Moved iTunes music folder to new HD and it won't play

I recently moved my iTunes music files to a larger external hard drive (for the third time) and now iTunes can't find any of the songs. It has worked in the past on 2 other HD's but not this time. I've selected the correct iTunes Music Folder location under <EDIT> <PREFERENCES> <ADVANCED>, have selected "Keep music folder organized", and have even "consolidated my music", but the files won't play. The files are in-tact; I can right-click on a song, click "get info", and manually locate the file to play it, but I don't want to do this for 70GB worth of music!!! Someone suggested dragging the music files into the iTunes library, but I have the library on my laptop and the actual music files on the external HD and I want to keep the library on my laptop so I don't think this will work for me. please help.
Message was edited by: brookap

I have a very similar problem. Hope I don't confuse people trying to help us since the solutions may be different.
I had my iTunes path directed to a 2nd internal hard drive. Everything was working fine - except I found that purchased Apps were still being downloaded to the Mobile Applications folder on my main hard drive instead of the 2nd internal drive. I decided to retry directing the iTunes path to my 2nd internal drive, hoping that might get iTunes to save my Apps there. Big Mistake. Suddenly, there were no Apps showing in my iTunes Library Apps window at all. I verified the downloaded apps are still in my main hard drive's Mobile Applications folder, but I cannot get iTunes to display them in my Apps Library window anymore.
I decided to try downloading a new app and, sure enough, iTunes once again downloaded it into the very same Mobile Applications folder on my main hard drive, where all my (now orphaned) original apps are, but the only one iTunes will only display in my Apps window is the new one. I read you can redownload purchased apps, but my apps are not missing. iTunes just won't display them in the Apps window anymore.

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HT1364 If I already moved Itunes media folder to external drive and now music is not matching up in iTunes?

Dear Itunes Community~
This is my first time using glad you are here, but all the passwords!!
Question/Quandry:
If I already moved Itunes media folder to my external drive and now my music is not matching up in iTunes, what should I do? I have tried my solution !?, and now I have 17,000 songs, instead of 9,000!
Should I just uninstall Itunes, and then reinstall Itunes, and let it do it's thing, and then figure out how to move to the external hard drive later?
Help, I screwed it up all on my own!
Any/all help and Itunes educated suggestions appreciated!
Thank you very much,
Doris =:o
PS ~~ Is there anyway to easily delete duplicates?? Seems not?

I have a very similar problem. Hope I don't confuse people trying to help us since the solutions may be different.
I had my iTunes path directed to a 2nd internal hard drive. Everything was working fine - except I found that purchased Apps were still being downloaded to the Mobile Applications folder on my main hard drive instead of the 2nd internal drive. I decided to retry directing the iTunes path to my 2nd internal drive, hoping that might get iTunes to save my Apps there. Big Mistake. Suddenly, there were no Apps showing in my iTunes Library Apps window at all. I verified the downloaded apps are still in my main hard drive's Mobile Applications folder, but I cannot get iTunes to display them in my Apps Library window anymore.
I decided to try downloading a new app and, sure enough, iTunes once again downloaded it into the very same Mobile Applications folder on my main hard drive, where all my (now orphaned) original apps are, but the only one iTunes will only display in my Apps window is the new one. I read you can redownload purchased apps, but my apps are not missing. iTunes just won't display them in the Apps window anymore.

Ooops...I manually moved iTunes music folder to my new external hard drive

So I thought I was smart and manually moved my iTunes music folder to my new external hard drive. I've changed the location in Preferences but can't locate my music through iTunes. What do I do now? My library is on my external hard drive, but I read I should have done this through iTunes. Any advice?

Is it still possible for you to temporarily return the iTunes Music folder to its original location?
If so you should be able to see your music in iTunes again and then follow the instructions in this article in the Apple Knowledge Base.

