Hard Drive Died, Lost Itune Music..

I lost my hard drive and had to replace it and updated to win7. Now I no longer have all my music on itunes. But everything is on my ipod touch, can I just plug it in and the new itunes will download my library from the ipod? Help...

If you are the USA you can redownload iTunes purchased music by the following. You can redownload from anywhere:
Downloading past purchases from the App Store, iBookstore, and iTunes Store
You can transfer iTunes purchases from the iPod to the computer by:
iTunes Store: Transferring purchases from your iPhone, iPad, or iPod to a computer
You can transfer other music by using one of the third-party programs discussed here:
new PC: Apple Support Communities

Similar Messages

I have downloaded the tv shows Homeland and Dexter. They have ended up in different places. Dexter is where is "belongs" in my itunes library on my NAS drive. Homeland ended up on my hard drive in the itunes/music/tvshows directory. Anyone know why?

Several months ago I bought and downloaded Homeland. Earlier this month I bought
Dexter Season 7. They have ended up in different directories. My iTunes library is
on a NAS drive and Dexter was stored there (where it belongs). For some reason,
Homeland got saved to my Mac hard drive in the itunes/music/tvshows directory.
This seems odd everything else I have downloaded, music, other tv shows, movies
have been saved to the proper place. I haven't changed the path to my iTunes
library in years.
Now, iTunes has kept track of these two tv shows and I synced them both
to my iPad. The only reason I know they are in different places
is because my wife couldn't find them on the NAS drive.
Mostly out of curiosity, I'd like to know why this happened and how to keep it from
happening again.
Oh, it's iTunes 11.0.3 running on a MacBook Pro with OS X 10.6.8.
Thanks
Bob

I don't think it is easy to move part of a collection unless you don't care about the metadata such as date added, etc. You can copy the files to the other drive, delete in iTunes the references to the copies still on your computer, then hold down the option key while dragging the files on the external to iTunes so it doesn't copy them back to your internal but just references them where they are. You have to remember to do this each time. Either that, or set preferences so iTunes does not automatically copy any file to your media folder when added but leaves them all where they land on your computer. You can move them by hand around the computer, but not between drives.
You could try Dougscript "Move Files To Folder" but I don't know if this enables iTunes to track items moved to a different drive. iTunes doesn't really like using multiple drives.
As for using Time Capsule, I have seen various takes on this. I recall reading somebody saying it isn't a good idea to have a backup drive competing for dual purposes. My take on it is, TC is a backup, period. If you keep your movies on it and the TC drive dies, you lose your only copy of the movies.
How often do you really watch these movies? Yes, it is nice having them appear in iTunes, but unless you are watching them every day then it isn't a huge burden to have them on another drive. Frankly, if I had iTunes movies I would probably make a whole different library for them and start from it with the external drive turned on when I was in a movie mood.

HT2292 After installing iTunes 11.1.5, my external hard drive holding my iTunes music cannot be acccessed

After installing iTunes 11.1.5, my external hard drive holding my iTunes music cannot be acccessed. Attempting to open the iTunes folder location locks up the computer and requires a cold reboot to restore.

Hello, LoudenFam.
Thank you for the question. Try the steps in the article below as they may help you resolve the issue that you are experiencing with iTunes becoming unresponsive.
iTunes for Windows Vista, Windows 7, or Windows 8: Fix unexpected quits or launch issues
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1717
Cheers,
Jason H.

Using an external hard drive to store itunes music.

I have recently put my itunes music library onto an external hard drive instead of storing it on my laptop, to save space. I have also told itunes where the new itunes library is on the external hard drive, using the 'preferences' folder.
Whilst the music was stored on both places, the files would play fine in itunes. However now that i have deleted them from my laptop, the songs cannot find the location of each music file, despite me having changed the location of the itunes library in the 'preferences' folder. Can anyone suggest why this is happening and what I can do to fix this?

