Ugh, again... itunes backs up files to C drive... I have path as M drive.

I recently installed another HD in my laptop. Current "C" drive only 60GB, have over 20k songs, and use computer to DJ sometimes. Intsalled another drive alongside C, named it "M" 500GB. Transferred all files to M. Changed path in itunes to itunes/M..... (whatever it is!) So everything is on my M drive, and anything new I put into my itunes copies to M. However, after I cleared the music files on my original C drive, every so often a big portion seems to come back. Is this some sort of backup? It slows my computer to a crawl. I don't want to have to keep deleting the files. My guess is on the sharing tab in itunes, I have clicked "share my library on my local network" and that's my C drive? Any harm by having that unchecked? I just want to make sure I lose no music! Hope that was clear, thanks for the help. (Run WINDOWS XP)

When you delete the new folder in C:, it is deleting the itunes database file.
iTunes Library.itl
When you use an exHD for the music, at MUST be connected before you start itunes. Otherwise itunes won't be able to find the music files, and it reverts back to the C: drive. I suspect that is what is happening. There's no way to change this.
My advice is, move the itunes library.itl file over to the M: drive. Do a shift-start of itunes by pressing *AND HOLDING* the shift key until you get a prompt to choose a library. Keep pressing the shift key until you see the prompt.
Browse to the M: drive and choose the ITL file you copied there.
Once that is done, delete the ITL file on the C: drive. If you ever start itunes without drive M: connected, itunes will show you a blank library and you'll know to quit itunes and do another shift-start after M: is in place. iTunes always tries to use the last library it opened. You should only have to do the shift-start once, if M: is always in place.

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Puchased music in itunes. but no file can be found. Have checked for available downloads but nothing available. Went to purchase again thinking i would not be charged again, but it warns me that i will actually be buying again and may have duplicates in l

puchased music in itunes. but no file can be found. Have checked for available downloads but nothing available. Went to purchase again thinking i would not be charged again, but it warns me that i will actually be buying again and may have duplicates in library after purchase. Normaly after i purchase from itunes, it is a free download any time after, and on my other devices.
Why can't itunes locate these files?

It has always been very basic to maintain a backup of the important files and data on your computer.
Use that backup to put everything back.

Does anyone know to to recover itunes back up file after its deleted

does anyone know to to recover itunes back up file after its deleted?

rmdlk wrote:
does anyone know to to recover itunes back up file after its deleted?
What is "itunes back up file"?

HT1751 When trying to reinstall my files from itunes back up on new hard drive It states that I do not have permissions to those files & access is denied

I backed up my itunes folder to my external hard drive.I then replaced my hard drive in my pc & installed windows 7 64 bit on the new hard drive. I reinstalled iTunes & and logged in & all my cloud purchases apperared. All my other music on the external hard drive is my problem. When I just try to open the file it states that I don't currently have permission to access this folder. I have tried to to take possesion of it & change the permissions but it keeps saying access is denied. I tried to drag it in to iTunes but it says I do not have permission. I am pulling my hair here because I have a lot of music that I cannot get to. I am so afraid that I am going to lose it all, I need help!! Please!!!!

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ITunes keeps storing files on C drive, even when the library/storage is on another internal drive. It should stop that.

Whatever I do to get iTunes to store it's data and settings on another internal drive, it KEEPS some sort of data/settings stored on the C drive.
A mkdir has been set up already to catch nasty "keep doing that" behaviour. Nevertheless, iTunes dumps stuff on the C drive /documents/mymusic.
Without to receive a technical story (read: a SIMPLE solution that does not feel like a hack), what's the solution.
Why does iTunes not simply ask WHERE to store the files rather than "assuming that the user is stupid and we think for him" attitude.
managing a database or DRM isn't THAT difficult.
Whatever files are within the directory is absolutely fine, as long as the user is allowed to choose that directory.

