Restoring my music library

[sevenseven7us]

So i tried to create a new Itunes music folder and erased my old folder. Now all my music cant be found. Song titles are still there but it says it cant find the original file. I have over 15000 songs and am a workin DJ and NEED major help here please... No I dont have it backed up to an external. Is there any way to restore to say like a week ago?

Sevenseven7us@yahoo.com

206-854-2420

Need help asap!

 

[myjay610]

Unless you had Time Machine enabled, you could be SOL.

 

[kajitox]

It seems like your question is phrased: "I had some files and I deleted them without backing them up. Can I get them back?" And I'm relatively sure that myjay is right on this one.

 

[sevenseven7us]

Yeah I had time machine working for a bit but I erased everything off of the external awhile back. Would it be possible to open up time machine and see if there was anything on it even though my external is empty? I just checked my time machine and my last back up was oct 5. Im at work today with my laptop and the external is at home. Am I sol? GRRRRRRRR

Thx for the help guys

 

[kajitox]

Yeah I had time machine working for a bit but I erased everything off of the external awhile back. Would it be possible to open up time machine and see if there was anything on it even though my external is empty? I just checked my time machine and my last back up was oct 5. Im at work today with my laptop and the external is at home. Am I sol? GRRRRRRRR

Thx for the help guys

Well if you have time machine backups, they're obviously a month old, but it seems as though they're there. Go into your iTunes Music folder (home->music->iTunes->iTunes Music) and then open time machine and try to restore your old iTunes Music folder from Time Machine. It won't have the stuff you've added since then, but if you still have a backup it will get what you had on the 5th.

 

[sevenseven7us]

Thx bro. Gotta wait till after 10am to tryn figure it out. Thx for the prompt reply.

Will time machine open fully with out the external connected?

 

[BigHungry04]

The drive you used for your Time Machine will need to be connected to the computer. You said you erased the drive you used for Time Machine, so I doubt you will be able to get anything off of it.

 

[ChrisA]

So i tried to create a new Itunes music folder and erased my old folder. Now all my music cant be found. Song titles are still there but it says it cant find the original file. I have over 15000 songs and am a workin DJ and NEED major help here please... No I dont have it backed up to an external. Is there any way to restore to say like a week ago?

Sevenseven7us@yahoo.com

206-854-2420

Need help asap!

Well, you could always re-rip from your CDs. But it could take a week.
There are data recovery services that can find files there were deleted. They can have success if (big if) you have not used the drive after the files were deleted.

What happens when you delete a file is the space the file used to take is given back to a pool of free space, to be re-used. when you write a new file space for the data is taken from this pool. So if you have not written new data to the drive all those files are still there on the drive but bt the index folders are gone and it will take a data recovery expert some time but he should be able to find your stuff. If you have not yet used the drive. It might cost you between $350 and $1,000 to have some on do this. But if the other option is to buy 15,000 tracks from iTunes or spend a week re-ripping CD spend the bucks.

The other option is for you to buy some data recovery software and try to do the job yourself. But if you are here asking these questions you are not quite qualified to be your own "data recovery expert". Pay a pro.

Why in the world would you not have multiple backups? You should have three backup copies with some stored in an off site location.

 

[sevenseven7us]

Well, you could always re-rip from your CDs. But it could take a week.
There are data recovery services that can find files there were deleted. They can have success if (big if) you have not used the drive after the files were deleted.

What happens when you delete a file is the space the file used to take is given back to a pool of free space, to be re-used. when you write a new file space for the data is taken from this pool. So if you have not written new data to the drive all those files are still there on the drive but bt the index folders are gone and it will take a data recovery expert some time but he should be able to find your stuff. If you have not yet used the drive. It might cost you between $350 and $1,000 to have some on do this. But if the other option is to buy 15,000 tracks from iTunes or spend a week re-ripping CD spend the bucks.

The other option is for you to buy some data recovery software and try to do the job yourself. But if you are here asking these questions you are not quite qualified to be your own "data recovery expert". Pay a pro.

Why in the world would you not have multiple backups? You should have three backup copies with some stored in an off site location.

Well i bought the external hardrive for this reason but when I went to transfer my music it only took 5000 files outta 15000 so I thought something was wrong and deleted what was on there so I could try again and the same thing happened... I noticed that my itunes music folder was the reason and it was only holding 5000 files in it so I consolidated the library and still had the same problem.

Yeah Im not too computer savy here. I've tried highlighting all my tracks, then draged them over to dump into the external but all I get is the spinning beach ball of hell... I notice that my external will accept around 3000 tracks at atime but its a pain in the ass to do it this way... Any way to do a bulk dump of around 15000 tracks?

Fortunatley 95% of my music was downloaded for free off of a DJ's only website but it still took about 3months for me to download 14000 songs.
Hopefully I didn't erase everything off the external... Im goin to connect the external tonight and open up time machine to see what I can find... I felt like crying last night when this happened. You live n learn I guess. LOL

PS> Why do I still see all the song titles in my itunes then if the original file cant be found?

 

[kajitox]

Well i bought the external hardrive for this reason but when I went to transfer my music it only took 5000 files outta 15000 so I thought something was wrong and deleted what was on there so I could try again and the same thing happened... I noticed that my itunes music folder was the reason and it was only holding 5000 files in it so I consolidated the library and still had the same problem.

Yeah Im not too computer savy here. I've tried highlighting all my tracks, then draged them over to dump into the external but all I get is the spinning beach ball of hell... I notice that my external will accept around 3000 tracks at atime but its a pain in the ass to do it this way... Any way to do a bulk dump of around 15000 tracks?

Fortunatley 95% of my music was downloaded for free off of a DJ's only website but it still took about 3months for me to download 14000 songs.
Hopefully I didn't erase everything off the external... Im goin to connect the external tonight and open up time machine to see what I can find... I felt like crying last night when this happened. You live n learn I guess. LOL

PS> Why do I still see all the song titles in my itunes then if the original file cant be found?

It's hoping you didn't delete them.

But in all seriousness, it has a link that points to where it should be. Since it's not there, it just gives you the exclamation point.