Fixing Library Playback Issue in iTunes after Moving Library Files

I recently backed up my iTunes Library to my external hard drive and deleted the iTunes Library off of my HD to free up space. Now when I try to play songs from my library I get an error message stating that iTunes cannot find my file for each item I play. I then have to locate each file in my library to get songs to play.
I have tried checking the path to where my library is located in Preferences but when iTune tries to sync my library I get an exclamation icon next to every item!
Aaaaargh! What can I do to get my files synced back with iTunes so they play automatically without me having to locate each file manually? I have over 5608 items in my library! I cannot manually try and locate each file to listen or watch. That's a major nightmare. Can someone help?

hey.
finally somebody with the same problem! i bought a new external drive because i was running out of space and backed up my entire library. then my computer crashed and i wanted to take advantage of a clean drive and not add my whole library back onto my computer. i'd love to be able to access my music folder on the external and have that show up as my library on iTunes when connected...
i followed all the steps as closely as possible and am pretty confident that my advanced preferences in iTunes are correct, but the library does not show these songs from the external drive. have you had any feedback or figured it out on your own?! i hope so, i'm at a deadend.

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My library will not show up in Itunes after moving library

I moved my library folder from my C drive (my primary drive) to my D drive because I was running out of space on my C drive. I did this through My Computer and not through iTunes. Then, my library does not show up in iTunes.
I moved the folder back to my C drive and everything, but to no avail. I read the tutorial on the Apple website called "Moving your iTunes folder," and I read the first 1,000 or so posts and nothing really solved my problem. There were other posts that were sort of related, but my case differs in that I moved the folder back to the same place it was before and nothing showed up.
This happened before, and I was able to fix it. I thought I did the same thing again, but apparently not, since it's still not showing up. I tried every imaginable thing. I looked at under preferences, advanced, and then made sure the iTunes music folder was the same as the one I had my files in. Still, nothing is showing up. I know where my files are and everything, but iTunes acts like no files were even imported.
I have tried importing songs into iTunes, but it doesn't show up on iTunes, so that rules out importing my files again.
Please help me. I really am at a loss of what to do. Thanks so much!
Yours, Al
2005 Acer TravelMate 6000, 39.2 GB Windows XP iTunes version 7.01.8

hey.
finally somebody with the same problem! i bought a new external drive because i was running out of space and backed up my entire library. then my computer crashed and i wanted to take advantage of a clean drive and not add my whole library back onto my computer. i'd love to be able to access my music folder on the external and have that show up as my library on iTunes when connected...
i followed all the steps as closely as possible and am pretty confident that my advanced preferences in iTunes are correct, but the library does not show these songs from the external drive. have you had any feedback or figured it out on your own?! i hope so, i'm at a deadend.

I'm having a huge issue with itunes locating my missing files..and it's too many for me to locate 1 by 1..It says I'm missing over 3,00 songs and They are all in my music folder..What can I do to fix this issue?

I'm having a huge issue with itunes locating my missing files..and it's too many for me to locate 1 by 1..It says I'm missing over 3,000 songs and They are all in my music folder..What can I do to fix this issue? I've looked at all the tutorials on youtube and none of it works. I recently got a new computer and I Back-Up all my music and itunes playlist and I import it on my new computer with the new itunes and I go to play a few songs, it says I'm missing them I locate a few but it's still like 3,000 missing and again they are all on the computer and in one folder..Please Help !

I did that and nothing changed half my songs still have examination marks beside them
I also just tried dragging my folder of music int he playlist and it duplicated all of my songs? My playlist was at 5k now it's at 10k becuz of 3 duplicates of songs. Is there a way to delete multiple duplicate files?

