Songs on an External Drive

Is it possible to have all your songs located on an external hard drive (i.e. WD Passport) and still use iTunes? I want to have all my songs on iTunes and be able to update my iPod when plugging it in, but not have all the space on my laptop taken up by songs.

Follow the instructions in this article.
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Migration Assistant problem? : New iMac's iTunes doesn't see the catalog or playlist of my old Mac's songs on an external drive

So I just migrated from a 10.7.5 iMac 27" from 2009 to 10.9.4 on a 2013 27" iMac with Fusion Drive.
I don't use Time Machine. There are no backups involved here.
Used Ethernet. Only took 20 hours... (BTW, it stayed on "less than 1 minute left" for like 12 hours but luckily I was away and just left it going in hopes it would work... and it did!)
Anyway, back on my OLD iMac, I kept all of my songs on an external drive because my internal drive was too small. So iTunes looked at that drive for the music it was playing. I turned that drive off, even disconnected it, during the migration process because I thought it was confusing it during the first attempt which took 10 hours and nothing happened.
So now it worked, finally. On my new iMac, running Mavericks, I now have two user accounts... the one that was set up when I started the computer the first time, and the new one that transferred over via Migration Assistant. No problem. I can live with that. The only thing is, I would still think the old XML files and library stuff would migrate over... but iTunes doesn't see it. When I open up iTunes, in *either* account, iTunes behaves as if it's brand new. Repeat: the old and new account on the new iMac, both, do not see an old iTunes library which IS on the old iMac. Only the music is on the external drive from what I understand.
I've done this before so I know it's possible. I remember upgrading a long time ago and got iTunes to see my old library... even though some of the music was no longer there. It just puts "!" marks wherever there is no link. I was hoping that that's what I would find when I launched iTunes, but no luck. Even connecting the old hard drive to the new Mac (via USB) doesn't make iTunes all of a sudden "see" the old library. That data doesn't seem to be there. It didn't transfer over. Did it not transfer over because the songs weren't on the internal volume? Should I have left my external hard drive on?
So.... now that I've spent almost 3 days total trying to get this to work, and everything is running... I don't want to have to start over in order to get iTunes to work. Is there a way I can just drag over some XML files or something from the old computer? I don't want to lose all of the ratings and personal notes and everything.
I should add also that I have like only four songs I've ever actually bought through iTunes. I'm still a bit old fashioned and buy CDs and rip them to Apple Lossless. So I hope it's not an authorization / reauthorization issue because I have like 1400 albums ripped.
Thanks in advance for any help.
--Jeff

iTunes does not use the .xml it uses the .itl
If you are sure your old library file migrated across (does the file size and modification dates suggest it has?) start iTunes while holding down the option/alt key and guide it to the .itl file to get it to use that one.

Moving songs to an external drive

Hi,
I know this may sound like a stupid question, but I'm not an iTunes user, my husband is... My hard drive is completely full because he has downloaded too many songs. We have a huge external drive. How do I physically move the songs to my external drive so that they can play in iTunes?
Also, can I delete the songs after they are exported? HOw will I know they were moved successfully? How do I open the songs from the external drive in iTUnes?
Thanks in advance to whomever answers my questions! Happy July 4th!

The simplest way to move itunes on to an external drive is:
Close iTunes
copy your iTunes folder onto the external drive. (That's My Music\iTunes)
Start iTunes with the shift key held down and when asked to choose a library navigate to the itunes folder on the external drive and choose iTunes Library.itl.
If everything works OK, rename the iTunes folder on the internal drive and make sure everything still works.
Once you are ABSOLUTELY certain everything works OK you can delete the old iTunes folder, which you renamed.
Most peope's recycle bin is not big enough to hold all the music so don't delete things until your are sure everything is working OK on the external drive.
It is also a good idea to have a separate backup of your music.
Note that this procedure only works if you have a standard set up with all your music in iTunes\iTunes Music.

How to download all songs from my external drive into my itunes library

I have enough Gbytes to not use an external drive for my music.
How do I proceed to download all songs from the external drive on my internal drive?

