Lost my itunes music library

I was having trouble with my ipod and I reset the settings in an effort to refresh it, hoping to later put back the music I had stored in it. Somehow, all my music is gone from my library. When I click on a song, it says the file is gone. Does anyone know how to get my music back? Is it backed up somewhere?

It's not backed up anywhere unless you did it yourself.
If the music is deleted from both the iPod and your iTunes library, then it's gone.
There are data recovery programs out there that can sometimes recover deleted items, but they are not free and not 100% successful.

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Computer crash wiped out itunes music library

My computer crashed and I lost my itunes music library on my hard drive. when I plug in my ipod to my computer I get a message that the music library on the ipod doesn't match my itunes library. How can I get my music library on my ipod back onto my computer so I don't lose all my stored music?

It has always been very basic to always maintain a backup copy of your computer for this very occasion. Use your backup copy of your computer ot put everything back.

Can't find my iTunes music library anymore

I just had the memory increased at the local Apple store. Unfortunately, one complication arising from that--I hope the last one--is that I have lost my iTunes music library. The computer screen gave me two choices (1) select a file and click on it (2) Install new music library.
I started with the first choice; however, none of the choices I made--all having to do with music, or iTunes, or both--were acceptable to the computer. I then tried the option of starting a new library, but that led me nowhere
How do I get my music back?

Zevoneer wrote:
Try holding down the Option key when opening iTunes. In the resulting dialogue you will get the option to create a new library or navigate to an existing one. The default location for your iTunes library is in User/Music/iTunes. Look in there and see if you have more than one library file. If you have more than one try opening them in turn, you may find your original library is still intact: How to open an alternate iTunes Library file
That worked--I think. By this I mean that I don't know if my library is now complete. I say this because I saw two or there libraries in the section you sent me to, and I'm now wondering what those other libraries contain, and how to consolidate all libraries into one should that be necessary.
I tried to get back there to check out all the libraries, but that OPTION KEY method didn't help this time. This time, all that happened was that an iTunes music library opened. Whether or not it contains all of my songs, I don't know.

HT1660 I lost my entire music library when my hard drive crashed 2 wks ago. It's all on my iPod, though. I just cannot figure out how to download my iPod music BACK into my iTunes library. All they seems to address is Library - iPod. I'm not an iT geek..

Hi, I lost my entire music library when my hard drive crashed 2 wks ago. It's all on my iPod, though..but the songlist appears gray. I just cannot figure out how to download my iPod music list BACK into my iTunes library. All they seems to address is Library -> iPod transfers. I'm not an iT geek.. Help meeee!

See Recover your iTunes library from your iPod or iOS device.
tt2

I have just synced my ipad with my itunes and have lost my original music library on my computer. How do I get it back?

I have just synced my ipad with my itunes on windows and have now lost the original music library on the computer leaving me with just the downloaded songs from my ipad. I don't have the original library on icloud for some reason and was wondering if there was any way to get the original library back on my itunes?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you Mario.
I am currently downloading my CD on my computer and saving them to my phone - AGAIN.
Your help I am sure was great but I am not good at this. The lingo confuses me. I need to find a pal, with an iPhone who knows what they are doing. Someone like you to talk me through this but you don't know my computer.....
Anyway, thanks for your help. You were the only one to reply and that meant a lot.
Nellybells

TS4062 Have lost itunes music library from my iPad

Cannot access my iTunes music library from my iPad3. It was working fine until I installed iTunes on my netbook (windows 7) yesterday. That seemed to result in losing my music library on the iPad. I also have the iTunes account on a desktop pc. Any suggestions as to what caused this and how to fix it? Thanks!

iOS devices can only be synced to one iTunes library.
You probably allowed syncing of your iPad when you plug it to your Netbook which was previously synced with your PC (by the way, you posted on the iTunes for Mac forum). It that time, you must have seen a popup warning telling you that your iPad is synchronized with another iTunes libray.
If you sync your iOS device with an empty iTunes library, it will result in deleting everything on it. In you case, you should plug back your iPad in your PC and then, select to restore it from your latest backup.