Find oldlocation after moving tempdb file

HI Friends,
How to check when tempdb files are moved to another location.
It looks like someone moved tempdb files,but how to check the old location for tempdb.
Thanks
Shashikala
Shashikala

How to check when tempdb files are moved to another location.
It looks like someone moved tempdb files,but how to check the old location for tempdb.
What you want to check original location of tempdb files or when was it moved ? Like Praveen said after moving tempdb files a restart is required of SQL Server service.
If you are using SQL Server 2008 r2 and above you can use below query to find out server restart time
select servicename,last_startup_time from sys.dm_server_services
If you are using SQL Server 2008 and above, use below query
select sqlserver_start_time from sys.dm_os_sys_info
Make sure you have view server state permission to run the DMV's
Please mark this reply as answer if it solved your issue or vote as helpful if it helped so that other forum members can benefit from it
My Technet Wiki Article
MVP

How to get existing library imported to new itunes install, old library was not backed up or exported

How to get existing library imported to new itunes install, old library was not backed up or exported. This occured due to Win 7 user profile was corrupt.

I know that in Mac OS X one can pick which library to use by holding down the option key while starting iTunes. What's the Windows equivalent?
Press the Shift key.
WIll the fact that the music is now on another physical drive make a difference
No.
I know the previous install is at least 7.0, but I have no idea about which point release.
Try checking the content of the iTunes Music Library.xml file.
Finally, what's the expected behaviour (or required procedure) with respect to reauthorization of this computer to use the same ITMS-purchased files?
You will be asked to reauthorize the computer.
(28446)

ITunes 7.0.2.16 - It hasn't fixed my playback issue(s). Your experiences?

A little recap of my iTunes 7 story:
-I went from iTunes 6.0.5 to iTunes 7.0.0.70 ("updated my library," analyzed gapless playback and indexed my album art) and got video slowdown (100% CPU) and horrible playback stuttering as the main issues, amongst others.
-Upgrading to iTunes 7.0.1.8 lowered the system resources a bit, but audio still skipped (though no longer distorted) and the playback bar never finished in playlists with repeat/shuffle turned off--the last song in a playlist would play, but iTunes won't end it once it reaches -0:00 remaining. iTunes also sometimes stopped playing back music entirely, staying put at 0:00 and requiring a reboot.
Here's my deal with iTunes 7.0.2.16 so far:
While installing iTunes 7.0.2.16, it wiped out and re-installed QuickTime 7.1.3 (just like the iTunes 7.0.1.8 installer did) as well as break all my QT + iTunes shortcuts.
Upon opening iTunes and clicking "Agree," it updated my library again in the same way it updated with the first-time launch of iTunes 7.0.0.70. Took quite a while to finish, and I thought the application hung for a couple of moments.
After a few minutes of usage alongside Firefox and other applications, I can say that in my case, the new version of iTunes has NOT fixed my playback-skipping issues and video playback slowdown that I first encountered with iTunes 7.0.0.70, but a few UI bugs are done with:
-Party Shuffle works as intended now.
-The 0:00 issue with tracks not finishing has disappeared. FINALLY!
-Cover Flow no longer refreshes artwork in its pane when playing a new song in that view.
-Checkboxes seem to work again in the Podcast library.
Minor bugs left besides playback performance: The visualizer only plays back in large size, no matter what size is chosen in Preferences. There's still a graphical glitch with the menu bar when stopping an enhanced podcast, and double-clicking an album cover not in focus in Cover Flow causes the animation to start from the beginning.
How's iTunes 7.0.2.16 for the rest of you? I might have to try that 48kHz/16-bit QuickTime tweaking again and see if it brings any luck.

A small update from my first post here since this topic's getting bumped - here's my temporary workaround with playback in iTunes 7.0.2.16, and it's worked:
Upon opening iTunes, play a track and don't let it stop. Just, whatever you do, keep some form of audio playing at all times (music/podcast/audiobook) without pausing or stopping it. Then, go about your regular multi-tasking routine and it shouldn't skip. Again, iTunes should always be playing something; don't let a playlist finish without "repeat all" turned on, for example.
If you need to turn off the music for a moment, just mute the volume in iTunes (drag the volume slider all the way to the left).
I find this to be the only workable solution for me until the next iTunes revision comes out - playback has been perfect about 100% of the time. Hope it works for you! Lemme know if it does.

