Moved iTunes library on external drive. All songs say missing.

Okay So I just copied my iTunes library to an external harddrive, and I set my music folder in my iTunes preferences to be the new music folder on my external drive.
If I play a song now in iTunes it says it can't find it and asks me to manually locate it, which I do. It seems like if I find one, iTunes would be smart enough to find the rest but NO! I have to find EVERY single song, even if they're on the same album.
There has to be a way around this. I have a 50gb+ library and would hate it if I had to find every single song.
Thanks a lot!

Simply copying the iTunes library to your new drive may not be enough. If, when you added your recordings to the original library, you didn't have the "Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library" checkbox checked in the Preferences->Advanced tab, or you did not do a "Consolidate Library" action before copying the library to the new drive, your actual recordings are probably still on your old drive.
To fix this, you'll need to copy these to your extermal drive and then add them to the library that is also on your external drive.
Tom Hesley

Similar Messages

  • Moving iTunes Library to External Drive

    Hey there,
    I would like to free up 25GB of space on the hard drive of my computer by moving my music library to my external drive.
    I tried once to have iTunes consolidate the library onto the external drive, and by doing that iTunes had difficulty locating the music on the hard drvie and the external drive. I had iTunes reload all of the songs off of my main computer and in doing so, I managed to lose all of the information from each song. Album art, lyrics, comments, some dates and genres were all wiped out. So now I had a huge collection of tunes that had none of that information and they all had the same date of being aquired. I have since repaired the blank-out by readding all of the information. I would still like to have my music folder on the external drive and I want to keep all of the information as well.
    I currently have the music files on the external drive as back up incase something happens to my computer. I just dragged and copied the I Tunes music folder onto the hard drive icon.
    I am wondering if there is a way that I can have my music library on the external drive, without the danger of having all of the additional information wiped out?
    Thanks for your time with helping,
    IslandB
    Cicero   Windows XP  

    iTunes: Moving your iTunes Music folder
    http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=301748
    The above article includes moving the folder to an external drive.
    Patrick

  • Moved iTunes library to external drive

    NOTE: I have the most recent version of iTunes (as of 14 DEC 08).
    I moved my iTunes library to an external hard drive. The music videos I purchased shows an exclamation icon next to them. Is there a way I can reference all those videos to their new location on the external hard drive? Or is the only way to do it is one at a time? Thanks!

    No longer an issue.

  • Moved itunes library to external drive..now issues..

    Hi, I recently picked up an external hard drive and needed space on my macbook so I dragged my folder onto my external drive. Next time I launched Itunes my library was wiped out. I still have the original library on the external but is there anyway I can direct Itunes to pull up the library instead without having to import everything a second time and end up with duplicates? I don't want to lose my purchased apps and songs.

    I am having the same problem.   - everything was fine, and I thought I had figured it out, It looks like I messed up on a step though.  I copied the ENTIRE folder to my external drive.  Then when I opened Ituned while pressing the option key, I think I selected the wrong thing (pretty sure I selected "create library" , when I should have selected "choose library".
    Now, when I open the itunes folder in my computers (macbook) hard drive OR on the external hard drive, looking for that "itunes library.itl" file, it is blank - just a white icon, and says it was created today.
    When I open Itunes from my desktop, there is NO music in it - which is not the end of the world because the files are on my external drive, but all of my playlists and customized itunes stuff is gone.  Is there any way to recover this?!?!

  • Moved iTunes Library to external drive- now can't move iPad purchase to Mac

    I moved my iTunes Library to an external drive because I didn't have enough internal HD space to move a movie purchased on the iPad to my Mac. Now iTunes won't sync my iPad - and wants to reformat it - because it says it was formatted on another Mac.
    I've tried Aiseesoft iPad Manager but the movie - a iTunes+ movie, so I assume it is a package of some sort - doesn't show up in the movie pane.
    This is a really crappy position to be put into. If I could re-download the movie I'd just reformat my iPad and be down with it. Unfortunately, this is not an option.
    Help!

    As a best practice, you should move your content to an external drive and import references to into iTunes rather than moving the whole database and app files. In iTunes > Preferences > Advanced, uncheck "Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library". This will keep all your music and movies on the external drive, but iTunes and all references to the content on your desktop.
    I know that's not what you wanted to hear as a fix, but this is how I have my MacBook Air setup and it works fine with the iPad. My son tried to move the whole app and database to a hard drive and we had endless problems with it.

