Library constantly screws up my song info

OK this has really been bugging me. I sorted my girlfriend's ENTIRE library (artist, track #, etc) and it randomly glitched up. So I finally got around again to fixing it all, but now its messing up again. It'll resort back to its old composer, delete the "of" part of tracks (like it says "1" instead of "1 of 5") and artwork will delete, and most weird of all, the comment section has weird stuff like "0000035C 0000035D 000041E9 000041E9 00024CC0 00024CC0 00008000 00008000 00012ADD 00012ADD". I searched the forums, couldn't find anything like this, but I am almost done with iTunes... this has really been bugging me. It'll be the third time I'll have to fix this.

Hello!
Go into WMP and change the setting to get info from the internet.
Look on the general, privacy, and library tabs for all 3 places where WMP can do this.
What is happening, is WMP is making these changes in the background. Next time you you look at one of those tracks in itunes though, it seems as if itunes was the program doing it....but all itunes is doing is reading the tag that WMP changed.
I know from bitter experience after taking a WMP update and having those settings turned back to their defaults to get info from the internet. I played a song sample in WMP and BAM! It changed about 500 tracks of mine, randomly. Thank god it didn't do it to all of my 30K tracks. I haven't seen it since I turned that bad setting off.

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How do I transfer song info in iTunes Library back to mp3 files?

1. some info of my songs in my itunes library is different from the info stored in the respective mp3 files
2. I want the song info in the itunes library to be preserved
3. but when I play a song in iTunes, iTunes would automatically obtain song info from the mp3 file and update iTunes Library.
4. And I have many files like that
Quesiton: Is there a way I could transfer the song info in my itunes library back into the mp3 files?
thanks a lot if anyone has any idea!!

The album, artist, etc information displayed in the iTunes library comes from the ID3 tags in the MP3 song files. If you change it in iTunes (using Get Info), iTunes updates the file. iTunes does not automatically change it.
There may be other programs running that are changing it, e.g. the automatic setting in Windows Media Player.

Updating song info from iPod to iTunes Library

I've got an iPod Video 60GB. I manually control the content on my iPod and iTunes. I listen to my iPod at work all the time and rarely listen to music on my computer. How do I get iTunes to update my Library with the play count, song rating, and last played data from my iPod?

To move your library see this migrate iTunes library post.
If it is only the media on the external drive see Make a split library portable.
You should make your edits in iTunes, and backup the library against problems.
Automatic syncing is generally easier, but if you edit in iTunes and then drag & drop updated files to the device, the updated files should replace the originals. Dragging songs the other way is not supported.
If you want to try extracting the updated tracks from your device see Recover your iTunes library from your iPod or iOS device.
tt2

HT1751 I need to uninstall and reinstall iTunes (it won't let me update). So, how do I copy or back up my iTunes library of over 1,500 songs? Can I use a Flash Drive to do so?

I need to uninstall and reinstall iTunes (it won't let me update). I have IE 8 on Windows XP, and iTunes 10 something. In my Program files list I see iTunes and iTunes (2) and even iPod and iPod (2) where a tech had to back up and do this for me before. I'm just trying to fix it all. I keep getting the "The feature you are trying to use is on a network resource that is unavailable. Click OK to try again, or enter an alternate path to a folder containing the installation package 'iTunes.msi' in the box below." I can even run a search and find the folder, but it gives me the same error message. I was planning on using the Microsoft Fix-It tool to help uninstall then Reinstall iTunes. But I need to backup my library. So, how do I copy or back up my iTunes library of over 1,500 songs? Can I copy the folder to desktop or can I use a Flash Drive to backup my music? I don't want to do anything until I know for sure how I can backup my songs, and then reinstall them into iTunes. Thanks for any help.

Ok, thanks that helps. I don't have an external hard drive though. What about backing up through 'the cloud'? I'm just wondering since my husband syncs his iPod to the PC through iTunes and he's worried that he will lose all the songs on his iPod if the library is lost from iTunes and he tries to 'sync' it up again. I'm not exactly sure how to 'copy the entire iTunes folder' either. I kinda suck at this unless I have step by step instructions, which I haven't found yet on iTunes help or other sources.
The only way I know how to back anything up is by going back to a restore point, etc. (as stated before, we don't have an external hard drive.)
Thanks for the info.

Mp3 tagging song info rename revert PROBLEM!!!

