One library, two Macbooks...

Hi all! First off, thanks for your time and support! Now on to my question...
I was wondering what is the optimal way to share an iTunes library between multiple Mac computers?
Here's some info:
On the same network at home, my wife has 1 Macbook, I have 1 Macbook and 1 Mini. How can we share our library without putting all our songs, etc. on to each Mac individually? My Macbook only has a 60 gig drive and I have about 50 gigs worth of music. We have a NAS on our network too. I tried changing "iTunes Media Folder Location" (under Preferences) to the NAS but if my wife adds music to the library, it's not in my library, and vice versa. I have to actually re-import everything on my computer to get any additions to show up! That can't be the right way to do it! I was hoping I could use the same "fix" you guys could give me for our iPhoto libraries as well, but that's a different thread, right? Someone please help!
Thanks!

you need to copy the entire iTunes folder (not just the iTunes media folder) to the NAS, then, on each Mac, launch iTunes while holding the option key, click on +choose library+, and select the iTunes folder you copied to the NAS.
only one instance of iTunes @ a time can access the library but changes made on one Mac will be available on the other(s) right away. also, if you and the wife use different iTunes store accounts to purchase stuff, iTunes on all Macs needs to be authorized for both iTS accounts.
finally, you need to make sure the NAS is mounted on the desktop before launching iTunes on either Mac.
JGG

Similar Messages

  • One trackpad, two MacBooks

    Hi,
    at home we have an Apple Cinema display with a keyboard wired into it, along with a magic trackpad and two macbooks.
    My problem is that when my girlfriend's been using it, I have to get her to unpair the trackpad from her computer before I can do it on mine.  This is pretty annoying, and I always thought I could just sit down and click on the trackpad powerbutton twice to switch the pairing from her macbook to mine.  But it never works.  Anyone know if this is possible?
    I know you can click and hold the power button on the trackpad to turn it on or off.  But you can also click on it once, then quickly click again and hold it until the LED blinks.  This means -- I assume --- that it's back in discovery mode.  But nothing happens from here, and it seems to still be paired with my girlfriend's macbook.
    As far as I can see, this click + click-and-hold is undocumented, so I was hoping there was an undocumented way of switching pairing on the trackpad alone.
    Any hints?
    Regards,
    Christian

    Hello:
    Short of getting a new girlfriend , a Bluetooth device may be only paired with one thing at a time.  What you describe is normal behavior.
    Barry

  • New Mobile Account works on only one of two MacBook Pros

    I am setting up mobile accounts for my small company. I have two accounts, two MacBook Pros and one MacMini with OS X Snow Leopard Server. One mobile account works fine on both of my portables and the other one only works on one of the portables.
    On the portable that does not allow the creation of the mobile account I get a message at logon stating "Unable to create mobile account... There was a problem creating your mobile account".
    The /var/log/secure.log on the MacBook Pro has these entries:
    loginwindow[46]: Login Window - Returned from Security Agent
    loginwindow[46]: AuthorizationRef returned an error (-60006), with username = randy.kahle
    loginwindow[46]: This indicates that a SecurityAgent plugin has returned something other than errAuthorizationDenied (usually cancelled) after the auth record is set up.
    All of the entries in secure.log indicate that authentication was fine and the home directory mounts occurred correctly.
    Both the OS X 10.6.4 server and client have the latest software updates.
    -- Randy Kahle

    Yup, that did the trick.  The other Macbook had sharing on.
    Thanks

  • Installing a printer works on only one of  two Macbooks

    I have 10.7.5 on two Macbooks.  One installs the Brother HL-5250DN from software already on the machine.  It works fine.
    The other Macbook wants to download the printer drivers from Apple despite the drivers already being on the machine.  This printer was installed on this machine before and new drivers have been downloaded from the manufacturer.
    Now it tries to download from Apple, then I get the message that the software is not available and to obtain it from the manufacturer, which I have already done.
    However, I cannot stop it from going to Apple for the drivers, making it impossible to install.
    Anyway to make it stop trying to download the drivers from Apple and use those that are already on the machine?

    Yup, that did the trick.  The other Macbook had sharing on.
    Thanks

  • Problem: One library two locations?