Hello there, Laetidela.
The following Knowledge Base article offers up some great steps on how to move your iTunes library from an external hard drive to your computer:
iTunes: How to move your music to a new computer
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4527
External drive
This option requires more work than Home Sharing, but it creates a backup of your iTunes library on the external drive in addition to moving your content.
Notes before you start:
You can use most iPods as an external drive.
Windows operating systems don't recognize Mac OS-formatted disks (HFS or HFS Plus formats). Because of this, you can't use a Mac-formatted iPod or external drive to move your music to a Windows PC. See iPod: How to determine iPod's hard disk format if you're not sure how your iPod is formatted.
Mac OS X can read Windows-formatted iPods and drives. This means there are many ways to migrate your information from your old Windows-based PC to your new Mac.
Mac OS X: To be sure external drives appear on your desktop, choose Preferences from the Finder menu. Be sure the options for "External disks" and "Hard disks" are enabled.
Part 1: Locating and consolidating the iTunes Media folder
Part 2: Copy iTunes folder from the old computer:
Part 3: Get iTunes ready on your new computer
Part 4: Back up any music that's already on your new computer
Part 5: Copy music to your new computer
Part 6: Add preexisting music that was on the new computer back into the library
Thanks for reaching out to Apple Support Communities.
Cheers,
Pedro.

Synch removes songs when using external drive?

I use an external drive as my iTunes library. I have a bit more than 5,000 songs in the library. If I sync (to charge, get photos from the phone, or sync on a podcast) without the external drive plugged in iTunes removes about a thousand songs from the phone, as far as I can tell it is the same group of songs each time. Then when I sync WITH the drive in place, it replaces those songs. Why are those songs different from the others which stay in place? Is it a setting, some peculiarity about the file types? What can I change to keep all songs synced?

Your iPhone is attempting to sync with your iTunes Library every time you plug it in and iTunes cannot find the songs on the external drive when it is unplugged, so it assumes they have been deleted. You should be able to select "Manually Manage Music" and make it so that your iPhone does not automatically sync music every time. By doing this, however, you will need to manually drag songs to your iPhone when you want to add new ones.

Transfered all songs to an external drive and now cant access them

I thought I could move my songs to an external drive and still access them the same way I did when they were on my PC. I have the external drive plugged in Itunes gives a message "the song could not be used because the orriginal file could not be found. Would you like to locate it." I can then search and find it on the external drive one song at a time. I wnat the Itunes to work as if the song were in their orriginal location. Can this be done with out mooving them one by one back to an almost full hard drive?

Yes you could move everything back to your computer start over with a new a new library if you wish. Just so long as you aren't concerned about things like ratings or playlists or the number of times something was played etc. If the songs are all in one folder you could add that folder to your new library and it would bring all the songs with it just go to Edit>Add Folder to Library. To create or access a second (or more) library, hold down the Shift key in Windows when launching iTunes. In the resulting dialogue you will get the option to create a new library or open an existing one: Using multiple iTunes libraries -Windows

Itunes can't locate songs stored in external drive

i had created playlists and added songs to the playlists in itunes 7.02. these songs are stored on an external drive. i did not sync my ipod immediately but tried it a few days later. despite the external drive being connected to my laptop, when i tried to sync the ipod with itunes, for 90% of the songs there was an exclamation mark next to the song & i had to manually double click on a song name in itunes, and locate it in the external drive, in order for itunes to be able to sync it.
i can't do that for 3000+ songs. why can't itunes recognise and locate these songs when they have been stored in the itunes library from the external drive? isn't there a way to tell itunes to locate songs in the external drive? especially when they had been added from there in the first place?

Hi there,
I'm having the same problem, I'll list it in case I'm somehow different from the other case but unfortunately directing iTunes to that folder doesn't seem to do the trick...?
Have bought a Seagate 320GB external drive, copied my iTunes library (that was located in my /Users/Shared folder) to a new location on my external drive and redirected iTunes to the new location. It said it was updating the folder which took a while and I assumed was a good sign due to my 8948 songs but alas the dreaded exclamation mark has appeared next to every track. If I redirect one to the new location it works fine but f*ed if I'm gonna do that for the other 8947. If I quit iTunes and reopen it, it's still directed to the same correct place and the previously located still works but the rest don't. Is there a) some reason this may not be working correctly; or b) a quick way to redirect every song to their location? Thanks so much for your help.

