Recovering from a crash - how to get all your iTunes settings back!

Question

Failed hard drive? Have a backup? Can't use Time Machine? Have an iPhone and a lot of music and don't want to go through setting it all up again? If you answered yes to all those questions, this is for you!
So this isn't really a question, and I'm not trying to sell anything (but I do have questions at the end for anyone who can answer). I'm posting this possible solution here because I have just confirmed it works, and I have been looking everywhere for how to do this and couldn't find the answer. I've had my second hard drive failure in the last 6 months (another Seagate), and I'm sick of having to start over again with the iTunes settings, syncing my iPhone, authorizing the store, holding my breath to see if my iPhone will be erased, etc. (Another reason I'm posting this here is because I might need to remember what I did later!)
If you were able to do a Time Machine backup you may not need this, but in my case, both Seagate drives failed before I could complete the entire backup. (In one case that left me with a large file that I could access by right-clicking and choosing Show Contents). If you don't want to restore from Time Machine but you were able to rescue your data, or if you want to have a fresh start on everything you can still pull from your Time Machine backups.
In my case I was able to recover 75% of my files (with Disk Warrior, but the drive completely failed before I could get it all) and I had already kept a backup of my Music folder, where I manually manage all of my music.
After installing my new Hitachi drive and re-installing Leopard, running the updates, etc. I was at the same versions of OSX and iTunes and everything.
I first copied all my backed up music folder, back into my Music folder where they were before. (This included the iTunes folder inside the Music folder.)
Just in case that wasn't enough, and I don't think it was last time I tried this, I found this article on how to remove all files related to iTunes:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1224
I used this article to learn what else iTunes uses, and where those files and folders are located, and I was able to copy those files and folders from the restore / backup, and copy them into the new places. Because I hadn't yet run iTunes for the first time on the fresh install, most of those files and folders hadn't yet been created yet so I knew I could just delete them again if this plan didn't work.
A summary of the relevant portions of the article, but make sure to replace "drag it to the trash" with "add it back here from your backup" (and note that a "~" symbol means it's under "Users/YourName"):
1. In the Finder, choose Go > Go to Folder and type in ~/Library/ and click Go.
2. Locate the iTunes folder and then drag it to the Trash.
3. Choose Go > Go to Folder and type in ~/Library/Preferences/ and click Go.
4. Locate the preference files that have names beginning with com.apple.iTunes and move them to the Trash.
File Names should be:
* com.apple.iTunes.eq.plist
* com.apple.iTunes.plist
* com.apple.iTunesHelper.plist
5. Choose Go > Go to Folder and type in /Library and click Go.
6. Locate the iTunes folder, and then move it to the Trash.
7. Choose Go > Go to Folder and type in ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/ and click Go.
8. Locate the preference files that have names beginning with com.apple.iTunes and move them to the Trash.
So I held my breath and launched iTunes on my newly installed system for the first time, and before I turned blue in the face, I notice that I did not see the "Accept License" window, and all my songs were in, ratings and selections and all! Even the podcasts began resuming downloads.
As for my iPhone, I noticed my Applications were already in too. I held my breath again and plugged it in, re-transferred my pictures right away in iPhoto, and it asked me if I wanted to back up my Applications from my iPhone, telling me if I didn't then they would be removed from my iPhone. Twist my arm, fine, I chose the option to back them up and it synced for a long time. It was an uncomfortable 20 minutes or so. (In fact, I'm writing this as it's about to finish.)
It ended up giving me a warning about how some apps were not authorized to be transferred to my computer, and gave me a list of 28 Apps (out of well over 100 on my iPhone). They weren't removed from my iPhone though! I synced again, and the same warning, so I selected Transfer, and this time no error at the end. I synced a third time, and no error messages!!!
I'm sure there are plenty of other places that might tell you the same information, but I couldn't find anything out there. Hopefully this will help someone. If anyone else has something to add or can offer any more advice on this, that would be nice too.

Answer 1

Both the iPhone & touch are designed to be synced with itunes on a regular basis. Neither are storage devices & not syncing is not only foolish, but as you've found out runs the risk of complete data loss. Purchased apps can be re-downloaded for free, as long as you use the same account that was used to originally purchase them. You can view your itunes purchase history under Store>View My Account>Purchase History. Music is a one time download. Its your responsibility to backup this content. You can try contacting itunes support regarding the lost music, plead your case & hope for the best. Whether they add the lost music to her download queue is strictly up to them:
http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/