Merge 2 iTunes Libraries

[badkaren]

hi there,

i've got an eMac (1GHz PowerPC G4) and a macbook (2GHz Intel Core Duo) both of which I recently upgraded to OS X 10.5.8 and iTunes 9.0.1 (9) I took off traveling a while ago and dumped a bunch of music, but not all, from the eMac to the macbook and have since uploaded more different music to the macbook. now that i'm back and everything is updated, i'd like to dump the music back onto the eMac which has a much larger hard drive, without duplicating and/or screwing everything up (there are 4000 songs on the eMac and 2400 on the macbook ...)

i found one article on this forum that appears to explain how, but it is from 2007 so i'm not sure if it still applies. i have Airport Extreme and am sharing the libraries between the two computers.

thanks for any & all help

 

[badkaren]

ok, since posting my query, i've found the folowing wiki:

http://guides.macrumors.com/Keeping_2_iTunes_Libraries_in_Sync

is this really what i need to do? i'm a little scared because i'm not super confident with this kinda stuff.

i think i've got them networked as specified in the wiki and the user accounts are both named "bk"; however in iTunes, the shared accounts show up as "Bad Karen's music" and "main's music". is this ok? also, i'm not sure about setting the static IP's.

basically, i'm not really concerned about having a lot of music on the macbook any more. i'd like to migrate pretty much everything to the eMac and just access the music through the shared folder. i just don't want to fiddlefart around with deleting duplicates.

thanks!

 

[mac88]

Is your library organized or is it all over the place? If it is organized it may be easier to just bring over the artists/albums you don't have on the main computer.

 

[plinden]

You say you have iTunes 9.0.1 on both, so just turn on sharing on the MacBook, go to the Sharing section of the eMac and click on Home Sharing, enter your iTunes id and password, then select the MacBook's library. Select "items not in my Library", select all and import.

 

[aksmax]

Plinden's method of Home Sharing is definitely the way I'd try first. You can see that list of differences and consider what to bring over.
Alternately, you can dump everything from one to the other, then use the File/Show Duplicates option. Sorting that list by the field "Date Added", let's you get rid of all the new duplicates in one simple step.

Personally, I'd make sure I had a backup before doing either. You neeever know.

 

[badkaren]

well now, that is MUCH easier and definitely my level of "expertise". thank you! thank you! thank yo!u