ITunes freezes after moving library

Hi all,
After moving my iTunes library to an external HD (I followed the instructions...) threre are some music files (not all) making trouble. I can't play or delete them from iTunes. If I try to, iTunes freezes completely. Removing and re-installing doesn't have any effect so far.
Thanks so much for your help!
Duko

I too moved my music libary to an external HD; however, I cannot see any music in iTunes? Suggestions?

How to get batch recognition of (!) on some tracks after moving library from external hard drive to new iMac (with terabyte hard drive)?

I'm using Lion 10.7.2 and iTunes 10.5.2
I have moved my iTunes music from an external hard drive onto my new iMac (with a terabyte hard drive) with music folder organized - when I try to play some tracks I get the iTunes can't locate warning and so I follow through and show iTunes the track - they are all in the music folder on my iMac hard drive - they all copied over and they all appear in the iTunes library list - so far as I can tell out of a 500 gigabyte music collection - but there are so many giving me the error - many other tracks function as they should too, some work others don't - So I'm looking for a way to get all the error tracks fixed in a batch correction way. Doing this individually with each track just isn't realistic.
Can anyone suggest how I might fix this issue?
Also, after I show iTunes the song location and it plays, I get a find files prompt that looks like it wants to find other files, but that just causes the process to jam and I have to force quit iTunes and then it doesn't remember what I last showed it next time I open iTunes.
Also I'm trying to avoid the use of the consolidate function because that would copy a whole other set of music - not in iTunes - that is in the process of being edited (audio hijack pro and fission tools being used to put vinyl and tapes to mp3) But all that other music just means the consolodate function across my whole computer would be too much.

Some details seem to be coming into focus - I have started scrolling through the main library list A to Z repairing tracks individually (there are thousands, but it's what works so far) - as I work through, it appears the problem occurred on tracks where album artist metadata was different than song artist metadata, predominantly. I'm not sure that is 100% the case in every instance, but that is what it's looking like. I don't why that happened, must be some technical glich I guess.
Also, I tried running Doug's Scripts - the one titled, iTunes Track CPR v1.3 - it is supposed to fix exactly the kind of issue I'm having - I bet it would work for some people with a similar issue - but for my case it only identifies the 'de-linked' tracks and doesn't repair them - that is at least helpful as I scroll though to fix them - I can see exactly which tracks have the issue quickly after running that script - but iTunes doesn't remember that warning symbol after a log-out, so it's only worth running the script on a set of tracks I intend to review and fix in any given session at a time.
If you are interested, Doug's free scripts can be found at
http://dougscripts.com/itunes/scripts/ss.php?sp=itunestrackcpr
there are other interesting and useful iTunes scripts there too...
also, unrelated to the issue I'm having, I found a lot of really useful and time saving metadata fixing free scripts at - hubi's iTunes scripts - the page isn't English, but the script download is easy to find -
hubi's scripts work for batch selections of tracks - so if you import an album and find the metadata screwed up somehow, you can select the whole set of screwed up tags at once (even across a series of albums), run the easy to use script, and watch it all be fixed automatically while you sit back and relax...
http://hubionmac.com/wordpress/category/softwareschmiede/applescripting/itunes/
just for reference, here is a sampling of what hubi's scripts can do...
there are other useful scripts out there - the tough part can be finding the one that helps you...
01-(un)capitalizes
01-(un)capitalizes
This script changes.... THIS TEXT into This Text... or this text
01-Delete spaces
Sometimes invisible blanks are behind an artist name or album name...this script deletes these blanks behind or infront of the strings
01-Delete x first-last chars. of Title
A Name like "01--Ray Of Light" will be changed to "Ray Of Light" and the01 will be entered in the tracks tracknumber id3 field =)
01-fix combined Artist-Title
Sometimes Tracknames look like:
"Madonna---Ray of Light" and in the artist field you see something like"Ripped by Me"... this script puts Madonna back to the right field... all youhave to do is to enter the right delimiter ("---" in this case)
01-switch Artist<->Title...
Switch ID3 field a with ID3 field b (not only Artist with Title any more =)!
01-z_filename ->Title
Sets the ID3 field Title to the track's filename)
01-z_trackNr-Filename->ID3
When a track's filename look like "01-Madonna-Ray of Light.mp3" andyou don't have the track's tracknumber stored in the ID3 Tag... this Scriptcan do this for your =)