  • Moving iTunes library to external HD - all messed up

    My C: HD ran out of space and my iTunes library was the biggest part so I decided to move it to an external HD. For reasons too complex to go into I have several. I followed the instructions in the "Help" feature of iTunes before I learned that there was a longer (and completely different) set of instructions on this website. I moved the contents (not the directory) as instructed from "C:\Documents and Settings\Owner\My Documents\My Music\iTunes\iTunes Music" to "H:\NewMusic". I then changed the reference in Edit->Preferences->Advanced to the new location. I reopened iTunes and it was blank. No music, no playlists. I tried copying things back and reset the reference but nothing. As a safety measure I copied the music to another hard drive but no matter what I do, or where I point iTunes nothing changes.
    I'm afraid to plug in my iPod for fear that the blank iTunes will clear the iPod rather than the other way around. Also not everything is on my iPod (most but not all) and I'd rather not lose things. How can I recover from this mess and get iTunes working again. I have all the files, but iTunes will not see them.
    Thanks

    I'm taking long deep breaths to keep from yelling and cursing. I read the article and found that nothing would work but putting everything (23 GB) back on my C: drive. I had to move other folders and finally put everything back. Then the original (I suppose) iTunes library seemed to work. Still I had to move and/or re-identify dozens of items. Finally everything worked. I then used the "correct" instructions and moved everything. All seemed okay. I tested everything and it worked. I then did the final instruction - to delete the original iTunes Music folder. Not the iTunes folder on C: - but the iTunes music folder. Now everything is GONE again. The lists in iTunes show everything but nothing will play because it doesn't know where anything is. I can only assume that the iTunes library was in the iTunes Music folder that the instructions said to erase. And no my Recycle bin is not active. several years ago I got tired of running out of disk space and having to erase everything twice. I have tried opening iTunes with everying iTunes Library file on every disk I have and nothing works. So I have to do everything all over again.
    Not asking for advice. Not blaming anyone. Just saying.

  • I have moved itunes library to external drive as per support article. Every time I know open itunes I have to re-direct it to the new media location on the external drive. Is there a way to retain the location?

    I followed the instructions on the support website exactly to transfer my media to an external hard drive (a network attached storage device), it worked immediately. When I quit itunes and re-open it, the library location has reset to the old location, I can change it to the new location and it works but the next time I log in its back to the wrong place.
    Has anybody got any idea how to prevent this from re-occurring?

    i also just move my library to a NAS. i suggest you do this:
    launch iTunes and point iTunes media folder location to the volume/shared folder on NAS. quit iTunes.
    copy the iTunes folder from <MacintoshHD>/users/<yourname>/music to the NAS.
    launch iTunes while holding option (⌥) and click on choose library when prompted. select the iTunes folder you just moved to the NAS.
    you must make sure the volume/shared folder on the NAS is mounted on your desktop before launching iTunes but from now on the media folder location should stick (it does for me).

  • Moved itunes library from external drive, now i have two of everything

    Moved all my music from an old computer to an external HD and onto a new computer.  I was able to make the move, but now all the songs have double.  How do I correct this?
    I am on a PC w Vista, crappy I know.

    Thanks!

  • Moved iTunes to an external drive, library files can't be located - help?!?

    So ok, I knew it couldn't be that easy...
    I copied my iTunes to an external drive to free up space on my laptop - followed the instructions for moving files on a PC - and got to the part about moving the old iTunes folder to the recycle bin. Well, the recycle bin wasn't large enough for the folder, so it deleted everything straight out of MyComputer. Apparently the "library files" went with it.
    Now I can see all my songs/movies/videos in folders on the external, but can't get my iTunes to associate with it when I open it.
    Is there any way to fix this? I'm tearing my hair out, here. I have a full backup on DVDs - will that help?
    Thanks!

    got to the part about moving the old iTunes folder to the recycle bin.
    There is no part about moving the _iTunes folder_ to the recycle bin.
    There is a part about moving th _iTunes music folder_ to the recycle bin.
    Did you move them to the external by using iTunes menu File -> Library -> Consolidate?
    Or did you move them to the external yourself?
    Which folders exactly did you move?

  • ITunes library on external drive issue....