Why can iTunes NOT FIND songs on an EXTERNAL DRIVE

I've read many posts regarding the use of external drives for iTunes data storage. Here's my situation:
I've just restored my computer to it's factory settings, then installed iTunes 9.2.1.5 My iTunes consists of songs only and they reside on an external drive following this path: E:\iTunes Music\(artist)\(album)\(song[s])
iTunes Music, artist name, and album name are all folders. The songs appear in numeric order (01, 02, etc.), and are individual MPEG files.
I have tried changing the iTunes Media Folder location to: E:\iTunes Music (by following: Edit-Preferences-Advanced) Indeed, I have attempted all possible folder paths...right down to individual songs...nothing works. iTunes simply does not see the folder(s)/songs. What's up?
The frustrating thing is that this very same external drive worked just fine before this whole affair! ??? What am I missing? Please provide a detailed answer. Many of us out here would like to know the secret.

You'd have had more luck if you'd moved your library files out to your external drive as well as the media. That way, when you'd reinstalled all you would have needed to do was use SHIFT-start iTunes and point it at the library on the external.
Next time you reinstall Windows backup the entire *Documents and Settings* or Users folders from the C:\ drive so that after the rebuild you can restore anything you discover you still want from your old profile.
Better yet do these backups before something goes wrong, say once a month. The following tool is great for general backups of any specifc set of folders, not just iTunes.
<hr>
*Fast backup for iTunes library (Windows Only)*
Grab SyncToy 2.1, a free tool from MS. This can be used to copy your entire iTunes library (& other important data folders) onto another hard drive or network share. You can then use SyncToy periodically to synchronise or echo your library to the backup. A preview will show which files need to be updated giving you a chance to spot unexpected changes and during the run only the new or updated files will be copied saving lots of time. And if your media is all organised below the main iTunes folder then you should also be able to open the backup library on any system running the same version of iTunes.
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tt2

Upgraded to latest Itunes - won't recognize songs in my external drive?

I recently upgraded to the latest Itunes. I store all my music on an external hard drive. Now I can't seem to get the Itunes library to pull songs from the hard drive - getting the message "The song __ could not be used because the original file could not be found. Would you like to locate it?" I didn't have this problem before. I tried importing the songs from the hard drive but now my library has doubled and I'm still having problems launching music. Anyone have any input? Thanks in advance.

No, my problem is when I open iTunes, none of my tunes are there because the new iTunes 8.1 looks into my hard drive iTunes for the library and it's blank. when I use preferences/advanced and choose "change" and attempt to select the library from my external drive, it's greyed out . . . not accessible.

ITunes has wiped my iPod, I think I have then songs on an external drive?

my iTunes has wiped my iPod of 8500+ songs. I have alway backed up my laptop, I think the songs should be on my external drive, can anyone help me to try an recover them, not to bothered about the playlist.
THanks

See Corrupt iPod classic. If you can't locate the files on your external drive it may be possible to copy them back from the device. Your media should be kept in an iTunes library which you backup properly.
tt2

Restoring/importing songs from an external drive

I make a monthly backup copy of all my files including iTunes music to an external drive. I keep about 6 generations worth on the drive. If my PC fails will I be able to import from that drive. Is there a restriction to the maximum number of times the music files can be copied?
Thanks in advance.