Moved iTunes music folder to HDD, Now iTunes Can't Find it--Help :-)

I finally was able to get an HDD that actually mounted and now I have moved my iTunes music folder based on the instructions here: iTunes: Moving your iTunes Music folder. I printed them out and followed them step-by-step.
Before moving the folder iTunes Music from my internal HD (~/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music) to the trash, I played random tracks with no problem. So I moved the folder to the trashcan, then emptied the trash as instructed. Went back to iTunes to play some music, and now all of my tracks have the dreaded exclamation point in the first column. When I click on a track to play it, I get the message "The song 'blah blah blah' could not be used because the original file could not be found. Would you like to locate it?"
Of course, I can select 'Yes' and go through the steps and locate the files on my HDD. This, however, is not an optimal process with over 2400 songs. Does anyone know what went wrong with my relocation?
Melissa
PowerBook G4 PowerPC Mac OS X (10.4.8) iPod 30G, MyBook 250GB HDD, iTunes 7.1.1

I've used that method to transfer music from one drive to another literally dozens of times and never seen it fail in the way you experienced. I'm at a loss to explain how you could have followed the instructions, successfully transfer the music to the new drive, and yet have the iTunes database still think the music should be on the original drive.
What I can suggest are two solutions: One for it you don't care about keeping your playlists, rankings, and playcounts intact. The other for if you do care.
Fast fix but loses the meta data: Quit iTunes. Open your home directory, find the music folder and open it. Trash everything you see in your music folder and restart iTunes. All your music and playlists will be gone. Open your new drive on the desktop, find the folder with your music, and drag it into your iTunes window. Your music will be imported into a new iTunes catalog and then you can create your playlists.
Keeping the metadata: After quitting iTunes, move the music back to its original location by dragging the music folder(s). Unmount the new drive and play some music. Remember the songs you clicked on and showed iTunes how to find? Do those songs all over again and once you've verified the iTunes library now points to all the songs properly, delete the songs from the new drive and repeat the steps to move them again.

Problem in moving iTunes Music Folder

I feel sooo stupid! I am using the document "iTunes: Moving your iTunes Music folder." I was going along OK until I came to number 5 in the second part:
"In the Change Music Folder Location window that appears, navigate to the location where you would like your new Music folder to be created. Note: By default, your iTunes Music folder is a folder named "iTunes Music" in ~/Music/iTunes/where the tilde "~" represents your home directory.
What does it mean, "....navigate to the location where you would like your new Music folder to be created." ???
I'm trying to free up internal hard drive space by moving my iTunes Music folder to my external hard drive.
Will it also take the movies, podcasts, etc??
Thanks in advance for any help. I'm dead in the water until I get this solved.

Open iTunes and at the bottom of the main window it will tell you how large in Gigs your library is - if that is larger than the space available on your ext HD then you will need a bigger ext HD - or remove some stuff from the ext HD to make space.
MJ

Missing files after moving itunes music folder

i moved my itunes music folder to my external hard drive using the directions posted here: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=301748 to the letter. a lot of things transfered but now when i look in my itunes music folder and compare to my itunes library, i see that a lot of things are missing. i really don't want to have to go through every single artist folder and check every song. shouldn't consolidating my library have taken care of this?

I just had a very similar issue, I moved my iTunes library from a 120Gb Drive to a 500Gb and the library was a bit corrupted because the main drive was full b/c of an error, but that's besides the fact.
SOLUTION To missing files, that aren't really missing because they exist and were all copied no problems.
go to the iTunes folder in your Home folder, and move the iTunes Music Library.xml file to your desktop (with itunes closed of course)
Then re-open itunes and the library file that's not an xml doc, will re-search your files and all should be well.
You should be able to safely delete the xml doc now, because iTunes made a new one.
Cheers
PowerMac G4 Dual 1Gz Mac OS X (10.4.9)

Moving iTunes music folder/library to external HD

Hi all, and happy new year: Yeah, I know I should know how to do this, but ... I want to move all my music to an external HD and delete it from my MBP HD. I would like someone to steer me to the best resource for a primer on how to do this. Thanks in advance!

Just drag the entire iTunes folder (the entire folder, not just the iTunes Music folder) to your desired location. Then hold down the Option key 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.
Once you've confirmed that it's working, then you can delete the tracks from the internal drive.