Is there a way to transfer my iphone/ipod music to my itunes music library?

my 1st generation iphone was synced with my laptop. then my hard drive crashed. so now i have a new hard drive. in order to sync my iphone with this one, it says it will erase all my music. what can i do? i heard about the software senuti, but i cannot get it to work, and i am worried that if it unlocks my iphone, it may render it useless, or something worse. what can i do? can anybody help? apple tells me i cannot transfer the songs from my iphone/ipod into my itunes music library because some of them were not purchased from itunes. i understand business. it's about money and copyright rights, etc...yada, yada, yada. i just hate to lose my songs (625 of them). i have no backup for the songs. i learned a lesson. BACKUP your stuff!
<Edited by Moderator>

iTunes includes an option to transfer content that was purchased from the iTunes Store from an iPod or iPhone, but this is for content that was purchased from the iTunes Store ONLY.
With your iPhone connected and without syncing, at the iTunes menu bar go to File and select Transfer Purchases From - the name of your iPhone.
Any content not purchased from the iTunes Store will be lost, which is why maintaining a backup of your iTunes library along with all other important data stored on an external drive used for backup purposes only is so important. The iPhone is not designed nor intended to be a backup device.
If your iTunes content that was not purchased from the iTunes Store was imported into your iTunes library from music CDs, dust them off and start importing them back into your iTunes library.
Using a 3rd party utility or application that provides for this but is not supported by Apple is your only other option.

ITunes Library.xml versus iTunes Music Library.xml

Hi.
What is the difference between the two?
Thanks

From this article: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1660
iTunes Library (iTunes Library.itl in Windows) is a database of the songs in your library and the playlists you've created. Some song-specific data is saved in this file. If you delete the file, iTunes creates a new, empty copy when you open the application, but any playlists, song ratings, comments, or other information you created is lost. The iTunes Library file is only used by iTunes.
iTunes Music Library.xml file contains some (but not all) of the same information stored in the iTunes Library file. The purpose of the iTunes Music Library.xml file is to make your music and playlists available to other applications on your computer. In Mac OS X other iLife applications (like iPhoto, iDVD, and iMovie) use this file to make it easier for you to add music from your iTunes library to your projects.

Bug: iTunes Music Library Not Showing Song Name Category

As the title says: the iTunes Music library does not the track/song name category.
I realized this after clicking "Auto Size All Columns" after a fresh install of iTunes. The track/song name disappears from the current view, and isn't an option when right-clicking the categories.

Hi Bigfrank28,
If you appear to be missing music in iTunes, you may find the troubleshooting steps outlined in the following article helpful:
iTunes: Finding lost media and downloads
http://support.apple.com/kb/ts1408
Regards,
- Brenden

ITunes Music Library and iTunes Music Folders Contain Different File

I recently lost all of the music off of my iPod because of a defective hard drive. I have now reloaded it all and bought an external hard drive to back-up my music (which music I either purchased from iTunes or copied from CDs I own). When I open iTunes Music Library all of my content is present and it is all on my iPod as well. When I look at iTunes Music Files on my C drive - not all of my content is present (for example, only 2 of 3 Billy Joel cds show up). Thus, when I attempt to back-up, I am not capturing everything that is in my iTunes Music Library. Is there a way to synch these, or is there a reason that they are not the same. Again, in the case of the Billy Joel example, all three discs were owned by me so presumably there is no source issue.
Thanks

Assuming that you're using the external drive strictly for back-up purposes and keeping "working" copies of your music on the C drive, you can use the Advanced menu > Consolidate Library option to make sure that the entire contents of your Music Library is placed in the iTunes Music folder - default location C:\Documents and Settings\User Name\My Documents\My Music\iTunes .

ITunes not opening, "iTunes Music Library .xml"

Hi, my iTunes wont start up and its currently stuck on -
Importing -
"iTunes Music Library .xml"
But nothing else seems to be happening.
Not sure what to do and I really don't want to lose all my play counts & playlists I have compiled over the last 5 years.
Please Help!
Thanks.

I eventually got around to trying to fix this problem but what I did was to let the message -
Importing - "iTunes Music Library .xml"
- continue to see what happens and after about 20 minutes it said my 'iTunes Music Library .xml' was damaged and was going to create another, so I let it do so.
The good news is everything is fine, all my playlists, play counts, ratings etc are there.
The bad news is the amount of songs!
I always keep a log of my iTunes Library in iCal everytime i buy a new CD and rip it.
I had - 24,105 Songs, 85.1 Days, 129.79 GB
I now have - 22,842 songs, 80.4 Days, 123.76 GB
So looks like I have lost or so it seems 1,263 songs!
Any ideas?
Thank You.

