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Music - transferring to new Mac

S

scouser75

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Oct 7, 2008
2,989
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Guys, having major issues with my new Mac. I've just copied and pasted my Music folder from my old Mac to new Mac, but when I open Music on my new Mac, all I can see are my iTunes purchases. The music I ripped from old CDs and my 2 playlists are not showing even, though it is in the music folder user / name / music / music / music

what am I doing wrong?
 
The music is there, it’s just not in the library. There are a couple of options.

1. Drag the music into the Music app, which will add it to the library - but not your prior play counts, playlists, etc.
2. If play counts & playlists are important to you, use Migration Assistant.
3. The method I personally use - subscribe to iTunes Match & all the music becomes part of your iCloud Music Library then you don’t even have to think about it.
 
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@FreakinEurekan thank you for the tips.

In my music folder in Finder, I have a folder named Music, which holds all the songs, I just don't see them in when I open the app.

1. When you say "drag the music into the music app, is that the Music folder or individual folders within the Music folder? Or just the songs themselves?

2. Migration Assistant - can I just migrate the music folder itself? Or do I need to migrate all folders? I'm setting up as new so really only want to move over the music and photos library (should I drag and drop Photos library or use Migration Assistant too?)

3. I don't have iTunes Match and don't really need it - other than for this task.
 
scouser75 said:
Guys, having major issues with my new Mac. I've just copied and pasted my Music folder from my old Mac to new Mac, but when I open Music on my new Mac, all I can see are my iTunes purchases. The music I ripped from old CDs and my 2 playlists are not showing even, though it is in the music folder user / name / music / music / music

what am I doing wrong?
Click to expand...

You need to add the folder to the Music app before it will see those songs. You can just drag the main Music folder instead of every subfolder.
 
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And I'm back. It almost worked - On the original Mac I have 2677 songs. But on the new Mac only 2522 came across. But the exact same number of Folder items were dragged across.

I have a previous libraries folder. Could that have something to do with it?

Or if possible to just migrate music and photos library, should I simply migrate those 2 folders?
 
You can't migrate "Just" music, migration is mostly an all-or-nothing proposition (there are a few things you can de-select, but you're always migrating a full user account - just with some items removed).
 
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Selecting File > Import is the menu equivalent of dragging your music folder into the Music app.
 
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Well, having gone down the Migration Assistant route for Photos first, after about an hour the Mac I was transferring from had a message saying something like "Mac must be powered on...." (which t was) and the transfer process froze.

I cancelled but then my new MBP reset itself and all my settings and word documents I'd copied and pasted have gone 😭

Have you seen this before?

I'm off now to blooming start again. BBS... I hope!
 
scouser75 said:
Have you seen this before?
Click to expand...
I understand iCloud isn't for everyone... but with all my photos, music, messages, documents, & desktop folder in iCloud, I basically don't use migration assistant at all any more. I just sign in on the new Mac, install whatever software I need on it (1Password and a couple others) and let everything sync up.

That said - when I did migrate, generally speaking, I tried to migrate from a Time Machine backup rather than directly from the old computer. If you MUST migrate directly, boot the old computer into "Safe Mode" first (if it has an Intel processor, hold a Shift key while it boots up).
 
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Right, back from resetting the new laptop. I went and tried using Migration Assistant BUT for some reason this time I'm getting an error message stating unable to connect... both machines need to be on the same network. But they are!

Grrrrrrrrr! I thought this was supposed to be easy and seamless 😥
 
Have you imported the Library file? What I did, after a bit of trial and error (migrating my music from iTunes on Mojave) was to clone the music folder, then import the library file (open Music with the option key held down, a dialog box gives you the option to create a new file or import an existing one).
 
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StuAff said:
Have you imported the Library file? What I did, after a bit of trial and error (migrating my music from iTunes on Mojave) was to clone the music folder, then import the library file (open Music with the option key held down, a dialog box gives you the option to create a new file or import an existing one).
Click to expand...
Thanks mate. For now, what I've done is shut down and restart both machines and that seems to have fixed the network issue. I've now restarted migration assistant for just the music. Now fingers crossed it works. 3 hours to go.... If it works, then I'll do Photos tomorrow. That's a 263gb file!!!

Thanks again guys for the help ❤️
 
StuAff said:
Have you imported the Library file? What I did, after a bit of trial and error (migrating my music from iTunes on Mojave) was to clone the music folder, then import the library file (open Music with the option key held down, a dialog box gives you the option to create a new file or import an existing one).
Click to expand...
Right, the migration assistant did bring in the music folder perfectly BUT it also copied over my previous profile including all the junk (mainly a 350gb odd system storage). So now to your suggestion.

I've got the music library on my external HD. Can I import from this HD? In the music folder I also for some reason have a previous music library. Which one do.i import?
 
scouser75 said:
Right, the migration assistant did bring in the music folder perfectly BUT it also copied over my previous profile including all the junk (mainly a 350gb odd system storage). So now to your suggestion.

I've got the music library on my external HD. Can I import from this HD? In the music folder I also for some reason have a previous music library. Which one do.i import?
Click to expand...
Yes, and the newer one (if it's up to date...).
 
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StuAff said:
Yes, and the newer one (if it's up to date...).
Click to expand...
Brilliant. Thank you. I'm currently trying the migration process again in case I done something wrong the last time. If this migration also brings in all the junk I'll try your method. Can I also use this method for the photos library? Import it over from.mynold mac?
 
scouser75 said:
Brilliant. Thank you. I'm currently trying the migration process again in case I done something wrong the last time. If this migration also brings in all the junk I'll try your method. Can I also use this method for the photos library? Import it over from.mynold mac?
Click to expand...
Should be able to import photos, I think...with mine I'd just cloned the data from my old MacBook.
 
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StuAff said:
Have you imported the Library file? What I did, after a bit of trial and error (migrating my music from iTunes on Mojave) was to clone the music folder, then import the library file (open Music with the option key held down, a dialog box gives you the option to create a new file or import an existing one).
Click to expand...
Is the library file the one with the Music logo on it? If so, that's only a 26mb file. The previous library file (which also has the magic logo) is 24mb. That can't be right, can it?
 
StuAff said:
Yes, it's the database of all the music files, plus playlists etc, rather than the music itself.
Click to expand...
Thank you. So if it's just the data base, where will the actual music come from? I've got mp4's galore 😂

Am I being really silly?
 
Morning / Afternoon, thank you for your help on all of this. After a lot of effin' and blinding' , I think I got there in the end. My Photos library was quite straight forward. The only issue is I have hundreds of photos I'd deleted from my Photos app on Mac showing again, so need to import all of these again and then delete. But other than that, all seems OK.

Thank you again :)
 
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And now the Music folder is also fully sorted out and I've done a full back up. Fingers crossed there are no more glitches.
 
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