Can anyone suggest why this is happening
Because you moved your files incorrecty.
iTunes prefs -> Advanced and point you riTunes music folder where you want youer music to gbe located.
Then iTunes menu File -> Library -> Consolidate.
and what I can do to fix this?
iTunes prefs -> Advanced. Make sure the iTunes music folder location is pointing to the iTunes music folder on the external.
Then File -> Add folder to library and select the music folder on the external.

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.

New hard drive on laptop, itunes music stored on external hard drive...

my hard drive on my laptop crashed and I got a new one installed...I kept all my itunes music on an external hard drive, and that is ok. I have reinstalled itunes on my laptop, but how do I get itunes to read the music from my external hard drive??

When you say "when i double click on my itunes files it just opens up this list of music." it doesn't mean anything to me. You need to explain clearly, remember I only know what you tell me.
I need to understand how you have things set up and if you had you iTunes library database on the external drive or the c: drive. That is the iTunes folder containing iTunes library.itl.
What do you see when you open iTunes on the new PC, are your music files there. If not, every time you play a track it gets added to itUnes so you should at least have some files in your library.
What problem are you trying to solve? Is just getting the tracks into your iTunes library, or are you also concerned about ratings, count and playlists from the old PC. If so do you still have access to the old PC?

When my hard drive died I lost my itunes library and now I'm being told that I can't synch my ipod with new songs unless I delete all existing because I can only have one library at a time

when my hard drive died I lost my itunes library and now I'm being told that I can't synch my ipod with new songs unless I delete all existing because I can only have one library at a time

Copy all the content on your iPod back to your PC and into iTunes. Then go ahead and sync the iPod with your new library.
See this older post from another forum member Zevoneer covering the different methods and software available to assist you with the task of copying content from your iPod back to your PC and into iTunes.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2452022?start=0&tstart=0
B-rock

External hard drive failed, lost music library. Any way to get music library from iPod classic to itunes on PowerBook G4?

External hard drive failed, lost music library. Any way to get music library from iPod classic to itunes on PowerBook G4?

Recover media from iPod
See this post from forum regular Zevoneer for options on moving your iPod data back to your computer.
tt2

Hard drive died, how to get music off iPod

My hard drive died so I lost iTunes. I've reinstalled iTunes and need to move all my music from my iPod to iTunes. If I plug my iPod into my computer, will iTunes take all that music and create a new music library, or will it go the other way around and the new empty iTunes will remove all the music from my iPod?
I hope that makes sense

Regular forum poster, Zevoneer, has written a very detailed list on your options of how to do this. I need to add one thing. Once you have recovered your library, PLEASE BACKUP YOUR MUSIC, so you don't have to go through this aggravation, again.
Wrong link, let me find the right one & re-post.
Try this one.
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=5197955&#5197955
Message was edited by: StarDeb55
Message was edited by: StarDeb55

I lost my hard drive contents and itunes wasn't backed up. Can I recover the library from my iPad?

I lost my hard drive contents and itunes wasn't backed up. Can I recover the library from my iPad?

You won't be able to recover you entire library from your iPad but you can recover some of its contents by transferring the purchases back to iTunes. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1848 This will not transfer anything you did not purchase from iTunes, for example music or video files you had stored on the HD and you put into iTunes. Without a backup that information is gone. One very important thing to keep in mind. Once you sync the iPad to the new iTunes it will remove all the afore mentioned music or video files from the iPad. Do not sync with iTunes if you want to keep those files. Hope that helps.

Hard drive died, want to upload music from iPod

my hard drive died a nasty death a few weeks ago and so far, no one has been able to recover any data. (Yes, I am one of those fools who hadn't backed up.)
I have a new (blank) hard drive installed now. My iPod has all my music, audiobooks, and photos on it. Is there any way to use the iPod to upload that data onto my new hard drive? When I plug it in, it gives me a message saying that an iPod can only be synced to one iTunes at a time, and do I want to erase (clearly not), or transfer purchases.
The problem is, only a small portion of my music are purchased. The rest have been copied from my old CDs. How can I transfer those songs/playlists to my new hard drive?
And likewise with the photos. In fact, I realize this is really two questions: 1) how do I transfer music and 2) how do I transfer photos? In both cases, I want to use the iPod to overwrite the new (blank) iTunes and iPhoto.
Since my iPod contains the only copies of my music and photos I have left, I really don't want to do anything wrong that might erase them. Help!