Did you mean mkdir or mklnk?
By default the iTunes library is stored at C:\Users\<User>\Music. If you play with Windows so that your entire profile is stored on a different drive then the library will be stored inside the profile. If you have used the option to change the location of the media folder to point to another path then you've only changed where the content is stored, not the database and supporting files. In addition if you use this option with an external drive or network share and that location isn't ready when iTunes starts then it will reset the path to the media folder to the default location inside the library folder.
Generally the solution when setting out is to move the entire library to the root of a different drive and then shift-start-iTunes to connect to the library in this new location. See HT1589: iTunes: How to open an alternate iTunes Library file or create a new one
Since you didn't do that to start with, either start again, or see my post make a split library portable.
There is another chunk of data stored in the %appdata% section of your user profile. If you don't have any iOS devices you can ignore this, but if you have, and have an SSD system drive, then there is merit in relocating the ...\MobileSync\Backup folder to another drive with a mklnk junction/symbolic link as these backup folders can become quite large. Note that junctions/links should not be used to relocate sections of the main library as they will be unraveled if iTunes ever tries to write to the path.
tt2

How can I prevent iTunes from copying files to C drive?

I keep all my music files on my D drive. When I installed iTunes, I made sure that each song title in the library was linked to the mp3 on the D drive. Recently I found about 155 music files that are now duplicated in a folder on my C drive named "iTunes music" Most the file modification dates are either 9/11/2010 or 10/25/2010. I tried to think of any action I've taken that might have caused this. The only unusual thing I've done recently with iTunes is try out a new accessory called TuneUp. I've used it to find album art and find details about some songs that were missing, like what album the file came from etc. Is it possible that TuneUp is creating new modified versions of the music files rather than applying the updated data to the original files on the D drive?

That sounds like a good guess.
I know nothing about TuneUp or how it works, and I can't recall where iTunes keeps it's Artwork, but they may very well be related.
Is your settings in iTunes for copying files/where they are stored correct? Perhaps installing the 3rd party application made a change to your settings.
Try tracing back one of the files to your library and see if you can identify an action you took that created the files. For example... look at one of these suspect files and find it in the iTunes library. Sort your music by Date Added and see if you can find a correlation.

How do I keep iTunes from indexing files on external drive?

Hi,
I did a clean install of Vista from XP. I used Windows Easy Transfer to restore my As part of the upgrade, I did a fresh install of iTunes 8. I think I was running 7 before but this may not be significant, and I may be mistaken.
iTunes automatically (?) indexed all MP3 and m4a files both on my C: drive and on my external drive. These files are largely duplicates; I only want my music on C: to be indexed by iTunes. I've searched and searched here, Help and with Google, have found some very good information about moving files to another drive, but haven't managed to find a way to limit the drive that iTunes looks at. (I have 3 external drives but only the one has music files on it.) Any help would be greatly appreciated.
tim

Chris CA wrote:
By default, iTunes copies the music into /My Music/iTunes/iTunes music folder.
Yes, but I don't use the default.
iTunes does not move files from their original location. It copies them to the iTunes music folder when they are added to the library.
I'm pretty sure mine does not copy them; it creates pointers to them in their original locations. I believe this is an available option to the default.
If they are not showing up in iTunes and they are not in the iTunes music folder shown in iTunes prefs -> Advanced - iTunes music folder location, then you are good to go.
Then I'm good to go. I've got 2800 tracks in my iTunes music folder, plus another 6000 elsewhere on my C: drive, all of which are correctly listed in iTunes. (There also a bunch of WMAs which, for these purposes, don't exist). None of the ones from my J: drive are listed in iTunes and none have been copied to the iTunes music folder. Thanks again for your help.

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I honestly thought they were backed up, along with a few hundred pictures. I actually went in and manually did a back-up a couple of months ago, because it didn't appear that it was following the schedule & auto-backing up. I'm just a 55 y/o, non-computer-literate mom, who now has adult children & am doing this computer thing on my own!! My computer is really old. Bought it when Windows ME came out!! HA! Saving for a new one, but our daughter's wedding this summer got in the way.
I thought about the delete-thing. Wasn't sure if that would work. Going to try (test) that now.
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http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3819
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http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2972
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Welcome to Apple Support Communities allensood!
You will get a wider audience and won't confuse the original poster with solutions that don't apply to them, if you start your own topic here
https://discussions.apple.com/community/desktop_computers/mac_mini?view=discussi ons
Unless you have a solution to try for the original poster, it is always best if you start your own topic.

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Welcome to Apple Support Communities
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Ugh, again... itunes backs up files to C drive... I have path as M drive.

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