Help me finish switching: iTunes from XP to OSX

[RumMunkey]

Hi, I need help. I thought I had this down pat, but made the mistake of going online today to try and check out some opinions and opened a whole can of worms.

I am a recent switcher. I am ready to make the final switch to making my Mac my primary computer instead of my other computer. I have set up just about everything; the last thing to do is iTunes.

I found a lot of conflicting information on how to do this without losing any meta data, some of which is as simple as "copy the xml file from PC to Mac, open iTunes and it'll understannd it" to "edit the xml file with Mac paths" to "purposely corrupt the xml file and force iTunes to rebuild it" to "export a fresh xml file from XP and import that file on the Mac".

Ugh.... now I'm confused.

I won't cloud the matter by explaining what I thought I had to do, I'll just ask what you think I should do.


Things you may want to know:

I'm a fairly experienced power user, but not a programmer (editing the xml file makes me a little nervous, but I will if I have to.. I have played with batch files and such in the past).

Both XP and OSX are using the most recent versions of iTunes.

My library is managed by iTunes (I copy the music to my iTunes folder when importing) and I'd like it to stay that way. I do everything through iTunes.

My current XP library is not in the default location. It's on a second (internal) drive. I believe it's assigned as "E:\" right now. I will be doing the same on the Mac (the library will be on a secondary internal drive).

There is no music on my iPod that isn't in my library. I have to wipe out the iPod anyway when I have the new library up (to restore it to Mac format) so I have no problems with any of that.

I have a library of mostly MP3s, some AAC (some from iTMS, and some ripped), lots of Audiobooks (some bought from Audible, some ripped and renamed to sit in the Audiobooks section), lots of Podcasts, and some movies & videos. It's fairly large, but I have the space to make it work on my Mac.

My Mac is a G4 Power Mac with lots of Ram and HD space. It's running Tiger (10.4.10), - and I have a G4 Power Book too if that would help at all.

I want to move my large (60 GB or so) library to my Mac. I want to keep all my original metadata (date added, play counts, etc) as I have some smart playlists that use the ratings and "date added" as criteria.

I have a 30 GB iPod (not the newest, one model earlier... with The Gorillaz on the package). My wife has a 1G shuffle (the one with the USB connector built in).


Help?

 

[zephead]

The thing I did when I got my MacBook is just copy the iTunes library files and put them in ~/Music/iTunes. Then I copied the iTunes Music folder into ~/Music/iTunes, and I was all set. It baffled me, really, because I expected I had to do a lot more. The thing you should do, since you have 60GB of music and a 30GB iPod, is copy as much stuff as you can into a folder on the iPod disk (being sure to remember which folder is right after the one you stopped at), then put it in the iTunes Music folder on your PowerMac, then go back and fill up the iPod again and dump it on your PowerMac. Lather, rinse, repeat, etc, etc, as needed. Then open iTunes and your music should all be there with the correct info.

 

[RumMunkey]

Thanks Zep. Did you have all your metadata there (play counts, date added, etc?) and the playlists? That's what I'm trying to not lose.

I actually have a fairly large external here that I might just load my entire library onto in one shot instead of going back and forth with the iPod. I assume that would work the same way.

Thanks again.

 

[zephead]

Yep, all the playlists (regular and smart), play counts, date added, last played, everything was there just as it was supposed to be.

 

[iHerzeleid]

Thanks Zep. Did you have all your metadata there (play counts, date added, etc?) and the playlists? That's what I'm trying to not lose.

I actually have a fairly large external here that I might just load my entire library onto in one shot instead of going back and forth with the iPod. I assume that would work the same way.

Thanks again.

It saves all that.

 

[rockstarjoe]

I did the same thing when I switched, just copy as posted above. The only thing that tripped me up was that I needed to rename my iTunes.itl file to just "iTunes" (removed the extension). Once i did that everything worked like a charm! Good luck.

 

[RumMunkey]

Just noticed you're using the defualt location for iTunes. Will this still work if I put iTunes on my second disk?

I assume I can put the .itl and .xml files in the default location (~/Music/iTunes) but the files on the second disk.

Oh, btw, I'm running my (DVD) backup now so I will be giving this a hot this weekend.

Will let you know how it turns out.

Thanks!

 

[zephead]

Put all the stuff in the default location first, then you can change the library location in the iTunes prefs. After that, close the prefs, go to the Advanced menu, and press Consolidate Library. It'll then move all your stuff to where you changed the library location to.