Copying from iPod to Computer threads...
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1534227&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=893334&tstart=0
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=797432&#797432
Also these useful internet articles...
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/copying-music-from-ipod-to-co mputer/
http://www.engadget.com/2004/11/02/how-to-get-music-off-your-ipod/
http://playlistmag.com/secrets/2006/12/twowaystreet20/index.php
http://playlistmag.com/help/2005/01/2waystreet/
Patrick

I have an attachment to my iPod Classic that allows me to record. However, when the hard drive died on my last computer I lost the software that allowed me to transfer files for burning CD's or email, etc. I don't remember where I got the software and the

I have an attachment to my iPod Classic that allows me to record. However, when the hard drive died on my last computer I lost the software that allowed me to transfer files for burning CD's or email, etc. I don't remember have an attachment to my iPod Classic that allows me to record. However, when the hard drive died on my last computer I lost the software that allowed me to transfer files for burning CD's or email, etc. I don't remember where I got the software and the package with the instructions is long gone. Anyone know where to get it?

What is the make and model of this recorder? Do you have that information available?
You can still use iTunes to transfer and manage your recorded audio.
iPod: Recording voice memos
B-rock

My very expensive 2010 MacBook Pro hard drive died over a year ago (never bothered to fix it as the dvd drive had also failed so not worth it). Nevertheless, I finally decided to sync my iPhone to the replacement laptop pc and it wiped out all the music

My very expensive 2010 MacBook Pro hard drive died over a year ago. I finally synced my iPhone to the replacement laptop pc and it wiped out all the music on the phone including most of the purchases. Can I get the music back (restore didn't help)?

Okay, I finally got the couple of songs left on the phone to play by uninstalling and reinstalling itunes on the pc and re syncing. The last version I installed (just prior to my original post) failed to start due to some unspecified error?!?. Great!. But I still couldn't sync the itunes purchases from the PC to the iPhone. Then, after about an hour of googling and reading assorted posts mostly about using google to resolve the issue, I finally figured out that I have to actually download ALL the purchased albums from iCloud back onto the iPhone! There are hundreds of them, and some are not even available anymore.
Why do I have to do that when I originally purchased and downloaded all the music to the phone? Why are they all on the PC to begin with and why won't they go to the phone via the USB cable? Why didn't all the music get wiped out on the phone when I synced with the dodgy itunes I had to uninstall. never mind.
I accept that all my original music from cds and shared collections is gone on the failed mbp hard drive, but how come this once okay experience has become a trauma? Hundreds of songs to download all over again, sheesh, this has not exactlybeen a "That Was Easy" experience guys.

PC hard drive died and I have replaced it. Need to import the music on my iPod, but get a message that it's synced with another library (old hard drive). How do I import the music onto new hard drive? Senuti's just for macs.No old hard drive to copy.

My PC hard drive died and I have replaced it. Need to import the music on my classic iPod, but get a message that it's synced with another library (old hard drive). How do I import the music onto the new hard drive? Senuti (one respondent's suggestion) is just for macs. I have no old hard drive to copy to the new hard drive (another respondent's suggestion.)

See this older thread from another forum member Zevoneer on different ways to copy music from your iPod back to your PC.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2417169?start=0&tstart=0
B-rock

HT2518 How do I transfer music from an external hard drive to my itunes on my mac? I have put the files into the itunes media, but they are not showing up in iTunes!

How do I transfer music from an external hard drive to my itunes on my mac? I have put the files into the itunes media, but they are not showing up in iTunes!

Hi, did you try iTunes>File>Import?

Hard Drive Died, Lost Itune Music..

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