Multiple issues with iTunes/iPhone Music Library

I have been having several problems with the new update (for the iPhone and iTunes.)
First, when I download music from iTunes, I always clean up the album names (for instance, if I download an album that is called "Can't Stop Me - EP", I always remove the "EP" part, etc. That includes anytime it says Deluxe or Single. I have always done this to keep my library clean, but since the new update, every time I fix it, I'll close iTunes, and when I reopen it later, some of the media I change reverts back to the original name. If I check info on the media, the name I changed it to is still there, and when I click "OK", it reverts back to the new name. Why is this? It is also never consistent, and it picks random media to revert every time I go into iTunes.
Also, one other issue I am having is I am seeing duplicates of artists in my Music on my iPhone. Avicii shows up twice with the same media listed under his name. What's weird, is that when listed alphabetically, the letter "E" appears above one of the duplicates. If I try to erase it, my phone crashes and both Avicii's disappear. If I sync my phone, the duplicates reappear and the cycle repeats. It does this for a few other artists in my library as well.
I've tried resetting my phone and it fixes the solution for a bit, but then it happens again. Some solutions would be appreciated. Thank you.

I had not tried that before, but from your suggestion, I went ahead and did it and it seems to have gotten rid of the crossfade issues I was experiencing but whenever I try and listen to a preview in the iTunes music store it still does not appear to be working. Also, I was testing a number of tracks and it seems like there are a few tracks in particular that will make iTunes stop playing when I click on them and then if I attempt to play something else, iTunes says it is playing but no sound is coming from it.
What I have found that is interesting is the first time I ran the Disk Utility it repaired a HUGE number of misc. files. After running it and still experiencing problems I tried to run it again but this time the files were not as numerous and were all within the /Library/CoreServices menu. Each subsequent time I ran the Disk Utility and rebooted, I tried to run the Disk Utility again and the same files seem to still be having the same issues. This is just an example of one of the files I have been having an issue with.
Permissions differ on "System/Library/CoreServices/Menu Extras/RemoteDesktop.menu/Contents/Resources/zh_TW.lproj/RemoteDesktopMenu.nib" , should be drwxr-xr-x , they are -rwxr-xr-x .
Repaired "System/Library/CoreServices/Menu Extras/RemoteDesktop.menu/Contents/Resources/zh_TW.lproj/RemoteDesktopMenu.nib" .
One in particular gave me a Warning and said it could not be repaired. I'm not sure if it is important to repair but I still seem to be having some issues here and there. Here is the message from the Disk Utility regarding the file in question.
Warning: SUID file "System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/MacOS/ARDAg ent" has been modified and will not be repaired.

How do you restore your playlists on iTunes after moving data to external hard drive and the playlists are deleted?

after moving everything to an external hard drive, is there a way to restore the playlists you've already created if they're not there anymore?

If you moved the iTunes folder to your external drive, you moved the iTunes library file - iTunes Library.itl, which is in that folder.
You need to tell iTunes where it is, start iTunes with the shift key held down and iTunes should ask you to choose a library.

Is there a way to easily locate original files in iTunes after moving everything to an external harddrive?

I recently moved my itunes folder (everything including library and music folders) from my computer harddrive to an external harddrive. I was able to find the library and it opens, but the music (all 7000+ songs) gives me this error. "The song “Beautiful People” could not be used because the original file could not be found. Would you like to locate it?" I know I cannot go and hand pick each artist folder and song, but this would take me forever! I have also changed the location via the preferences. I know all my music is in my folder on the external drive, so is there a way to easily fix this?
My path looks like External drive--Music folder--iTunes folder...Inside this folder are hundreds of folders (every different musician has its own folder and if there are two or more cds by same artist they are within the artist's folder) and my itunes library files and my automatically added to itunes folder and several itbd folders etc.
Please help!