Hi guys,
I can see that there are loads of people who have the same problem as me. That is... that itunes is a mp3 tagging nightmare. The problem is simple. after editing song information in itunes. sometime later, itunes will happily revert or change the info back to the original file name or only display a portion of it. Im sure you guys know what im talking bout. Someone suggested that u edit the ID3 tags with an external program. However, what i dont understand is that, my itunes last time had no problem whatsoever displaying the correctly edited song information. Suddenly, now it decides to randomly change whatever it feels like. Also, it is extremely troublesome to externally edit the song info. The whole point of itunes is to make it convenient and simple to use. What is the point of having itunes only to have to use another program to edit the info??? I have seen numerous other threads with the same problem as me. What frustrates me is that... why is Apple not doing anything bout it? and why arent they posting any solutions or answers as to why their fantastic software is behaving like a spoilt kid. Why are there no answers. It is NOT a small program. I have about 10000 songs and countless CDs. You cannot imagine what a headache it is to have spent months and months of carefully and meticulously editing the song info in itunes to perfection, only to start it up one day and find that 5000 songs are incorrectly named.
For Apple, this is just simply unacceptable.

Hey guys, i got this from the WMP help file...
"Update my music files (WMA and MP3 files) by retrieving missing media information from the Internet
Specifies that the Player automatically obtain and update missing media information for music files that are added to or are in Media Library, if the information is available. By default, the music files in your My Music folder are added to Media Library.
The Player attempts to update any missing media information in your music files by sending data about the files to a database operated by WindowsMedia.com if this check box is selected and you perform any of the following actions:
Use Media Library for the first time after updating the Player
Add files to Media Library by searching your computer
Add files to monitored folders, such as My Music
For example, if you have music files that contain the artist name but not the album name, the Player adds the album name to the file after retrieving the information from the database.
The Player also adds album art to files and music folders in your My Music folder."
In light of this information, wouldnt it be fair to say that WMp will only rename the files if they are physically added by the user in WMP? If i am not using WMP to play my mp3s, then why would WMP still be tracking and altering the file names?

I've imported several CDs that are "collections", with songs by various artists. Only a PORTION of the song info appears in iTunes, and, when a song is "clicked-on" to play it, a message appears that the "song could not be found". Any ideas ?

The CDs are imported into the "iTunes Media" folder, under "Compilations". Each CD has a folder, with the name of the CD. However, EACH SONG in the folder is assigned a sequential number as a prefix before the song's name. For example "2-1 Sunshine of Your Love." This prefix, I believe, prevents the song from being imported into the iTunes library. The song's name appears in the iTunes library (with the number prefix), BUT no other song info (artist, CD name, time, etc.) shows in the iTunes library. I am NOT designating these CD's as "complilations", but somehow, iTunes is arbitrarily assigning them to this "Compilations" folder, and then assigning sequential numbers to each song. I am confused. (My only remedy is to MANUALLY remove the prefix number from each song in the CD folder, within the COMPILATIONS folder, then "re-import" it into iTunes. Cumbersome.) Thanks in advance for any opinion, tips or guidance.

The numeric prefixes in filenames are probably the optional disc number, followed by the track number. iTunes will pick up the Compilation flag from the Gracenote CDDB database if you ripped the tracks with iTunes, or the flag may have been set earlier if these are existing tracks you have imported into a new library. The iTunes naming convention is <Artist>\<Album>\[<D#>-]<T##> <Name>.<Ext> where Album Artist is used instead of Artist if not blank, and Compliations is used instead of Artist when Part of a compilation is true. Empty Artist or Album values are replaced with Unknown Artist or Unknown Album respectively. With Windows, file and folder names are limited to 40 characters. If more than one file is added with the same details subsequent tracks get suffixes to separate them.
If iTunes can't find a file that usually means that it has been moved after it was added to the library. Select a single broken track and press CTRL+I to Get Info. Look on the summary tab at the location that iTunes expects to find the file. Where is it really? Post back both paths and I might be able to figure out what has happened, and suggest a fix.
tt2

I just downloaded itunes 10.6 and it will not allow me to edit song info! Why?

why won't itunes 10.6 allow me to edit song info?

Have you moved your iTunes library recently? Are you using a different profile?
Right-click on your main iTunes folder and click Properties, then go to the Security tab and click Advanced. If necessary grant your account and SYSTEM full control of this folder, subfolders and files, then tick the option to replace permissions on child objects which will repair permissions throughout the library. This is the XP dialog but Windows 7 shouldn't be too different.
If it won't let you change the permissions use the Owner tab to take ownership from an account with administer privileges.
Also in iTunes properties tap the read-only check box until it clears, then click OK. When prompted apply the change to the folder and all files and subfolders.
tt2