"+I was wondering how does it keep track of the number of computers that has been copied onto.+"
It doesn't. iTunes tracks how many _Authorized Computers_ that are allowed to play iTMS Purchased Songs (up to 5 PCs).
You may copy and archive as many times as you want: to CD, DVD, ExHD, PC, Flash Drive, etc.
Make sure you are keeping all the iTunes/iPod/iPhone attributes that you want (or do not want to re-create):
1) All Music Files in their current folder structure (usually located in and under the ‘iTunes Music’ folder)
2) All Application Files in their current folder structure (usually located in the ‘Mobile Applications’ folder)
3) All Album Artwork Files in their current folder structure (usually located in and under the ‘Album Artwork’ folder)
4) The Library database file: ‘iTunes Library.itl’ located in the ‘iTunes’ folder
5) The Library XML file: ‘iTunes Music Library.xml’ located in the ‘iTunes’ folder
6) The iTunes Library Extras.itdb and iTunes Library Genius.itdb files, also in the ‘iTunes’ folder
7) Any XML playlist files created for Playlist retention
8) The two iTunes.pref files (optional)
i) C:\Documents and Settings\<your username>\Application Data\Apple Computer\iTunes\iTunes.pref
ii) C:\Documents and Settings\<your username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Apple Computer Inc\iTunes.pref
9) The XML file of Ratings, Play Counts and Last Played attributes saved from the main Library and created by Otto’s SaveRatings script (also optional, but recommended):
“Download this: http://ottodestruct.com/itunes/SaveRatings.zip . It's a program, just run it like any other program. Run it on the machine where you're copying the info from BEFORE you move the files to the new machine. Click the "Save Ratings" button and it'll create a ratings.xml file. Now when you move the files, move the program and this file as well. Then after you make your new iTunes library, run it again and click the "Restore Ratings" button. Voila, all your information is back in the Library. Well, most of it anyway, it's not perfect. It'll tell you what songs it couldn't figure out though, and there's usually not very many.”
10) The folder(s) used to store and sync photos to your iPhone (if applicable)
11) The iTunes created Backup of your iPhone usually located at:
C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup
Best of Luck

How do I delete all songs on an external drive?

iTunes recently decided to scan my computer for addtional music and it found and added all the songs in a backup folder on an external drive. Now I have duplicates of over 2000 songs in my iTunes. I want to delete all the backups and use only the original songs on my hard drive in iTunes. Unfortunatly, I cannot tell them apart just by looking at them in the list view. To delete them manually, I have to "get info" for each song and check the "where" at the bottom to see which folder it is from. This is taking forever. Is there a way to delete an entire folder from iTunes, just like you can add a folder? Is there a way to display the folder address in the list view so I could sort by that and delete them all. Any suggestions? Thanks.

cdharris wrote:
Thanks, I tried that, but iTunes also added a lot of songs from my hard drive on that same date that I do not want to delete. So I cannot just delete every song added on that date.
OK, here's what to do. Unplug the external drive. (Nothing will change immediately about your iTunes library.) Next, sync your iPod. iTunes will tell you which songs it could no longer find, and also it will note them with an exclamation point. Then you will know which library entries to delete.

Putting songs on an external drive once previously consolidated

I exported (did the whole consolidation thing) the itunes library to an external drive awhile back.
Subsequent to that, I added some more stuff to my library. Because I was a dork, I didn't have the external drive hooked up, so instead of saving the stuff to the external drive like it should have, because that's what I changed it to.... it saved to the HD on the computer because the external drive wasn't on.
What I'd like to do is save the newly imported stuff and playlists, that are as of this moment on the computer's HD to the external drive without losing the playlists and without losing the 60 gigs of stuff I've already exported.

I had a similar problem some time ago. The solution is actually quite simple though. All you have to do is consolidate the library again. Follow the same steps as before and your newly added music will be added to existing library on your external drive. After, making sure this worked you may want to delete the music off of the internal HD to free up space.

I have my iTunes library between an external hard drive and my PC. How do I get all of it onto the PC? When I consolidate it leaves the songs on the external drive.

My iTunes library is split between an external hard drive and my PC. How do I get all the songs onto my PC? When I consolidate, it brings the names of the songs to the PC but they are empty files.

Hold down the "option" + "command" keys and launch iPhoto.
Select the "Rebuild Thumbnails" choice.

Easy Question - Playing song through iTunes when song is on external drive

iTunes is set up as the default music player. When I play a song that's on an external hard drive it appears that iTunes not only plays the song but it also copies it to iTunes permanently. Am I correct? Is this an option that I can turn off? Thanks.

It seems that in both cases the song will be added to the library if I checked the box that says: "copy files to i Tunes music folder when adding to library" Can you confirm this?
In both cases, a reference to the song appears in the iTunes Library. What the setting controls is whether or not the song is copied to the iTunes Music folder.
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Songs on an External Drive

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