ITunes Library on an External Hard Drive issues
I've read hundreds of forums, but none of them discuss my problem in a way that's at all related to mine.
I have two external hard drives for my iTunes library. I have iTunes set up to read everything from the two external hard drives, and it works fine...until the external hard drives get disconnected somehow. Sometimes when I hook up my iPod, they just get disconnected and come back a few seconds later, but by that time, iTunes has lost all the links to my thousands of files.
What is the simplest, easiest way to keep iTunes from losing those thousands of links. I have a TON of TV shows that I made myself that I HATE having to put into iTunes again and again and again and having to convert from Movie format to TV format.
I know there's a simple way. People talk about doing it all the time, but none of them seem to have linkage problems like I do. I'm getting so tired of having to destroy my entire iTunes library and rebuild it from scratch every day.
The article Zevoneer linked to has a very good explanation of the porcess.
One thing it dos NOT mention, is that you should assign a permanent drive letter to your exHD before you start moving/consolidating anything to it. Windows has a nasty habit of changing drive letters unless they are permanently assigned, like when you plug in a digital camera, it could change your exHD's letter and mess up itunes finding your songs.
Use these directions and the further down in the alphabet, the better. Like M: for music.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307844
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Hey everybody
I recently moved my iTunes library to an external hard drive. It worked great for a while; whenever I opened iTunes I made sure my hard drive was plugged in. Since then, I've used iTunes without plugging the hard drive in to sync my iPhone contacts, so there is also a local iTunes library without any files. My question: how do I tell iTunes to open the library on my external hard drive again? The hard drive is plugged in but iTunes won't open the library on the hard drive. I think there is some key I have to hold down while opening iTunes (?) it's not ctrl or option. Help! Thanks
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A couple of years ago I moved our itunes library to an external hard-drive to free up some space. I got a new MacBook Pro and would like to move the itunes library to it. I don't remeber how I moved it from my old laptop to the external hard-drive and have no idea how to move it to my MacBook.
See Restoring your iTunes Backup here...
Backup iTunes to an External Drive
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1751 -
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Any suggestions?The library itself is the /Home/Music/iTunes/ folder in its entirety. Did you also change where preference files were stored? Normally, they would be in the /Home/Library/Preferences/ folder.
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How can i transfer/copy my itunes library from 1 external hard drive to another one?
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1449
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How do I create an iTunes library on an external hard drive?
I have a MacBook Pro running OS10.6.8 and iTunes 10.3.1.
I have simply run out of hard drive space on my laptop.
I want to create a secondary iTune library on an external hard drive.
(I know how to create a new iTune Library - it ends up in my Music folder on my laptop hard drive).
So how do I:
a) create or move this folder to an external hard drive, and
b) once done, how do I move my video files (television programs and movies) from my laptop iTune folder to the external hard drive?
Thank you for any assistance.no need to create a secondary library - too troublesome, IMHO. you can spread your library over as many drives you can connect to your Mac (wired or wirelessly):
iTunes > preferences > advanced.
point iTunes media folder location to the external
on the same tab, ensure the copy files ... when adding option is checkmarked
okay out of preferences
highlight the content to be moved in iTunes and right-click
select consolidate files from the pop-up menu
wait for the process to finish
when done, you may delete the original files from your boot drive.
alternatively, you could move the whole shabang to the external HD:
copy the entire iTunes folder (not just the iTunes music or media folder) from <MacintoshHD>/users/<yourname>/music to the external, launch iTunes while holding the option(⌥) key, click on choose library when prompted, and select the iTunes folder you copied to the external.
when done, be sure to point iTunes media folder location to the external so that new additions to your library will be put there. also, you need to make sure the external is mounted on your desktop before you fire up iTunes. -
How can I combine the iTunes library on an external hard drive (hooked to laptop) with the iTunes library on an external hard drive (hooked to PC) so that both external HD's and both laptop and PC have all the music on each one?
no need to create a secondary library - too troublesome, IMHO. you can spread your library over as many drives you can connect to your Mac (wired or wirelessly):
iTunes > preferences > advanced.
point iTunes media folder location to the external
on the same tab, ensure the copy files ... when adding option is checkmarked
okay out of preferences
highlight the content to be moved in iTunes and right-click
select consolidate files from the pop-up menu
wait for the process to finish
when done, you may delete the original files from your boot drive.
alternatively, you could move the whole shabang to the external HD:
copy the entire iTunes folder (not just the iTunes music or media folder) from <MacintoshHD>/users/<yourname>/music to the external, launch iTunes while holding the option(⌥) key, click on choose library when prompted, and select the iTunes folder you copied to the external.
when done, be sure to point iTunes media folder location to the external so that new additions to your library will be put there. also, you need to make sure the external is mounted on your desktop before you fire up iTunes. -
How do I migrate my itunes library from an external hard drive to my mac mini's internal hard drive?
I have my iTunes library on an external hard drive because my macbook pro's internal hard drive didn't have enough room. I would like to migrate or transfer the itunes files while continuing to keep my playlists. Is there a way to do that with the migration software?
Thank you for your help. My biggest concern is losing all of my sorted music into playlists. I have 124GB of music and resorting it will very difficult. When I moved the itunes library with the help of a supervisor at apple tech to the external HD I had to resort it.
Will it move the entire library and setting as they are now? -
How do I move my itunes library to an external hard drive?
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Drag it there in the Finder, launch iTunes with the Option key held down, click on Choose Library, and navigate to that instance of it.
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