Using Itunes with an external hard drive

I have an old powerbook which has become full with all my music. I have bought an external ION hardrive. All i want to do is transfer my entire music collection to the ION drive, whilst keeping all the titles and artist info within itunes, so that it acts as a frontline database that points to the external harddrive. I do not feel the need to have any music on my internal harddrive and am happy to only ever be able to access my music with the external hard drive attached.
I have played around with it, but have now managed to have a few bits on the ION, and a few bits in the powerbook and nothing seems to be able to find the other. This creates problems when i then connect my ishuffle, which seems to find nothing.
I hope i've done nothing terminal. Any help?
Powerbook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.3)

Thanks for the help. I should point out that there is only one powerbook involved, not 2. Anyway, I have done that and indeed my ION external hardrive shows all the music files, but they are no longer featured in itunes at all. i thought i would see th titles of my library there, but the actual files would be on my external hard drive.
It a mystery! how do i get the titles and artists info back into itunes whilst the actual music stays on the external hard drive?

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How to use iTunes with an external hard drive?

Hi-
I'm pretty new to iTunes, so forgive me if this is a stupid question. I have about 15GB worth of music saved onto my laptop now and taking up a ton of space. So I got an 80GB external hard drive to move everything onto. What I don't understand, though, is what happens after I save my music onto the external hard drive and remove from my laptop hard drive. How do I play music in iTunes from the files stored on the external hard drive?
Thanks in advance!!
HP Compaq NC6000 notebook Windows 2000

Welcome to discussions! Even though this is the "using iTunes music store" forum, for questions & issues using the store, I can go ahead & offer a little advice. This link from MacMuse will explain about moving iTunes to a new drive. The most important point being is you must tell iTunes the location of the iTunes music folder on the EHD. Please post back if you have any questions.
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=121879

How to set up iTunes with an external hard drive so that there is not a double location for the iTunes Media folder

Hi,
A very helpful postee got to the end of his knowledge level, so I am posting this for you tech guys to sort out. Bit long because I've tried to set it out step by step. Briefly I'm new to iTunes and my laptop has a very small hard drive and is virtually full and due to be replaced. So I want to use an external hard drive.
Now I know that iTunes installs itself to two locations: 1. Programs Files 2. Music. And its the Music location that bothers me.
I asked about using an external hard disk to store the actual AAC files. I was advised that in order to change the loaction of the iTunes media folder I was should employ preferences/advanced/ and this is what i saw (as you would expect):
Then I hooked up my hard drive, hit 'change', and this is what I saw:
I was a bit worried by the lack of pathway details, but assumed it must have done something on the external drive, so I looked on it and this is what i saw (highlighted):
But compare this with what was in the directory I attempted to reproduce, viz in the iTunes folder in /laptop/Music/iTunes:
A ton of stuff. The only stuff that corresponded with what iTunes had created on my external hard drive was in Music/iTunes/iTunes Media folder:
Now this suggests that there are TWO locations for my preferences. The advanced tab only allowed me to ADD an extra location, not REPLACE the original.
So:
1. Which of the two locations will iTunes choose when I add music? Surely it will go with the original pathway laid down in the directory when iTunes was installed, and ignore my external Hard Drive? I mean, how can there be two automatic locations?!!!
2.. I don't mind itunes library being on my laptop as this is just a list, but it obvoiusly has to have a pathway to the site where the actual AAC files are stored.
so surely it won't work unless the whole lot is on the external hard drive: library, extras, genius, the lot?
4. How then do I get it all on the external since merely changing "preferences" doesn't do the job?
5. Is this perhaps the reason why so many people report that iTunes does not recognize their external hard disk:
http://www.ehow.com/info_12199596_external-hard-drive-not-recognized-itun es.html
I just don't want this to happen to me. Any answers?
Philip Joy
UNITED KINGDOM

As I've replied to your other threads...
Easy method 1:
Move or Copy entire working library from current location to the root of your external drive. Press & hold down shift (option on a Mac) as you click the icon to start iTunes. Click Choose when prompted, then browse to ..\iTunes\iTunes Library.itl on the external. If you copied the library across then test your new library works properly after renaming the original folder, before deleting the original folder to recover space.
Easy method 2:
If you haven't really started to build your library. Press & hold down shift as you click the icon to start iTunes. Click Create. Browse to the root of the external drive. Create the library as ITunes. Drag your media into ..\iTunes\iTunes Media\Automatically Add to iTunes.
Complex method:
Required if you've already tried other things and now have media & library scattered around. See the post make a split library portable.
in addition...
In all cases the idea is to get a library folder called iTunes containing a media folder called iTunes Media with all media inside this media folder. Once you have the library in this shape it is easy to reconnect to the library with the shift-start-iTunes method if the drive letter changes, move the library to another computer, and backup the library by cloning the folder to another drive.
tt2