Error message when moving iTunes music folder to External Hard Drive

I have followed the instructions in Apple support to move my iTunes music folder to an external hard drive. During the consolidate library step, only half of my music is transferred before I get the error message "Copying music failed. The disk could not be read from or written to."
Has anyone gotten the same message, and what was your experience correcting the issue?
15" Powerbook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

In Windows, you go through File >> Library >> Organize Library. here you can choose to consolidate your library. this should do the job.. alternatively you could take a look at this blog..
http://www.tuaw.com/2006/09/19/how-to-keep-your-itunes-library-on-an-external-ha rd-drive/
Even though its step by step on mac you should be able to figure it out from there.
Message was edited by: MuldVarp3N

I need help! I have moved my music to my new computer and now...

My music won't play. ITunes tells me that it can't find the music and opens a window to seach, when I take it to the music folder, it then plays the music. How can I do this for all of my music instead of one by one?
Help, desperate and tired!
Message was edited by: lasnow

lasnow,
Try this.
1. Take all of your music files (that play) and move them to your my music folder.
2. Once the songs are in that folder, go into iTunes and delete all of your songs from your libary.
3. Now select all of your music in the my music folder drag and drop into iTunes.
4. Once iTunes is finished importing your songs, go to Advanced>Consolidate Library**
**When you consolidate your library it takes all of your music and places it into the iTunes music folder so it will allways run out of the same file location.
Hope this Helps,
DJFX

Moving iTunes music folder from hard drive to external drive

I see a couple of topics related to iTunes folder locations and losing track of where the file are. What's the right way to migrate from having the iTunes music files on my hard drive (C:) to using an external drive...without having to re-map everything manually? I'm running out of space on the C: drive!

There's actually hundreds of those topics. It gets asked daily.
Did you still have a specific question after reading several of them?
Here is a very thorough and wordy article on it
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/moving-your-itunes-library-to -a-new-hard-drive

Moving iTunes music folder on another hard drive

My hard drive is getting full but I want to download more music. Is there any way to move the folder to another hard drive?

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1449
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/moving-your-itunes-library-to -a-new-hard-drive/
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1449
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1751

How do I get a song to play when it requests authorization, I authorize it, then iTunes acknowledges it was already authorized and still won't play?

I have gone through several different troubleshoots and still the problem remains. Inside the "get info" tab on the song it says that it was authorized by my account. The song is part of an album where I purchased the entire album. Out of the 14 songs I purchased on the album, 2 bring up the following screen when clicked on to play:
This computer is not authorized to play "You Reign Alone". Would you like to authorize it?
To play this song you must authorize this computer to play songs using this account. You may authorize up to 5 computers for each account.
So I input the Apple ID and password for the account and it gives me the following screen:
This computer is already authorized.
Including this one, you have authorized 3 computers out of your available 5.
But nothing has changed. I still can't play the song. As I said above, I checked the Get Info tab on the song and it showed the account I had logged in for authorization. Is there something I can do to get iTunes to play the songs I purchased?
(Side question: does anyone know how to email iTunes support. They say on the website that it can be done, but 45 minutes of frustrated screen hopping landed me nowhere but the same FAQs and Express lane call in support options. I just wanted a simple email option.)

Hi there cfarrington18,
You may need to remove and redownload the tracks that giving you troubles. Take a look at the article for more information.
Downloading past purchases from the App Store, iBookstore, and iTunes Store
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2519
-Griff W.

Playlists can't find musc already in iTunes Music folder

I've seen this question is many forms but can't find the answer. Here goes:
I rebuilt my Vista system and then restored my iTunes files and music. I also installed the latest iTunes version. Within iTunes I see all my songs, playlists, ratings, etc...
However, each entry has an "!" to the far left and when I try to play it I get a message that says "The song XXX could not be used because the original fine could not be found. Would you like to locate it?" If I say yes, I can go to the iTunes Music folder, find the file, and then it will work.
However this is not a viable solution for 4,341 files. My music is stored on a separate internal D: drive witch looks like D:\iTunes Music\artist name\album name\file name. It has been this way for a couple of years. The reinstalled iTunes application and related files all all in their default locations. Only the location of the music files is different than the default, but not different from when it was working just before the system rebuild.
If you go to the iTunes menu for Edit - Preferences - Advanced - General tab - "iTunes music folder location I have it set to D:\iTunes Music, just as it was before I did the system rebuild.
With these settings and folder/file structure it won't "find" any of my music. There has to be a way!! Please help!!
BTW, all music was originally imported by either (1) ripping from original CDs with "keep iTunes Music folder organized" or directly from the iTunes store.
I need to get my songs to play "without:" moving the songs or losing the playlists, information, ratings, etc. Help, there has to be a way. I just can't take the weeks or months necessary to recreate this.
Many thanks,
John