    Hi all,
    I have a 2010 Mac Pro and have always had my itunes library on a separate internal drive. Recently I noticed my boot drive had been filling up and discovered that mobile apps have started to be stored in the Mobile Applications folder in an identical itunes library folder on the boot drive.
    I'm assuming at some point I did an itunes update and it switched over to the default file location, "Music" on the boot drive.
    In the itunes preferences my itunes media folder location is still listed as the separate internal drive, not the boot drive. Newly imported music is still going to the designated location.
    Please see the attached image. The top panel is from my boot drive, the second is the separate internal hard drive. There's some minor differences in the way the two are organized. For example, in the boot drive "Automatically Add to iTunes" is under "itunes Music", but in the selected location-- the separate internal drive-- "Automatically Add to itunes" is directly under "iTunes".(just an example of one of the small differences in the way the folders are organized)
    Again, the bottom panel is my selected itunes folder location from the itunes preferences and where I've always stored my music. The top panel is from the "Music" folder on my boot drive— an iTunes folder that I don't remember creating and where my mobile apps are now going.
    Any way to get this smoothed out?
    Thanks very much in advance for any help anyone may have

    If you set both accounts to store files in the same place this can work. Each user will still have separate playlists, playcounts, etc.
    http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300432
    Files added by one user will be available to the other user but must be added to library using add folder or add file option. It is not automatic, there is no iTunes option for it to be made automatic.

  • One Mac, one User, one library, two Store accounts possible

    Is it possible to buy with two different store accounts?
    It's one user on the computer, one Music library but I would like to shop for my daughter without adding another account. She's on an imac G3, so I can't fill her iPod nano there.
    Joachim

    Hi Joachim,
    Yes, you can create two or more accounts to use on the same computer at the same time. For example, in my case, I have one US and other Portuguese account.
    Just make sure you authorized your computer to play content from both accounts.
    Hope this helps!

  • One library, two users

    Can I have one iTunes library and two users with separate music on their ipods?

    Yes.  How to use multiple iDevices with one computer.

  • One library - Two or more computers

    I recently got a NAS device and I'm now running my iTunes library on it. However I have several computers and I would like for them all to use the same libary. I'm not sure if it's even possible, since the files for itunes playlists and such are saved localy?
    I don't want just to share my Libary. I want to be able to edit playlists and such from other computers aswell.

    As an alternative, and you may find this primitive, but you might be able to remote into your computer, modifying your playlists or the like, from other computers on your home network. If you're running Windows 7 Enterprise or Windows 7 Ultimate (not the Home editions or the Starter edition), you can control you machine remotely via "Remote Desktop". And if you've got Macs that you want to connect to your Windows machine via Remote Desktop Connection Client for Mac 2. Using these apps, you can log into your Windows 7 machine from another computer, and it looks like you're sitting right there at your Windows 7 desktop machine.
    I gather this isn't applicable for you, but Windows machines can connect to Macs using a VNC client (such as VNC Viewer Free Edition). You can also connect from one Mac to another using Screen Sharing.

  • One library, two users question

    Hopefully I can explain this clearly. My wife and I share our macbook and we each have our own user accounts. In my account I have an itunes music library. (My account is the administrator account btw.) While she is logged into her account and using iTunes, there doesn't seem to be anyway for her to play songs in the music library in my account. From my account, I've tried to set up sharing the music library folder. I've also tried to point her itunes preferences to my library but the folder is blocked with a red slash. Is there some way for her to play songs in my library while logged into her account?

    The iTunes sharing preferences are for sharing music on several computer across a network.
    To allow different user accounts on the same computer to use the same iTunes library, the iTunes folder has to be in the Users -> Shared folder.
    This shows you how: http://www.computeraudiophile.com/How-To-Share-An-iTunes-Library-Among-Several-U sers-Video

  • Can I share one iTunes library on two Macbooks

    I have two Macbooks and would like to have the same iTunes library on both. Is this possible??

    Can I rip my CDs to only one of the iTunes instances and share this iTunes Library between both instances of iTunes?
    Have a look at this article in the Apple Knowledge Base and let us know if it brings you any combination of joy and/or satisfaction.

  • How can I put photos from two iphones in one library?

