Itunes smart peeps

[Curly Bill]

I bought a new computer and have a question about Itunes. Can I access my old music library through Itunes and if so how? I had the songs I had on my old computer saved and I have already put them back onto Itunes, but I did so by starting over so to speak. If there was a way to just start back with my old library I did not discover it and so have lost my play counts, EQ presets and all that stuff.

If there's a trick to getting my old library back and onto the new computer let me know....and yeah computers are not my thing. :D

[Whet]

can you Export the old library, then import it into your new itunes library on your new computer?

Are both laptops networked? if so, try the export/import

[setem]

Did you put the cover sheet on your TPS report?

[soonerbrat]

I bought a new computer and have a question about Itunes. Can I access my old music library through Itunes and if so how? I had the songs I had on my old computer saved and I have already put them back onto Itunes, but I did so by starting over so to speak. If there was a way to just start back with my old library I did not discover it and so have lost my play counts, EQ presets and all that stuff.

If there's a trick to getting my old library back and onto the new computer let me know....and yeah computers are not my thing. :D



don't know..i had my itunes backed up on a removable hard drive for my old computer and just plugged that into my new one.

[JohnnyMack]

I asked this question a while back and I think you can use your ipod itself as a removable drive and pull the songs off of it, save it to your computer and then drag them into itunes. I need to try this actually.

But brat's idea is prolly the best way to handle it.

[BlondeSoonerGirl]

So you moved all your music over to your new PC, right?

On your old computer, in the My Music\iTunes folder there's an .xml file called 'iTunes Music Library.xml'. This file contains all your ratings, playlists, etc.

Copy it from your old computer and paste it in that same folder on your new computer. Open that file using Wordpad (or any other text editor) and verify that the path it's using (My Documents\My Music\iTunes...) is what your new computer is using and that it's pointing to where your music is 'living' right now. That file will put all your stuff the way it was but you have to make sure it's 'pointing' to the right directory.

After you copy that file over, the next time you open iTunes it should all be back like it was.

[soonerbrat]

I asked this question a while back and I think you can use your ipod itself as a removable drive and pull the songs off of it, save it to your computer and then drag them into itunes. I need to try this actually.

But brat's idea is prolly the best way to handle it.


actually, you're not supposed to be able to do that...but you can. you have to buy a software program - it costs about $20. if you're interested PEEM me and i'll give ya more info on it

[BlondeSoonerGirl]

And yeah, if you had no way to connect the two computers you'd have to use your iPod or another external source to copy/move it over. If you could have networked the two machines you could have just imported it.

But you should still be okay.

[Curly Bill]

Using my old computer was not an option for anything as it had given up the ghost. Apparently the power supply went fail and when it did it took the motherboard with it. I had the geek squad do a backup from my old computer onto my new one, so I had the songs I had downloaded, I just ended up with basically a new Itunes set-up as I knew not how to just keep on with the old one. I had thought there might be a way to import that stuff from the Ipod into the new computer but knew not how to do that either.

[soonerinabilene]

Using my old computer was not an option for anything as it had given up the ghost. Apparently the power supply went fail and when it did it took the motherboard with it. I had the geek squad do a backup from my old computer onto my new one, so I had the songs I had downloaded, I just ended up with basically a new Itunes set-up as I knew not how to just keep on with the old one. I had thought there might be a way to import that stuff from the Ipod into the new computer but knew not how to do that either.

Ipods are programmed to be a one way transfer system. You can put stuff on them, but you cant pull stuff off of them. There are ways around that though. You can download a program that is free that will allow you to do it. Google "ipod getter" and you will find a link to a program that will copy everything from your ipod onto your hard drive.

[BlondeSoonerGirl]

Most of the time, all those little programs do is enable your iPod to be used as a hard drive and give you a little interface that looks like iTunes. You can enable your iPod to be used as an external drive yourself.

See, the rub comes in when something bad happens. And your PC dies. And you never enabled your iPod to be used that way. And the default is to automatically update when you plug your iPod in. And when you get a new PC with no music in your library and you plug you iPod in it does just that. Which means it makes your iPod look just like your iTunes and if there's nothing in your iTunes then BOOM! - nothing on your iPod. This is when people go 'I LOST ALL MY MUSIC!!!'.

Yes. Yes, you did.

So, it's kinda good to set iTunes to not automatically update and manually synch them up. And enable that thing to be used as an external hard drive.

I found this out because I had a hard drive die and for a brief time thought I'd lost my library. I was freaking out. Computer place was able to recover most of my music but the complete library was on my iPod so I had to somehow get it on my new PC. So I bought CopyPod (which is now TransPod or something) and found out that all it does it something we can do ourselves. You just don't think about it until something horrible happens. But it is only $20 bucks so not a big deal but if you can do it yourself for free.

[JohnnyMack]

Your post would have been better if you had used, "And boom goes the dynamite" instead of just BOOM!

[BlondeSoonerGirl]

I was gonna say 'BOOM! HEAD SHOT'...

Heh.

[soonerbrat]

if you plug the iPod into the computer - assuming it's manual update and not auto update..you can look at it as an external hard drive, unhide the folders and find all the music..i did that a couple years ago and I was able to move all the songs over to my new computer but it didn't automatically put them in itunes for me, just into a folder...and my playlists were not intact....but when I used copypod it organized everything for me..definitely worth $20.

[Curly Bill]

Thanks all, I should have posed this question first, but since I did have the computer geeks back up all my stuff I did manage to put all my songs into my new Itunes set-up. Still had I known about this copypod thing I would have done it.

[Whet]

happy birfday Curly Bill!

[Curly Bill]

happy birfday Curly Bill!

:D