"including library and music folders) from my computer"
Did you move the entire iTunes folder the hold Option, select Choose library and select the iTunes folder you moved?

Horrible playback issues with iTunes 8 and Airport Express over Wifi

Hello folks,
I just upgraded to iTunes 8, and since then, I've been unable to get good playback from my Airport Express with iTunes on my Macbook Pro.
I get between 5-30 seconds of continuous playback, then a hiccup, ad nauseum, ad inifintum. A five minute track usually ends up taking six-seven minutes to complete, and it's like listening to a CD skip.
Both the Macbook Pro and the Airport Express are communicating over 802.11n, and worked well before the upgrade to iTunes 8. On my older, slower, crappier Powerbook which only has 802.11g but runs iTunes 7 (in the same room, about two feet from the other laptop), playback is rock solid.
I've noticed when I monitor the WLAN interface on my MBP with 'netstat -in', I'm seeing a lot of Ierrs, but there's nothing in any of the system logs to indicate a hardware problem (yet, anyway).
Has anyone else had this issue since upgrading? Should I be looking to get my WLAN NIC fixed, or is it an issue with iTunes 8? Are there diagnostic applications I can use to perform hardware confidence tests on the WLAN NIC?
cheers,
Klaus

My AirPort Express optical out has this problem as well, stutter and very bad sound. But only the new 802.11n modell. A older 802.11g model works without a problem.
It worked well until I upgraded to iTunes 8, I bought in in May.
I just had my AirPort Express 802.11n replaced under warranty by Apple but the new unit has the same problem.
Everyone who is using the optical out and have the stutter problem needs to write to Apple about it so they realize it's a problem and fix it.
http://www.apple.com/feedback/airportexpress.html

Missing album art after moving library

Hi,
I had to move my iTunes library to my new computer. The music files were then place on the H:-drive instead of the D:-drive. I also copied the iTunes folder from my old computer over to my new compuer's My Music folder - just as it was located on my old computer.
iTunes had no problem locating the music files, but it appears that all the album art is missing. I have checked that my Album Artwork folder is copied as well.
Is there any quickfix to this, or do I have to reload all the album artwork? There were quite a few albums for which I had located the art manually (not using iTunes) so it's a shame if it's all lost
Any help is appreciated.
thanks and regards,
Svein-Helge Lea

It's solved !!
It was really silly of me not to see this immediately. On my old computer I had the small album art window showing "selected item", but after moving to my new computer it showed "Now playing". And last night I wasn't playing, hence nothing showed up there.
Now evertything is okay and in place.
Thanks anyway.
S-H

Cannot open iTunes after moving to new Mac

I just replaced my original MacBook with one of the new ones, the aluminum 2.0 GHz one with the RAM upgraded to 4 GB. I had everything on the hard drive of my old computer transferred to the new computer by the staff at the Apple store.
However, now when I try to open iTunes, I get a message saying, "The file "iTunes Library" cannot be read because it was created by a newer version of iTunes," and no iTunes window. Every iTunes menu option is grayed over except for "Hide iTunes" and "Hide others", so I can't check for updates. When I click OK to the message saying "The file "iTunes Library" cannot be read because it was created by a newer version of iTunes," iTunes closes.
Does anyone know how to fix this?

Update you iTunes by running Software Update (Apple Menu-> Software Update) or going to http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/

Backed up library onto external hd - want to get music bk into itunes lib - moved 2 files library.itl and library.xml but reverts bk to 5kb and 11kb (ie. no music)

I backed up library onto external drive. (itunes directory - with Album artwork, itunes music directory, and xml/itl files)
Now I am trying to upload music back to a new Windows XP computer - I have new itunes version.
First I moved/copied the itunes directory whole to the new computer - then opened itunes and the library.itl and library.xml reverted to 5 and 11kb
Then tried just moving those two files - still nothing
Help - as I have over 28MB of music I am trying to recover.
Thanks,

The "missing file" thing 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 a drive letter has changed, it should be possible to reverse the actions. I can provide a step by step guide if you give me the two paths.
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

Fixing Library Playback Issue in iTunes after Moving Library Files

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