    I want to use one family Macbook pro for downloading photos from two iphones with separate apple IDs.  In other words, we'd like to have all our photos stored in one library on the Macbook.  Possible, and if so how does one set it up?

    If you use iPhoto on the Macbook you can merge the photos from multiple cameras (iPhones) into one library. The Apple Id is irrelevant for this.

  • HT204053 I have two Apple ids, how can I get all music I have purchased in one library?

    I have used two Apple IDs to purchase music. I want to consolidate the music to one library. How can I do this?

    Wooookay ..... I need to slow down some here.
    OK. Thanks for this. Yes I was confusing two things.
    Forget the Store.
    In my iTunes Library there are some songs I purchased (with ID2) along with those from ID1. There are a few songs with a "!" in the first column on the left of my songs listing. When I click on those songs I get a message which says "can't play this song as itunes cannot locate the file, then it gives me the option to locate it. Once I take that option I am in finder but cannot find the song. it is not in the location other "playable songs" are.
    somewhere in frogging around i did see a location that looked something like //file/xxxxx/xxxx/user/etc. but I cannot find this location. somehow a few songs from a specific download have been sent to this eroneous location which itunes cannot find. I want to get them moved to where itunes can find and play them.
    I can later deal with ordering music with two different IDs.
    Thanks for helping

  • I have two users with different music on each itunes and i can only use one library, how do i use both for one iTouch?

    i have two users with different music on each itunes and i can only use one library, how do i use both for one iTouch?

    Chris, I believe this link may have the information you're looking for. Welcome to discussions!
    http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300432

  • How can I synchronise my iTunes Library on my iMac with the one on my MacBook?

    How can I synchronise my iTunes Library on my iMac with the one on my MacBook?

    Carolyn:
    I have almost 10,000 songs/cuts in my music collection and, because of the poor quality of iTunes music, very few of those songs/cuts come from iTunes.  My music came from me ripping it disc by disc over hundreds of hours. I would like to be able to add a disc and have both the iMac AND the MacBook music files (plus an external backup) be updated.  Surely there is an intelligent, relatively easy to implement procedure for doing this. Perhaps I am missing something but your response doesn't seem to address the sync issue with all its implications...

  • I have a new iMac and i created two libraries on iTunes. how do i copy songs from one library to the other?

    I have a new imac. I created two libraries, one for me, one for my kids. how do I copy songs from one library to the other library?

    Not easy unless you're just content with adding some files to the other as new files but lose playlists for those files, and playcount, and ratings, etc.  If you're okay with that, you can drag the media folder from one library to the other. If you use default settings and want to duplicate the media, just drag it. If you want to add the media but leave it where it is currently located, hold down the option key while dragging to the library window.
    Otherwise:
    PowerTunes - http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/powertunes/ (commercial software)
    syncOtunes - http://homepage.mac.com/oligrob/syncOtunes/syncOtunes.html

Maybe you are looking for

  • How to populate data selection in infopackage from spreadsheet

    Hello, I have to load data for thousands of missing CRM orders into BI via the BI-CRM extractor 0CRM_SALES_ORDER_I . We have list of those missing orders in a spreadsheet. How do I  populate these order numbers into the data selection tab of the data

  • My imac screen is flashing after startup?

    I may have a problem with my imac's screen flashing around the dock right after blue screen it shows up. The dock will flash for a 1sec or 2sec and thats it. Do i need to test the memory because i did install Hynix 2 X 2GB PC3-8500S DDR3 and they whe

  • Best practices to use stored procedure

    Just wondering about best practices of using Stored procedures in TOPLink with respect to Objects. Any thoughts on this? I find the approach suggested at re:Coding for Stored Procedures is a lot of work! seems to be fine. Is there any thoughts on con

  • How do I order a specific phone number

    Hello to all, Who can I contact to order a specific phone number for my new business? It'll be a local geographic landline where I live and operate, but I want to choose the number. Any direction or contact would be greatly appreciated. Many thanks A

  • Public instance variable vs. accessor method

    I know some OOP purists believe all instance variables should be private, and if there's a need to view or set the value of these instance variable, public accessor methods need to be created. Data encapsulation is the driving force behind this belie