ITunes keeps losing track of music on my external hard drive.
I keep "new" music on my laptop and my vast library of "old" music on an external harddrive ('cause there's not nearly enough space on my laptop...and not enough remaining space on my ext. harddrive to put all the music there either). iTunes is good about finding the music on the hard drive some of the time, (especially after I delete all the music and then re-introduce it to iTunes...this all takes forever and then I have to laboriously, manually delete duplicates etc.) but other times, seemingly at random, it suddenly can't find the harddrive music at all...and once, after losing the harddrive for a week, just as I was about to rebuild the whole libraray...again, iTunes magically re-found all the music...I have no idea why or how...it was just working once more. I know to have the harddrive up and running before turning on the iTunes (believe me I've tried and tried to trouble shoot this on my own). And I've tried a couple of the suggestions offered to other posts, but since I have 2 music sources, I can't do the "hold the shift while starting iTunes and name a library trick" and another suggestion of merely highlighting all the files, clicking "get info" and then restarting iTunes didn't work either because "get info" merely offers me the option to edit the files not find their source.
Thanks in advance for any advice!
hi waltm!
it's a user-to-user troubleshooting forum:
What is Apple Discussions?
you might have a bit more luck if you post over in one of the iTunes fora, like:
Using iTunes for Windows
love, b
Similar Messages
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Do you have a working copy of the library anywhere? The key file is called iTunes Library.itl and normally exists inside <User's Music>\iTunes. This is the file that knows what is in your library and each of the playlists, and holds ratings, play counts etc. Changing the media folder path in preferences tells iTunes where you'd like it to store media in future. It doesn't magically connect iTunes to any media that might already be there, or fix links to media that has been moved, or make it pick up a non-existent library file. If the worst comes to it you will need to import the media into the new empty library.
See Recover your iTunes library from your iPod or iOS device if you have any of these to recover ratings, play stats and playlists, and to associate your device with the new library.
tt2 -
I have set a brand new external harddrive as the location of my Itunes Music folder. Im trying to transfer my music from an old external hard drive. If i drag n drop from one external to the other will it automatically sync to itunes? or do i have to drag n drop into itunes to sync the two folders?
Our iTunes guru Terence Devlin advises the following:
1. Quit iTunes
2. Drag the iTunes folder from your internal hd - located in ~/Music folder - to your external hd. DO NOT delete the original one from your internal hd... yet!
3. When the transfer is complete, press and hold the Option(alt) key and fire up iTunes.
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More info:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1751
Or if you prefer a more complicated explanation:
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I have all my music on an external hard drive. I just transferred all my files to a new hard drive . How do I sync all my files with my itunes library without losing all my playlists etc and keep everything intact?
Launch iTunes with the Option key held down, click on Choose Library, and specify it. If the external drive doesn't contain the iTunes database files, create a new library there and import that music.
If the library contains any rented movies, they won't play on a different computer.
(109334) -
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Click the icon to launch iTunes
Immediately press and hold down the shift key
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Browse to the iTunes Library.itl file you want to open.
See also: HT1589: How to open an alternate iTunes Library file or create a new one
If you had copied across as directed there would be no need to move anything back...
tt2 -
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Hello, so i just got a new pc. Have downloaded and authorized Itunes and have pointed my file media folder to the external hard drive. What I'd like to do is keep all my music on the external hard drive without saving any music onto my new pc. So is it possible to keep all my music on the external hard drive but still be able to manage the music library in itunes?
Hi,
I'm not sure if this is exactly what you're asking for, but I asked a similar question once before. I hope this helps.
Here is a tutorial from Apple: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1364?viewlocale=en_US
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If you are running iTunes 6 or wish to keep the library files on your internal drive, see:
iTunes: Moving Your iTunes Music Folder
IMPORTANT: do not delete the iTunes folder or the preference files it contains from your boot hard drive; delete ONLY the tracks themselves (i.e. the contents of the old iTunes Music folder).
If you have iTunes 7, then you can use the procedure above, or you can just drag the entire iTunes folder (the entire folder, not just the iTunes Music folder) to your desired location. Then hold down the Shift key in Windows while launching iTunes. You'll be given a dialog box where you can select the iTunes library you want to use. Navigate to and select the iTunes folder in it's new location.
In either case, don't delete the tracks from the old location until you've confirmed that they're working correctly from the external drive.
Forum Tip: Since you're new here, you've probably not discovered the Search feature available on every Discussions page, but next time, it might save you time (and everyone else from having to answer the same question multiple times) if you search a couple of ways for a topic, both in the relevant forums, in the User Tips Library and in the Apple Knowledge Base before you post a question.
Regards. -
I recently reset my computer and copy my music from an external hard drive to my itunes library. When I click on a song to play i get an error message that says " the song could not be used because the original file could not be found". But when I have my external hard drive plug in the song will play with no problem. What do I need to do to play my music without having the external harddrive plug in ???????? Please help
Because the location for each song in your library is on your hard drive. If the hard drive isn't there, how can iTunes play it?
You'll have to move/copy the music from your hard drive to your computer's hard drive.
Basically, EASIEST way to do all this, if you don't care about your play counts, etc...
-Delete EVERYTHING from iTunes, so that your library is now empty.
-Go to "Advanced" inside of the "Preferences" window, found in the "Edit" drop-down. You can also access Preferences by pressing Ctrl+, (Press Ctrl and the comma key)
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Shouldn't have any more problems... -
I have all my music on my external hard drive when I try to add it to iTunes it is automatically added to my MacBook Pro's hard drive. How do I stop this from happening? I just want the music to stay on the external hard drive. Thanks!
