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ontheplains

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 20, 2009
18
0
tl;dr somewhat - cloned iTunes folder from one non-boot internal to another; changed Media Folder Location in Preferences, both boxes below checked; iTunes still plays music off old location. Help!

First off, I want to say that I've read through numerous similar threads on the topic, but as I explain below, the Apple endorsed method of letting iTunes copy the media failed horribly twice for me.

I have a Mac Pro in which I have a 1TB drive separate from the boot drive simply to house my iTunes media folder. I have been running out of space on the drive, so I purchased a 2TB drive to move my iTunes media folder to. I had been allowing my iTunes Library files to stay on my boot drive in their default location, but after reading more about how the library files + media folder work, I decided to copy all of the library files to the 1TB drive iTunes folder, to mirror the boot drive's. I used Option + open iTunes and selected the copied library file and everything worked perfectly - I mention this in case this has created the problem I'm now having.

I used the Apple endorsed method of having iTunes do the copying/consolidating of files to the new location on the 2TB drive but it failed - and I know I followed the directions perfectly, I even tried it twice. It copied over ~100k of my 134k songs, and the missing songs weren't just albums that had strange symbols (which I've had issue with before) - it would simply not copy some artists; or copy six of an artist's seven albums. This was not going to be an option for me in terms of how to move my media.

I had wanted from the beginning to use Carbon Copy Cloner (which I use every day and trust) to simply clone the 1TB to the 2TB drive and then change the location in the iTunes preferences. I unchecked 'Keep iTunes Media Folder Organized' and 'Copy files...', then changed the location and clicked OK. I then went back in, checked those two boxes and iTunes started into "Updating iTunes Library", which lasted a few minutes. However, even though the new location is set to the 2TB drive, when I play a song (to make sure it works) and then click to see info, it's still reading it off the 1TB drive.

So I remembered the whole Option + open iTunes thing, did that and selected the iTunes Library.itl file on the 2TB drive - nothing changed. I read some more on various forums about it and thought that maybe I should Option + open iTunes and then select the iTunes folder itself - nothing changed.

So I'm stuck with the media in the right place on the 2TB drive but iTunes still trying to read it off the 1TB, even though the location in Preferences has been set to the 2TB. I feel like I'm just missing something simple here. WHAT DO I DO?! I'm guessing it's not as simple as removing the 1TB, renaming the 2TB and letting iTunes look where the 1TB used to be.
 
Replying for archival sake. In case anyone comes across this post in the future and has the EXACT same problem, I figured out an answer.

WARNING: If you have a similar problem, don't trust that my fix will work. If you read my post and have the EXACT same problem, it likely will.

All I did was eject the 1TB drive (original location) that it kept accessing the files from. Once that crutch was gone, iTunes finally decided to do what I'd already been telling it to do - accessed the files from the newer location that I'd set in preferences.
 
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