Alright I got my iTunes on my old mac with about 6000 songs in the other room and my albums are all sorted by playlists.... IE: Outkast - Idlewild ... all in order with pictures and everything , Im real picky... but I wanted to know the best method of transfering my iTunes onto this mac that Im using now with all the playlists and everything still together... anyone that can help me it would be greatly appreciated...... also sorry if its a stupid question haha..
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Transfering iTunes and playlists from one computer to another
- Thread starter Buttuh B
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I suppose it depends firstly on whether you let itunes sort your music for you automatically into its own folders etc, or whether you just have a link to your music all over the place on your computer.
If you let itunes do it for you, then the easiest way i found was to simply get a external hard drive and get the itunes music folder which contains the library file and all of the artwork and music files etc. Then simply put all of this into the new computer into the Music folder that was on your old mac. (You could also do this via the network, as in create a shared folder and transfer all of the files that way)
After youve done this, you need to open up itunes whilst holding down the 'Shift' button and select 'Choose Library...' then select your own library that you have put into the music folder.
Now when in itunes go to Itunes Preferences then select the 'Advanced' tab and then where it says 'Itunes Music Folder Location' select 'Change' and chose the music folder where your music is contained and your music should now be on the computer and fully working.
You may also want to Authorise the computer so that you can use music that you have bought off of itunes, this can be done by selecting Store then selecting Authorise Computer.
Hope that helps and isnt too confusing!
If you let itunes do it for you, then the easiest way i found was to simply get a external hard drive and get the itunes music folder which contains the library file and all of the artwork and music files etc. Then simply put all of this into the new computer into the Music folder that was on your old mac. (You could also do this via the network, as in create a shared folder and transfer all of the files that way)
After youve done this, you need to open up itunes whilst holding down the 'Shift' button and select 'Choose Library...' then select your own library that you have put into the music folder.
Now when in itunes go to Itunes Preferences then select the 'Advanced' tab and then where it says 'Itunes Music Folder Location' select 'Change' and chose the music folder where your music is contained and your music should now be on the computer and fully working.
You may also want to Authorise the computer so that you can use music that you have bought off of itunes, this can be done by selecting Store then selecting Authorise Computer.
Hope that helps and isnt too confusing!
To keep your playlists, etc. just make sure you copy the "iTunes Library" and "iTunes Music Library.xml" files into the new iTunes Music Folder along with the music you move. Detail is in this article.
Thanks I appreciate it guys I will try to do it later on this week, I need to buy an external hard drive then.. So if I do the Authorise Computer my videos I bought off iTunes will also show up? Correct?
You dont necessarily 'need' an external drive, its just in my opinion the easiest way, plus external drives are super cheap these days, but yeh aslong as you authorise the computer, then all of the music/videos etc that you bought off itunes that you put on the new computer will be able to run on that computer and you can sync it to ipods etc, i think its a maximum of 4-5 computers you can authorise to use your content.
You do not need to buy an external drive. You can transfer the files using a couple different ways (target mode, local network), and there have been other threads discussing how to do that.
(You can authorize 5 computers to play songs purchased with your iTunes account).
(You can authorize 5 computers to play songs purchased with your iTunes account).