Upgrading Itunes with an external hard drive and another question

Okay so about a month ago I transferred my itunes library to my external hard drive. I have since purchased and downloaded new music/video to my Ipod. Here are my questions if anyone can help me please.
1) Because I moved the library to the external, does that mean I also moved the Itunes program OR just the place where new music is downloaded/purchased and save to?
2) Upgrading to new Itunes on this computer, will that ruin what I have in my library or just upgrade and keep everything the same like it is now?
3) Horror story I heard is that when I upgrade, I may have to re-purchase music from Itunes in order for it to play on new Itunes. If that's true then I am paying like $400+.
I'm not a dummy, but this Ipod and music are very, very important to me. Any help would be very appreciated.
Sincerely,
Gusaphit

gusaphit wrote:
so because you have kept your itunes folder and library on an EHD, I take it you have also deleted the actual Itunes program folder from your computer's C drive?
Not the program folder, iTunes folder where your music library and ancillary files are kept. I haven't had my iTunes music on any internal hard drive on any computer for years.
I am trying to delete the music/movies off of this PC as it is my work station as well.
What steps do I need to take in order to successfully ensure that my Itunes will be secured on my EHD and fully operable should I want to add more music, purchase more music, or delete/re-arrange music as I am doing now.
Check in Preferences>Advanced to make sure that iTunes is pointed to your EHD. If it is, you should be fine. Then, just to make sure that everything is where it should be consolidate your library: File>Library>Organize Library.
Follow-up: If I move the program over to my EHD does that mean I can use any PC to download music into the Itunes library from my EHD?
I don't think you want to move the iTunes.exe file to your EHD. As I understand it, iTunes isn't really happy there and it takes some work to get it there. Just move the library.
I'm asking because you responded and you're cute.
Very happy to help but really, I'm not that cute.

Transferring itunes with an external hard drive

I bought a new computer and need to transfer itunes. It is backed up on an external hard drive, but won't transfer correctly to the new computer. This includes many of the purchased songs. How do I get them all to transfer/play?

iTunes: How to move [or copy] your music to a new computer [or another drive] - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4527
Quick answer if you let iTunes manage your music: Copy the entire iTunes folder (and in doing so all its subfolders and files) intact to the other drive. Start iTunes with the option (shift on Windows) key held down and guide it to the new location of the library.
To see your iTunes folder click on the Music folder icon in your Finder sidebar.

Updating itunes with an external hard drive as library host

A quick question: I have my itunes library on an external hard drive. Do I need to have the hard drive plugged in in order to do updates (i.e., if I don't, will bad things happen when I do an update of itunes)?
Thanks,
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If you try to add music or launch iTunes and click play, without your external drive connected and running, iTunes will revert to the default location: ~/your user name/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music.
Updating the iTunes application (iTunes 7 anyone?) will not cause problems.

Itunes with an external hard drive?

I have just got myself a new external hard drive and to free up space on my computer i have put my itunes library on i, however every time i go into itunes there is nothing in my library but i have all of the files on my external hard drive so i have to import them every time.is there any way that i can stop this from happening??

There's a certain way you need to move the itunes library content so the itunes library database will know where to find the files in their new location on the exHD.
Also, not mentioned in any apple article, but windows can reassign hard drive letters without telling you. Your exHD could be drive F: one day and then G: the next day, and that is confusing to itunes (and many other programs).
Here's the apple directions - pay strict attention to step 11 and don't delete your itunes library database files.
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1364
And here's some really in-depth directions
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/moving-your-itunes-library-to -a-new-hard-drive/

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i have about 10G left on my laptop's harddrive. i've been told placing itunes on an external harddrive would free up space.
i put everything on the harddrive, did the whole advanced stuff by changing the location, etc. etc. but ater all that there's still no difference on my hard drive....
what the heck?

Hi... Looks like things have got a little confused over there. Can we get a few facts straight before suggesting things that might make matters worse?
Where exactly is your active library file? If you hold down shift as you start iTunes and click the option to Choose a library, then drop down the list box at the top of the search box it should reveal the current path. E.g. mine here is at D:\iTunes and the library file is called iTunes Library.itl so my active library is D:\iTunes\iTunes Library.itl
BTW if you didn't get asked to choose or create a library you didn't do it right.
What is the current setting under Edit > Preferences > Advanced tab for the location of the iTunes Media folder? Mine is D:\iTunes\iTunes Media.
Where is the media that you've moved around? Are there copies on the internal drive and the external drive? Select a file in your library that currently plays, press CTRL-I to get info, and copy down the location of the file from the Summary tab. Repeat the process for a file with a broken link. Its path should begin file://localhost...
With all these bits of information we should have a better picture of where things currently stand. I have scripts that can be used to repair broken links, and iTunes has got better at doing it by itself, but things need to be in a sensible layout before that is worth trying.
tt2

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Hi. First some background, I just got a new 500g ext. Hard drive which I've partitioned int 2 parts,1 for backing up my int. drive. (which I will do with Superduper, as recommended in another topic I found on here somewhere). The other for my photo's. I've so far succesfully copied my pictures folder to the external.
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Well, what do you know, I just finnished typing this question, went browsing the forums, found someone else had asked the same question and the first reply answered it for me.
Problem solved. ; )

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Using iTunes on an external hard drive

My iTunes are clogging my lap-top C drive, so I've purchased an external HD. I have a single USB connection between the external drive and the lap-top. I'd like to run iTunes from the external drive exclusively, but can't quite figure it out; any one done this successfully?
Thanks

Sure.
First thing you're going to want to do is transfer everything to the external:
MacMuse: Moving iTunes to a new drive
Then, just make sure that the external drive is powered on and connected every time you start iTunes.

How to back up an iPhone through iTunes with an external hard drive?

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I am using a T61 ThinkPad with an external hard drive and my itunes library keeps disapearing but remains on the external drive. Any idea how to fix this so my music doesn't disapear all the time? It's a real drag pulling music back into iTunes each week.

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Using Itunes with an external hard drive

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