Un able to edit song info in itunes 7

I am currently organizing and fixing some errors in my itunes library and i'm having extreme difficulty editing song info.
For example about half of my songs show up as blues in the genre category. So i've gone through and changed them to rock, electronic, etc. The info will change but when i double click on the track (play the track) it changes the info back to the previous settings. I went to itunes help which instructed me to uncheck "organize itunes library" in order to write the new info to the file. But this has not worked either. this is a very frustrating problem because GNDB has given some very wrong info about album names and and info and i can't reorganize it.
Another example is a CD by Blockhead the album title is Music by Cavelight. Only 3 tracks have the correct album title the others are Blockhead Music by Cavelight, for some reason the artist name is included in the album title. When i correct the tracks that have the improper album name they do change untill the song is double clicked on, and then it resets to the previous name.
Please help i am a DJ with lots of music and organization is KEY!
compac laptop Windows XP

Select one or more tracks, press CTRL-I to Get Info.
Are the tracks in question in .wav format? No tags there, so nothing for iTunes to read other than the filename. I have a script that get more data provided iTunes hasn't "helpfully" rearranged them.
tt2

Can't edit track # in song info

In my music library, I'm able to edit song info such as artist, song name, album, etc. But I can't figure out how to change the track # of a song. I have the column displayed for track #'s, but clicking inside the track # boxes doesn't allow me to edit the numbers. This is particularly frustrating for files that don't have track numbers at all, since they're listed out of order. How can I fix this? Thanks

You can't get to it from the main library screen.
Right-click on the track > Get Info > Info tab
You can change it there.

Can't edit song info in iTunes 8

I just updated to iTunes 8. Everything was working fine in iTunes 7. Now, I can't edit some songs in my library. When I select 'Get Info', the information is grayed-out and not available for edit. Some songs that I recently added to my library using iTunes 7 can be edited, as well as songs that I added to the library in iTunes 8. I was thinking of trying to uninstall iTunes 8 and then re-install, but I didn't want to waste time if this was a known problem. I have fully administrator rights on my computer and I did not move the library location for the upgrade to version 8.

My 'gat info problem: I
Since updating to version 8:
right click to 'get info' on single file is fine.
But if I try to right click on a selection of files, I get a blank grey window, and a sort of weird truncated layout of SOME of the options normally available in those tabs down the right-hand corner of the big grey box. and they appear to be moving out of the frame of the window so some of them are only half visible. You can't get to them. Also if you move your mouse over it, I get a sort of "floating" OK button, - the only way to get out of the thing. Seems to be a serious graphical mess there. (hard to describe-I wish I could attach image file)
Anybody else out there have anything like this?
Geoffrey in Melbourne Australia
PS: Just a thought: not sure if this is OK with Forum rules, (my apologies if it aint) but here is a link to images of the problem:
http://geoffreybaird.com/itunesmeltdown.html

Lost Song Info

OK, here's my situation:
I have Windows XP. I realised that no album artwork was showing on my iPod nano, even though it was on iTunes (most up-to-date version). This was because the error with the "Chkdsk" thing kept appearing. After I ran that, nothing changed, but after I'd changed some setting somwhere, I thought I'd fixed the problem. But I had to stop partway through the operation so only some of it came up on the iPod.
However, when I went back to it, I somehow accidentally deleted all song info (artist, album, album artwork etc) and now all that appears on both the iPod and iTunes is the song title. This is the case in "iPod", "Purchased" and "Library" sections. Nor is it on my hard drive.
Is there an easy way to retrieve all lost song info quickly and easily?
dell Windows XP
dell Windows XP

How many songs are you talking about? You can enter the information yourself for each one if you're up to it. Right click on the song file, then choose get info. On the second tab "info" where everything is probably showing up unknown, you can type in the information. I'm sorry I really don't know of another way to do this if the program can't ID the song to search the internet for details.
Are these whole albums or individual songs? If they're albums, you could burn them to a CD and then rip them into Windows Media Player. You'll get an option to search for the album info. online before you rip the CD. You can enter the artist or album name and let Windows Media Player find the correct song details, then Windows Media Player will enter the info into all of the columns for you. Once you have these albums ripped in Media Player, you can re-import them into iTunes and the tags will be there. (Just make sure you rip using mp3 so you don't have to go through a conversion process to bring them into iTunes.) Album art doesn't transfer from Windows Media Player to iTunes. You'll have to hand add this.
I don't rip in iTunes so I don't know how the program tags unknown albums. If iTunes can search for and add tag information to unknown albums--skip the Windows Media Player step and just re-rip everything in iTunes.

Itunes messes up song info

hey everyone
well i gots me a problem with itunes
i dunno why but it all of a sudden started doing this
i put a song in the library [that already has all the info like artist & year etc etc] and when it gets in there it doesnt show any of the information. just the song name. it doesnt do that to every song i put in there. but its annoying cuz i dont wanna have to copy and paste all the info. ya know?
i dunno what changed. i didnt do anything to it. before it used to read them all good now it doesnt.
any help please?