    I have my entire iTunes library on an external hard drive. I recently moved and had to restore my computer because of some issues. The computer is working now but iTunes does not recognize my library on the external drive. It shows everything I have purchased in the cloud but anything that I have manually put in my library doe snot show up in my library. When I look in the external drive all my media is there, I just can't get to it through iTunes. The path that can be changed in the advanced settings is not right and I am not sure how to correct the path. Thanks
    I have a late 2008 iMac - 3.06GHz Intel Core 2 Duo - I just upgraded RAM to 6GB - right after I upgraded the RAM iMac booted into disk utilities - had to end up reinstalling OS and basically restore my files from Time Machine. Since I had to redownload iTunes the path under Advanced settings is not correct - it is not linked to my external. How do I fix this - I have had my library set up like this for years I just can't remember how to do it.
    Thanks

    dekker1 in your screenshot the folder that is usually 'one level above' that has the 'iTunes Library.itl' and the 'iTunes Music Library.xml'. Do you have copies of those files?
    Those two are the files that maintain iTunes Data (playlists, ratings, song info …). Purchased files come from iCloud so that is why they always show up for download. According to Apple the library files should be placed in your home folder…
    iTunes: What are the iTunes library files?
    Can you restore those files back to /Users/[username]/Music/iTunes/ ?
    If you don't have these files the only choice I can see is to import all the files & manually recreate all the playlists (this loses metadata, play count etc).
    Normally you also have the following at the same location in your /Users/[username]/Music/iTunes/ folder.
    Album Artwork/
    iTunes Library Extras.itdb
    iTunes Library Genius.itdb
    Previous iTunes Libraries/
    If you also have copies of these, restore them too.
    The media folder can live anywhere, but you set the preference in iTunes to that location. It looks like your library may be in a mess already, the duplicate "Automatically add to iTunes" folders are a sign that you have chosen the wrong folder for iTunes media at some point.
    Apple have a guide for moving the media, you need to ensure the media library is in the same path as on the old system, otherwise links to files will break.
    iTunes for Mac: Moving your iTunes Media folder
    Once the media is working you can 'consolidate it' but it must be in a good state before this.
    I hope that makes sense, does this clarify anything? I use those Apple pages as a guide for moving & handling iTunes media.

  • Question about moving itunes to wd external drive?

    i found the page where it says u can move itunes music to external drive but will that include my tv shows also and if so can i delete it from my laptop after i move it to other drive?

    \Music\iTunes\ folder is the main iTunes library location. It contains the library files, music files and everything else.
    I have all of my music files already stored on an external HD. But for some reason when i moved it all
    What exactly does "moved it all" mean? What did you move?
    in other words in the old drive I still have the following files:
    itunes library genius
    -itunes library extras
    -itunes library
    These three are all the same type of files. I don't know what type of files they are
    The iTunes library.itl file is the iTunes database file. Without that, iTunes is empty.
    Since i already have all of my music files on my ext. HD can I delete these files without messing anything up?
    Only if you want iTunes to be completely empty and you want to start from scratch.
    Moving the music file syourself is not the correct way to do it. iTunes will lose everything.
    If you want to move everything, copy the entire \Music\iTunes\ folder to a new location.
    Hold Shift and launch iTunes.
    Select *Choose library* and select the iTunes library.itl file in the iTunes folder you moved.

  • How to import ITunes library from external drive

    Using Mac, Leopard, Time Machine, my hard drive crashed Had a recent backup on Time Machine. New computer doesn't recognize last backup of TM on external hard drive, but I can find my ITunes Library there, with thousands of songs.
    when I go in ITunes to Import Library and navigate to the old ITunes Library, it won't let me import the whole thing, only lets me import one song at a time, which would take eons.
    Any suggestions on how to do it in one fell swoop?

    I'm sure that solution would work, but I guess something else I did is messing things up.
    the first tip I got was to Consolidate Library. It forced me to consolidate on another partition of my external hard drive. Now that I tried Add Library, it's putting all the music on that external location, which filled up fast and can't take anymore.
    Any thought on how to get my full library back on my internal drive?

  • Moved Itunes to an external drive.  When prompted to update versions, the download would not install, now I get an error message indicating file msvcr80.dll  is missing.

    I moved my ITunes to an external drive.  Whe I was prompted to run the update for a new version of Itunes, It downloaded but would not install.  now when opening Itunes I get an error message indicating the file msvcr80.dll is missing.  How can I restore this, and e

    Try the following user tip:
    Troubleshooting issues with iTunes for Windows updates

  • I moved my itunes library to external drive and now itunes wont work.

