External hard drive -- old file path from a previous laptop is still where to find my songs,  how do I change?

My iTunes library is a mess, it is stored on an external hard drive.  My old laptop died unexpectedly and I didn't have a problem resetting the file path for the library on my new laptop.  The other day my son was trying to update his iPod when I wasn't home and I don't know what he did.... GRRRR  Any songs I purchased on my old laptop are now not able to be found.  When I click on 'get info' on a song it shows the old file path from the old laptop.  Songs that I purchased since the new laptop are still playable and great.  I know my songs are still there but I can't seem to get the file path to reset on the old music.  HELP!!! PLEASE

This happens if the file is no longer where iTunes expects to find it. Possible causes are that you or some third party tool has moved, renamed or deleted the file, or that the drive it lives on has had a change of drive letter. It is also possible that iTunes has changed from expecting the files to be in the pre-iTunes 9 layout to post-iTunes 9 layout,or vice-versa, and so is looking in slightly the wrong place.
Select a track with an exclamation mark, use Ctrl-I to get info, then cancel when asked to try to locate the track. Look on the summary tab for the location that iTunes thinks the file should be. Now take a look around your hard drive(s). Hopefully you can locate the track in question. If a section of your library has simply been moved, or an external drive letter has changed, it should be possible to reverse the actions.
Alternatively, as long as you can find a location holding the missing files, then you should be able to use my FindTracks script to reconnect them to iTunes .
tt2

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