HI djMassrv,
The article below looks like it may be helpful. It's for the previous version of iTunes, but it looks like the informaiton is still revelant for the issue that you have described above.
iTunes 10 for Mac: If song titles don’t appear correctly
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH999
iTunes 10 for Mac: If song titles don’t appear correctly
If a song’s title and information don’t appear correctly, the file was probably created using a program that stores information differently from iTunes. You may be able to resolve the problem by converting the song’s information tags (ID3 tags) to a different storage format.
Converting the ID3 tags is also useful for songs with information in languages that use non-Roman characters, or if you want to use your MP3 files with another program that uses a different format.
To change the format of the song information tags:
Select the songs you want to convert.
Control-click and choose Convert ID3 Tags.
In the window that appears, select “ID3 tag version” and choose a version from the pop-up menu.
If song titles look scrambled after converting information tags:
Some applications don’t translate Unicode characters correctly, resulting in scrambled song titles when you convert the ID3 tags. If your song information looks scrambled after converting the song’s ID3 tags, you can change the song title back to the title it had previously.To reverse the Unicode characters:
Control-click the song and choose Convert ID3 Tags.
Click Translate Text Characters, and then choose Reverse Unicode.
To change the information back to what you had before, choose Translate Text Characters again.
-Jason

Will edited song info be saved?

I swear I've edited the info in my music library for songs so that the artist name, song title, etc. are correct. However it seems like iTunes is not permanently saving these changes. I could be wrong...
My question is: If I edit song info in "Get Info" will it be saved permanently?
It is tedious to keep doing this. I just want to know if my efforts are futile.
Dell Desktop Windows XP Pro

All settings are saved during backup.
I manually setup my mail accounts and don't sync them.
With each update of the firmware, all is wiped and put back on and my settings are always there.
I beleive the only thing that doesn't get backed up is your Camera Roll (photos you took with phone). Could be wrong though. Think they may of changed that somewhere along the line.
Settings of everything are saved (preferences, cookies, saved data from applications you installed, etc). All other content is on your computer (music, videos, apps, etc).

Song Info is not staying put

I am pretty anal about keeping my music collection organized, so after I import new songs into iTunes, I like to edit the song info to change the track number, disc number, genre and other things. I hit OK, and the changes appear to be groovy, but as soon as I play one of those tracks that I just edited, the info goes back to what it was when I originally imported the track. I have enabled iTunes to keep my music folder organized and all music files I use are in that folder that's specified.
Any idea how I can make these edits permanent so I can finally quit repeating all the work I've been putting in to cleaning up my collection?
Thanks much
-Chris

Excellent question ! You need to make regular backups of the itunes database file, which is named
iTunes Library.itl
That is the file that holds ratings, play counts, and other metadata. With that ITL file, you can rebuild your itunes library if your hard drive crashes.
I copy mine over to a USB thumb drive about once a week. More often if I've added lots of music, and ALWAYS before any itunes update.
You can back up the XML and Genius files too, but as I said, the most important is the ITL file. iTunes can re-create the XML and genius files from the ITL.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1660
That article doesn't list the default Vista path - it's something like
c:\ users \Music\iTunes on Vista
But you may be running your library from a non-default place.
The actual track info should stay within the track's tags.
Message was edited by: Katrina S.

Itunes 11 not "finding" internet...not connecting to gracenotes and delivering album/song info

installed itunes 11 and now when i insert a cd to upload to itunes it doesnt find the gracenotes database and populate tracks ets. help!

Is the music showing up in your library but with a little , or is it not showing up in your library at all?
If it's not showing up at all, it might be worth looking around for the iTunes Library file (think of the library file as a sort of sophisticated table of contents for iTunes so it knows what media files you want shown in iTunes, and some special attributes such as ratings, play counts, playlists, etc.) that has reference to these files. Start iTunes holding down the shift key, and you'll eventually get some message about being able choosing a library file (or create a new one). Try opening a few of the .itl files you see on your machine. Hopefully everything is ok, but just sitting in some library file. (Note, this is different from the Edit/Preferences/Advanced setting which says where your music files is, but says nothing about where the iTunes library file is located.)
If you have to re-add the music, you generally will not lose your album and song info (unless these are WMV or other non-MP3-like format). But this meta data is generally included in the MP3/M4A/etc file. The worst you'll generally lose would be the album artwork, and often even that is buried in the music file itself (depends upon how the artwork was originally associated with the media files.)

Library constantly screws up my song info

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