hexonxonx,
Thanks for responding to my question. I'm trying to troubleshoot an audiobook that won't download from the iTunes store. It's part one of a two part audiobook. The second part downloaded properly, along with three other audiobooks.
iTunes support has given me two sets of instructions, neither which I can carry out.
The first set is to empty the Downloads folder and then empty the trash, and the second set to to empty the cache folder. Unfortunately, I can't find either folder. I also cannot find a folder labeled with the name of the audiobook that is hung up. If you have any further advice, I'd appreciate it.
Caoim

ITunes Music Folder

Ok, so I tried downloading a TV show last night from the iTunes store and it said I didn't have enough space on my Hard Drive to complete the download. Well, that threw me off and as I was looking to see what was eating all my memory I noticed that my iTunes Music Folder, when navigated to via the finder, shows I have 30 GB of music files. If I look at the bottom of the iTunes window when the program is open it only shows 14 GB. I did FILE>SHOW DUPLICATES and it only shows 6.5 GB of duplicates. Does anyone know what is going on or how to correct? It is like there is two of every song, but I don't see duplicates in the iTunes Music Folder.

it is possible and likely that you have song files in your iTunes music folder that aren't referenced in your iTunes library. in other words, there are files in your iTunes music folder that iTunes doesn't know about.
for an unknow reason, you may have duplicate your songs using the finder. you can validate this by doing a "Get info" in iTunes on a song for which you see duplicate using the Finder. The Get info will show you the path of the selected song in the General tab. The duplicate you will see in the finder would have a difference in the name. This will allow you to manually discriminate which song is referenced in iTunes. But this could be a tedious task.
At this point, you will need to clean up this mess and there is several way to go. the simplest could be to drag'n drop your whole iTunes Music File into the iTunes window in order to have iTunes reference all your files and then, clean up the duplicates.
you may think of other way to go, but this will not be simple if you have a large library.

I've moved my music folder and now iTunes can't "find" my music

I recently moved my iTunes folder of music (46 gigs) from an external drive back to my iMac's internal drive. The music files are all on my iMac now (in the music folder), and I've changed the preferences in order to map iTunes to the new location. But when I attempt to play most of the songs, iTunes will give me a message saying the song could not be found, and I have to manually locate each song in order for iTunes to play it.
There seems to be no commonality to the problem either. For the "compilation" albums, I can kinda understand why I would have to do this. But I'm having to do it for single songs, full and partial albums, and even iTunes-purchased songs.
1) Why is this happening?
2) Is there a way to batch-process this requirement to map ALL the songs for iTunes so I don't have to do it for every other song file in my 46-gig folder?
3) Once I finally do "find" all the files for iTunes, will I face the same problem when I move my music back to another external drive in the future?
Thanks in advance for any advice.

I see. For your future benefit, here is the "canned" response I usually post for people trying to move their library to an external drive...
Assuming you use the iTunes default settings where iTunes copied added items to your iTunes folder and organizes your library (meaning - everything is all self contained in the iTunes folder), then all you have to do is drag & drop your iTunes folder (not just the iTunes Music folder you find inside the iTunes folder) to the external drive and copy the entire thing.
If you want to test that it worked or would like to actually start using it from that location instead, use these instructions when you start iTunes to point it to the new location...
How to open an alternate iTunes Library file or create a new one
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1589
If you are just testing to make sure a backup copy works and still want to use the internal location, then close iTunes after you verify it works, and restart iTunes again with the same instructions and point it back to your internal drive (original) location. Otherwise you are all set to use the library from the external location.
Additional info...
Back up your iTunes library by copying to an external hard drive
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=307074
Cheers,
Patrick

Moved iTunes music folder to new HD and it won't play

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