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adding additional Music folder in iTunes. any ideas?

cb911

cb911

macrumors 601
Original poster
hi all,

well i've just re-installed Panther, about a month ago. i backed up my iTunes library so i could keep my ratings and not lose everything from my iPod. now i've put a small selection of my music back onto my computer and set my iTunes music folder to that folder that the music is in.

but here's the problem - i've got the rest of my music on a external HD and i can't see a way in iTunes to 'add new Music folder' only 'change Music folder'.

so does anyone know a way i can get iTunes to look in my Music folder on the external HD as well as the Music folder on my PB? 😕

any help would be great... i dont' really want to go through my library and do 'file can't be found. locate the file?' an applescript, anything that could help with this would be great. 🙂
 
If you import you library file (with .xml ending in the old Music folder) you'll have all your ratings and playcounts and all the junk that fills that .xml file inefficiently (since the whole thing needs to be parsed) then point iTunes to that folder and set iTunes to organise your music and copy files to your iTUnes music library iTunes should sort itself out. I have done this before so it can be done, though the exact procedure may be a little askew.
 
Similar to this, if I'm switching from a PC to a Mac is there a way to keep my itunes database info (ratings, play counts) and migrate it across the platforms? (if it helps my ipod is still mac formatted)
-jim
 
i'm not sure if i explained myself... i want to keep two seperate 'Music' folders for iTunes, one on my PB, one on the external HD because that's got alot more room on it.

i thought just then that i could add an extra line into the iTunes Music library file specifying the Music folder on the external HD, but it's all garbled inside the music library file. is there a way i can open it so i can read it's contents? would adding another Music folder to the Music library file actually work?

basically i've already got my iTunes music folder set to the one on my PB, so now iTunes looks there for my music. i want to tell iTunes 'hey, look in this folder on the external HD for music as well.'

i might try this over at the Apple discussions as well...

Xenious - you could try movign the exact file to your Mac into the Music>iTunes folder (since that's where the library file is stored) or you might be able to copy the contents of the file and paste it into the Mac iTunes music library file. but i don't know really.
 
You can do this, but you have to manually manage files, you can't have iTunes managing one folder but not another. Turn off automatic-file-management in iTunes, then drag both folders onto the iTunes window. You should wind up with a single playlist of both folders. However, you must manage files yourself, as I said.

You may also be able to place an alias to the second music folder inside of the Managed folder... but I don't think that would work... you'd still have to drag the second folder to iTunes, which would copy the contents of the second folder to it's Managed folder.

paul
 
Here's my simple two cents...
I did the same thing (two hard drives) by merely choosing "Add to library" under file in iTunes. Then you can select the stuff you want without having it copied to your PB harddrive.
 
well i've found some AppleScripts that might help me get things sorted out...
i think i'll just have to add the Music folder onmy external HD to iTunes and then use a script to remove all the double tracks from iTunes, i'll lose all my ratings for those tracks, but oh well...
 
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