Itunes music library "damaged"

my ibook crashed when trying to download a large email attchment and when I re-started, my music library was damaged and a new one was "created" with nothing in it. How can I re-install my old library.... I can see the one labelled damaged but I can't import it via itunes.

A damaged 'iTunes Library' file is unusable and there is no way to repair it as far as I know.
If your 'iTunes Music Library.xml' file still reflects the contents of the now damaged 'iTunes Library' file, you can try to use this one.
Choose 'Import...' from the File menu and navigate to the 'iTunes Music Library.xml' file. Click 'Choose'. There's a very small chance it will work.
Usually you have to re-create the library after a 'damaged library file' message.
Drop the 'iTunes Music' folder (in./Users/YourUsername/Music/iTunes) on the empty library in iTunes.
iTunes will rebuild the library. You have lost your playlists, play counts, date added, ratings and podcast subscriptions, but at least the library is populated again.
Hope this helps.
M
17' iMac fp 800 MHz 768 MB RAM Mac OS X (10.4.7) Several ext. HD (backup and data)

ITunes musical library located on a WD 2TB, ext. drv. Computer destroyed by virus; ED survived. Bought new laptop, connected ED. Not able to see library. ED shows as 'G:' 95% full. How can I reconnect my old library to new laptop?

I had my iTunes musical library on an ext. drv. WD 2TB, ‘MY BOOK ESSENTIAL'. Three weeks ago, my computer was infected by a virus that fried it. It did not affect the external drive. I bought a new computer: a laptop, Dell XPS, Intel Core i7-2630QM CPU, Windows 7 Home Premium. I have been able to connect the WD external drive; however, I am not able to see the musical library in my iTunes or Explorer. ‘My Computer’ shows the external drive as ‘G:’ 95% full. It reads, 32.1 GB free of 1.36 TB. When I click on the drive to see its contents, it shows nothing. The library in iTunes also shows nothing. Can anyone help, please? How can I reconnect my old musical library to my new laptop and iTunes? Many thanks.

Hmm, viruses don't generally "fry" drives. They can make bootable operating systems not bootable, hide data, and corrupt executable files. Software can potentially wipe all the data from the drive but it shouldn't be able to physically damage the drive. Bah! What's done is done.
As to unhiding your files assuming they are just hidden....
Hit Start > Run, type in CMD and press enter. Type the following at the prompt and then press enter:
attrib -h -s -r g:\*.* /d /s
This tells windows to clear the hidden, read-only, and system flags from all files on the drive, assuming of course your profile has the power to "see" the files and change them.
If that doesn't work then you may need to take ownership of the drive first. The drive may have security settings that make it "belong" to an account on your old system. Right-click on the drive in Windows Explorer and click Properties. Click the Security tab, the Advanced button, the Owner tab, then the Edit tab. Make yourself the owner, then you can make any other changes to the security settings you want to back on the Permissions tab. (If you can't change the owner log out and log back in as Administrator). For iTunes your account (or everyone) and SYSTEM need full access to all files. Any changes you make should be applied to "This folder, subfolders and files", should be inheritable and you should also replace the permissions on all child objects.
tt2

Why doesn't my whole iTunes music library show up on Apple TV? Only songs I have purchased or downloaded show up

Why doesn't my whole iTunes music library show up on Apple TV? Home sharing is on on all devices.

nevermind, i had automatic graphics switching check off. i removed the check mark and then went into about my mac and voila there was the amd card. Figured i'd post what i found in case anyone else was looking for an answer.

I bought a new laptop and used Windows Easy Transfer cable and moved all files from one computer to another. I installed iTunes and found my iTunes music Library. However, when I plug in my iPod it says it is already synced with another iTunes Library.

I bought a new laptop and used Windows Easy Transfer cable and moved all files from one computer to another. I installed iTunes and found my iTunes music Library. However, when I plug in my iPod it says it is already synced with another iTunes Library.
I don't see anything in Help that shows when you already have transfered all the files over. Why would it want to erase and sync when I already have all the music folder copied over? I didn't have an issue when I had another technician copy from one laptop to another. Home sharing is also on but not being recognized.

I suspect you only migrated the media folder instead of the complete working library. Either review the transfer process and copy over the entire iTunes folder from your old profile's music folder or see Recovering your iTunes library from your iPod or iOS device.
tt2

Lost my itunes music library

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