This is true of course, but doesn't cover the situation where some files are in the iTunes Media folder and others are on an external drive. In my case I keep my music in the Media folder and all my films on an external drive (there are too many to have on the internal drive). In iTunes 11, and before, it was easy to add those external files by holding down the alt/opt key while dragging to the sidebar. In iTunes 12 this is no longer possible. There are several workarounds: use TuneSpan to move the file after it's been added; delete the file from the Media folder and empty the trash then use iTunes Get Info which will report the file is missing and allow you to locate it; constantly switch the Add to iTunes toggle on and off as required. All of these require a lot more work than just holding down the alt/opt key while adding.
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Why can't iTunes find the music from an external hard drive?
I moved my music to an external hard drive to free up space on my old laptop. Since I moved to a new laptop, iTunes never seems to find the music. I have to go through and manually select a song for it to find it one and then it says should it use this to find the rest of the songs. Then it crashes. I have reinstalled iTunes tonight with no real improvement. I want to be able to create a playlist to upload to my new iPad as well as updating music on my iPod but I can't do any of it. Please, any advice!
angelafromlanchester wrote:
I moved my music to an external hard drive to free up space on my old laptop. Since I moved to a new laptop, iTunes never seems to find the music.
Has the new laptop given the external drive a different drive letter?
The "missing file" error 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, one of its parent folders, or 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 click No when asked to try to locate the track. (Due to a bug in iTunes 12 you currently have to say No twice!) 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, a folder renamed, or a drive letter has changed, it should be possible to reverse the actions. If the difference between the two paths is an additional Music folder in one path then this is a layout issue. I can explain further if that is the case.
In some cases iTunes may be able to repair itself if you go through the same steps with Get Info but this time click Locate and browse to the lost track. It may then offer to attempt to automatically fix other broken links.
If another application like Windows Media Player has moved/renamed the files then the chances are that subtle differences in naming strategies will make it hard to restore the media to the precise path that iTunes is expecting. In such cases, as long as the missing files can be found somewhere, you should be able to use my FindTracks script to reconnect them to iTunes. See this post for an explanation of how it works.
tt2 -
I have more music than I can keep on my Macbook hard drive by over 200GB. I'm hoping to be able to show and play all music from my external hard drive in iTunes without having to add any of it to my Macbook Hard Drive
Hello B3NN13,
If you would like to add the music from your external hard drive to iTunes without copying it to the iTunes Library on your internal hard drive, you may find the following article helpful:
Add files to your library without adding them to your iTunes folder
When you add an item already on your computer to your iTunes library, iTunes places a copy of the file in your iTunes folder. The original file remains in its current location.
You can change this setting so that files are added to your iTunes library without being added to the iTunes folder. You might want to do this, for example, if you prefer to store video files on an external disk but still want to view them in iTunes.
Choose iTunes > Preferences, and click Advanced.
Deselect the checkbox next to “Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library.”
From now on, when you drag a file to your library or choose File > Add to Library, the item appears in iTunes, but the actual file isn’t copied or moved.
Tip: You can temporarily reverse this setting by holding down the Option key while you drag files to the iTunes window.
iTunes 12 for Mac: Change where your iTunes files are stored
Sincerely,
- Brenden -
ITunes Music on an External Hard Drive
Sometime ago I put, or as you will see, thought I'd put, all my itunes music on an external hard drive, I used the instructions as outlined on the Apple website, and it all SEEMED to work fine, except that when I choose "organise library" or as it used to be known "consolidate", itunes copies about 300 or so tracks and thats it, but I have over 10,000 songs, vids and podcasts. Also if I go into Spotlight/Finder, there are a lot of iTunes files on BOTH the external hard drive AND in the itunes folder on the INTERNAL hard drive, now I'm worried about copying one from the other in case I lose some stuff, any ideas?
apple-lovin-it wrote:
Sometime ago I put, or as you will see, thought I'd put, all my itunes music on an external hard drive, I used the instructions as outlined on the Apple website, and it all SEEMED to work fine, except that when I choose "organise library" or as it used to be known "consolidate", itunes copies about 300 or so tracks and thats it, but I have over 10,000 songs, vids and podcasts. Also if I go into Spotlight/Finder, there are a lot of iTunes files on BOTH the external hard drive AND in the itunes folder on the INTERNAL hard drive, now I'm worried about copying one from the other in case I lose some stuff, any ideas?
check if iTunes is pointed to the desired location in preferences > advanced like so -
Moving music files via external hard drive-- Can you keep ratings/playlists
I keep all my music on an external hard drive in order to prevent it getting lost. Anyways... what I'm wondering is if I go to move my music from one computer (comp. A) to another computer (comp. B), is it possible to keep all the ratings and my playlists? I've seen the stuff for transfering with your ipod, but the problem is my 30Gb doesn't hold all my music, and I would reeeeeaaally hate to go through and redo all the ratings. If anyone knows maybe a file involved with itunes that might contain the ratings or playlists that I could store with the files themselves to transfer that would be excellent. Thanks to anyone who can help out. If you need clarification on any of the details just lemme know.
It looks like it should, thanks. One other bit that I'm wondering about is how do I load that Library list once I've installed itunes on comp B? Is it just a matter of going file>import or file>add new file to library? Thanks again
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i have backed up all my music on an external hard drive and i was wondering is there a quick way to put it all back on itunes.
Hello, Gazzlaa84.
You can import your media a couple different ways. If you plan on keeping the media on the external drive, I would just direct iTunes to read the media folder on the external. Here are the steps on how to make that change.
iTunes for Windows: Moving your iTunes Media folder
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1364
iTunes for Mac: Moving your iTunes Media folder
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1449
Also, here is another great resource for moving your iTunes media.
iTunes: How to move your music to a new computer
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4527
Cheers,
Jason H.
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