easily found, as they said was my case, then you're just left with having to get an entirely new computer. Part of why I dislike electronic computer gadgets generally is that they are obsolete so quickly.
So, anyway, thanks very much for your information.

Which types of external hard drives works with T400?

Hi Thank you for reading my post.
Can someone please let me know which types of external hard drives works with a T400?
eSata, USB or firewire?
Which model and brand you suggest for a 1TB drive?
Thanks

USB 2.0 is the connection that is natively supported on the T400, no eSATA or Firewire port i think, you can get these ports by buying an expansion card for the card slot (i think it is the expresscard one) on the T400.
Regarding a 1TB drive, most of the large drive manufacturers have one out, but i suggest you unless you need the large capacity, i would stick with a smaller drives like 750 gig or 500 gig since the cost gigabyte is lower. Also i would stay away for storing all your important files solely in these drive, because if these things start to fail it would be on a moment's notice, you probably won't even have time to backup the files, before the harddrive gives up on you.

Do I need to keep my external hard drive connected at all times for time capsule?

Do I need to keep my external hard drive connected at all times for time capsule?

Hi,
I have a similar question. I have backed up my external hard drive through my computer, onto my TC. When I go into TM, it doesn't show the external hard drive unless it is connected to the computer. Can I access the info from the external hard drive that is on the TC if I don't have the hard drive plugged in? If so, how can I do that?
Thanks,
Bernadette

I just got a new mac and use my external hard drive to save all my images to but whenever I go to save my photo to my hard drive it says I do not have write access....Whats wrong how do i fix this or do i need a new hard drive??

I just got a new mac and use my external hard drive to save all my images to but whenever I go to save my photo to my hard drive it says I do not have write access....Whats wrong how do i fix this or do i need a new hard drive??@

This is a Mac question not a Photoshop question, and I am a Windows users, but I can Google and this might be what you need to do:
http://www.makeuseof.com/answers/change-read-permision-external-hard-drive-mac/

External hard drive compatible with macbook pro 10.5.8

external hard drive compatible with macbook pro 10.5.8, i need a hard drive that will work with 10.5.8 to back everything up before upgrading to 10.6. a hard drive that is compatable with 10.5.8 has been impossible to find, a hard drive that works with both opperating systems is what i am looking for, any information that can help is appreciated

You can buy just about any USB2.0 hard drive and use it with your MacBook Pro. Many older external drives come pre-partitioned and formatted FAT32 for use on Windows. Your Mac can use that file system as well, but it has limitations on file sizes. You can always re-partition your external drive and re-format it as HFS+ (MacOS Extended Journaled) then your old Mac OS version and your new one should both be able to access it just fine. One thing to keep in mind is that many older OSes don't really handle drives larger than 2TB well, so you would probably want to try to keep your external drive to something smaller than 2TB...

External Hard Drive crashed with all songs on it. HELP!!!

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for