Hi Simon, Tim, Olivia, and Others,
Apple actually covers this topic about moving your iTunes Music Folder
in a recent Article:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1449
(iTunes for Mac: Moving your iTunes Music folder)
This is the simplest and most robust method to use if you have always
let iTunes manage your your music (i.e., under the iTunes Preferences
Advanced menu you have "Keep iTunes Music folder organized checked"
and works entirely within iTunes using the "Consolidate Library"
command which, in iTunes 8, has been moved from the Advanced Menu
options to the Library submenu of the File menu on the iTunes menu bar.
Here's Apple's description of what "Consolidate Library" does (from an
older iTunes 7 description of Managing your Library -- hence the
reference to the Advanced Menu):
<begin quote>
Consolidate Your Library
The music and video in your iTunes library may be saved in different
places, depending on how you imported them. Consolidating your library
ensures that everything in your iTunes library is saved to your iTunes
Music folder. To consolidate your library, choose Consolidate Library
from the Advanced menu.
<end quote>
Now moving your iTunes music folder to a new location with the
"Consolidate Library" command includes moving your music folder to a
location on an external hard drive.
This is not a good choice if you have lots of music files outside of
your iTunes Music folder that has it's own organization (not the way
the iTunes library organizes music by Artist, Album, and Song) and
with little or not tagging information. If you have been using VLC or
another such app as your primary player, and have recently migrated
from Windows with a large music collection, the "Consolidate Library"
method may not be for you, but it is the simplest way for other users.
One warning is that you should make sure that your external hard drive
is powered up and connected before you start iTunes if you want to
access these tracks. If all the tracks in your library are on an
external drive, iTunes may either prompt you to locate the library or
to create a new library (which will be empty) when you start up. If
this happens, quit without making these selections and start again
with the drive connected.
The best description I've read of using iTunes on an external drive
and how to handle issues for laptop users is this artcile at ilounge:
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/moving-your-itunes-library-to-a-new-hard-drive
(should be no blanks or breaks in that link)
Managing your iTunes Library on an External Hard Drive
The ilounge pages have lots of images and links, so you may want to
Select all and then send the contents to TextEdit using the Services
menu (Safari > Services > TextEdit > New Window Containing Selection)
or copy and paste the content into a text file.
Cheers,
Esther
On Sep 18, 2008, at 8:30 AM, Tim Kilburn wrote:
Hi Simon,
The iTunes folder in your Music folder contains a number of files
and folders. The "iTunes Music" folder I spoke of houses all the
actual m4a, mp3 and other media files that you have in your
library. The library is the term that iTunes uses to encompass
anything and everything that belongs to iTunes. In the iTunes
folder, there is an item called iTunes Library but this is simply a
data file that iTunes uses to locate the media files to be played.
So, in a nutshell, the folder named "iTunes Music" is the one you
need to copy.
Later...
On 18-Sep-08, at 11:45 AM, Simon Cavendish wrote:
Dear tim,
This is exactly what I wanted to know when I - perhaps prematurely
- wondered how I could use an external drive to house my music
library should it become too large or dangerously voluminous. I
presume by "music folder" you mean music library? Sorry to be so
dumb but I'm just making sure I udnerstand your instructions
precisely as you meant them. Thanks for your post - most useful.
With best wishes, Simon
On 18 Sep 2008, at 13:58, Tim Kilburn wrote:
Hi Olivia,
You said: I spent a long time at my apple stores genius bar
today trying to figure out how to transfer my tv shows in my
Itunes library to an external hard drive (they explained that I
could then take them in and out of my ipod from the external
drive) The problem? None of us could figure out a way to do this
using the keyboard with out a mouse. Selecting and copying them
didn't work. They did a pretty extensive online search for a
keyboard shortcut which would let me do this, but to no avail.
Both they, and I, would love to know how this is done (if anyone
can give me info on this they said I need to make another
reservation and show them how it is done.) So, can anyone help
me out here?
The apple store people were great, but were as frustrated as I
was that nothing we tried worked!
Any help you can give would be wonderful, so that I can free up
some space on my internal drive!
TK: You are correct that it can't be done from within the iTunes
app. You need to copy the files from within the Finder. All the
itunes music, movies and other such media is stored in the Music
folder of your Home directory in a folder named iTunes. If all
you wish to do is free up space on the internal drive, I would do
the following:
• Go to your Desktop Vo-shift-d.
• Press cmd-shift-h to open your Home directory.
• Navigate to and then open the Music folder.
• Navigate to the iTunes folder and open it.
• Navigate to the iTunes Music folder, make sure it is selected
then use cmd-c to copy it.
• Open your external HD.
• Paste the iTunes folder to the location you wish it on the
external HD.
Depending on the size of your itunes library, the copying process
could take a while. Next, you'll want to choose the iTunes folder
from the external HD to be your music folder location.
• open iTunes.
• Press cmd-comma to bring up the Preferences dialog.
• Interact With the ToolBar.
• Press the Advanced button.
• Stop Interacting With the ToolBar.
• click on the Change button for the iTunes Music Folder location.
• In the dialog, locate your itunes Music folder on the external
Hd and select it.
• Click on the Open button.
• Click on the OK button to close the iTunes Preferences dialog.
Now, all the iTunes xml files and other library info is left in
your Home directory but the actual iTunes Music folder that uses
up the most HD space will reside elsewhere. Then, simply delete
the iTunes Music folder from your Home directory and empty your
Trash to regain that HD space you desire. Just make sure that you
confirm that your music library is all there by browsing through
it while in iTunes. Also, that iTunes Music folder has all the
music organized by Artist and Album so it's possible to locate
specific songs if you wish to copy them somewhere.
Hope this was what you were looking for.
Later...
Tim Kilburn
& Carter the Canine
Fort McMurray, AB Canada
Tim Kilburn
& Carter the Canine
Fort McMurray, AB Canada