    I moved my itunes library to an external drive and now itunes cannot find the library. I followed a youtube video and all seemed to work fine until i deleted the old library and emptied the trash. Prior to deleting and emptying the trash I checked preferences to verify the path of Itunes was to the external drive. It seemed to work even when I moved the original library to the trash.
    Now when I launch itunes the song listings show but the songs cant be found. I checked the volume of my itunes that I moved to the external and it was about 4 GB that i moved. I have approx 2000 songs.
    Any suggestions?

    Hold down the alt/option Key when you start iTunes a dialog box will open
    Select Choose Library and select the itunes library on your external drive

  • Moving iTunes Library to external HD--song could not be used

    I wanted to move my iTunes library to an external HD, because my internal drive was running out of space. I looked around on here and found directions how to move my iTunes Library to an external hard drive. I followed those directions, and everything seemed copacetic the first time I started iTunes after the move and pointed it at the moved library. Songs played and everything was great.
    But tall subsequent times I've started iTunes, I get the dreaded "song could not be used because the original file could not be found" message for every song I've tried.
    I looked around on the discussion boards here some more, and seem to be seeing that there is no general solution. There's no good way to tell iTunes, "Go match up all the lines in the iTunes database with all the song titles in such-and-such a location."
    I also read the article about "What are the iTunes Library files." I see that there are 2 basic files. One is a database file called "iTunes Library," and the second is a text file called "iTunes Library.xml." I opened up the XML file and looked around a bit. Here is what I find:
    Every song in the XML file seems to be referred to with a relative path, such as: <string>file://localhost/Users/rodney/Music/iTunes/iTunes%20Music/Krys%20Mach,%20Jo%20Az usa,%20Jerome%20Mokar/Native%20Spirit/01%20Cave%20Dweller.m4a</string>
    The thing is, that's not the right path, unless localhost happens to be pointed at my external HD, which I don't know why it would be.
    I suspect that this is the exact same problem inside the database file, too.
    I'm looking around for a definition of localhost... the only thing I'm finding is in /etc/hosts, which looks like:
    127.0.0.1 localhost
    255.255.255.255 broadcasthost
    ::1 localhost
    I think it's odd that localhost is in there twice, but maybe that's normal.
    Anyway, enough rambling, the basic question is, how can I tell iTunes that my files are on my external HD instead of wherever it thinks they are on "localhost," which I'm sure somehow resolves back to being my internal HD. Can I do some tricky grep-ing through the database file and strategically replace all occurrences? Or is that just asking for trouble?
    Thanks!
    Rodney

    I don't know if this is at all useful to other people having similar problems, but I did get all my songs back more or less, and this is how:
    1) With iTunes shut down, I went into my iTunes directory (ExternalHD/Users/rodney/Music/iTune), and moved my "iTunes Library" and "iTunes Library.xml" files to someplace else.
    2) I started iTunes while holding down the Option key.
    3) When iTunes popped the "Quit / Create New Library / Choose Library" dialog, I selected "Create New". I chose the path back to where my original iTunes Library used to live and where my music is; ExternalHD/Users/rodney/Music/iTunes.
    4) iTunes started up with a completely blank library. I went and looked in the above directory, and yes, there was now a very small "iTunes Library" file there.
    5) Under the File menu in iTunes, I chose "Add to Library". I then navigated to the location of all my music, which was ExternalHD/Users/rodney/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music.
    6) When I selected this folder, iTunes started going through a bunch of gyrations of scanning, organizing, adding... I don't know what all it thought it was doing, but it finished 24 GB of music in about 3 minutes.
    And now my music is all playable again! Of course, all my playlists are toast... completely gone, since they were in the old library.
    The thing I notice is that iTunes moved all the artist folders... For instance, my album by the group Baka used to be in "ExternalHD/Users/rodney/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music/Baka" with previous versions of iTunes, but now iTunes 8 seems to want to flatten that out and it moved that directory to reside at "ExternalHD/Users/rodney/Music/iTunes/Baka". So, while it works, it looks messy. I liked it better when all the artist folders were down a level in the directory /iTunes Music/. Then the only things in the iTunes folder were the database files, a few other files iTunes has created over the years, and the iTunes Music folder.
    But whatever... at least I don't have to add thousands of songs back into iTunes manually.
    Just as a side note, I took a clue from the directory flattening out, and I tried one other thing: I put all the artist folders back down in the /iTunes Music/ folder, and I moved my original "iTunes Library" files down into that folder too. Then on startup, I tried pointing iTunes at the original library which was now down one level. But that didn't help... the individual song paths in that database are apparently still pointing onto my internal HD.
    Rodney

Maybe you are looking for