Q: Itunes 11 deleted ALL my music!

I saw something about this potential issue earlier in the thread, and I changed from AVG to Avast just in case the issue was true. So maybe that change and/or the upgrade found by Avast solved the problem? <Fingers crossed>

This works:

A detailed tutorial:

1. Go to the iTunes folder (For me, it's Libraries/Music/iTunes
2. Delete the file "iTunes Library.itl" (You could also just put it in a backup folder in case this doesn't work for you)
3. Rename "iT 1.tmp" to "iTunes Library.itl". Even though you change the extension, it still works.
4. Open up iTunes and you should be back to normal! To be sure, do a search for the last thing you imported.

Also if purchased music will still not let you use it, simply drag all folder from your iTunes Media folder back into itunes, any very recent additions to the library may need to be imported again. Apple lizards

I followed the support article here, and it worked perfectly:

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1967?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

This was really easy, just dragging the library file to the desktop and then copying the correct file from the Previous iTunes Libraries and renaming it.  Reopened iTunes and everything was back where it was.

If you have AVG, make sure you have updated.

I just recently got the 5th generation iPod touch.... i had 1,045 songs on it yesterday... i went on it to listen to music and all of the albums had iCloud signs on them, i was really shocked and thought that it was just a malfunction or something, so i then tried to reboot my computer to see if that was the issue, IT WASN'T!!! iTunes had deleted all but about 300 songs off of my iPod and my iTunes... i am so p****d and do not have any g*****n time to put all the f*****g songs back on my iPod.... someone CLEARLY needs to fix this!!! IT IS B******T!

Same and I had music from years back I had on cd all gone thanks to itunes.

I am beyond frustrated.  After years of using iTunes I upgraded to 11 on my laptop.  About a month ago I lost everything, like you all.  I investigated and concluded it was our free AVG so we disabled the scan.

As of yesterday I finally had everything back, all my playlists rebuilt.  I closed iTunes, remembered a track

I wanted to download, came back and opened iTunes and it was all gone AGAIN.  How can that be if the AVG scan is disabled?  Am at my wit's end now.

I'm not very tech knowledgable, so instead of disabling AVG, I deleted it and replaced it with Avast! AVG apparently has issued an update to fix the issue, but I'm not switching back. Not going to risk getting burned again.

BTW, I've had a functional iTunes ever since I dumped AVG. Knock on wood.

Agree with tootht.

I believe you have to COMPLETELY remove AVG from you system rather than just disable the scan, that means down to the very last registry entry. I've also replaced AVG with Avast.

Have you looked in the recyle bin to restore the itl file?

However, it really is a bloody pain and I've lost a lot of previous admiration for Apple products.

I've been having my Library disappear frequently since the latest Apple update. I restore the Library from my backup files, only to find them gone again later in the same day.  Yes, it's easy enough to add the back up files back into the Library....but not if you have to do it several times a day!

I've uninstalled Itunes at least 3 times by now, hoping to eliminate the problem.  Unfortunately, in the process I eliminated the older version, so I can't just revert to the one that actually functioned!  But nobody should have to revert to the older version.  APPLE NEEDS TO FIX THE BUG IN THIS VERSION!  It's clear from the forums that numerous people are having the same problem.

I don't believe the problem lies with AVG, as many people have speculated.  Listing Itunes as an Exception does NOT work.  And I'm sorry, but one program (Apple's) should not force me to give up another good one (AVG), especially when it's protecting my computer! 

Long story short: I managed to keep my Library intact for three days running after I unchecked the box in Preferences (General tab) that updates Itunes automatically.   To test my suspicions, I checked the box just a few minutes ago, and the whole Library INSTANTANEOUSLY disappeared again.

IT IS THE APPLE UPDATE THAT IS REMOVING THE LIBRARY.  IT IS THE APPLE UPDATE THAT NEEDS A FIX.  Please stop blaming AVG. 

Guys, while I realize this *****, it's more of a pain to see more reports on this problem, but you don't mention that you're running in to it on a PC.  If you look at the top of this page, this thread is in the support discussions for iTunes for the Mac.

You're reporting it on the wrong list.

You're not mentioning that you are on a PC, so people are forced to guess which platform you're on.

Problems that exist in iTunes for the PC are entirely possible to have a completely different cause than problems in iTunes for the Mac.

Look here:

https://discussions.apple.com/community/itunes

This is where you should be reporting these issues:

https://discussions.apple.com/community/itunes/itunes_for_windows

It is 100% AVG's fault.  A.  They've acknowledged as much on their site (in related threads, released a temp. fix and are working on a permanent fix), B.  When you remove AVG completely, the problem goes away, and C.  nobody using Avast had complained of this issue.

Thanks, Alex. 

Itunes stores your music files outside of the interface in a media folder on your hardrive. I've updated and then noticed that all or some of my music was missing inside the itunes program. But, all my files were still in the itunes media folder on my HD.

Thanks.  Holding SHIFT while opening itunes worked for me.

I just had this happen to me.  After updating iTunes (just to make that annoying "updates available" popup go away) all of my music is physically deleted from my itunes folder.  Not a bad .itl file.  Not AVG.  I don't even have that on my computer.  The files are gone, no where on my computer.

I haven't seen any thread with a fix for this.  I believe this is intentional on apple's part.  They want to control all media they don't care if that media was made by my friends or by myself.  If it gets put in the itunes folder, they assume that it is their's to do what they like.  It's rotten and evil.

Here's my solution.  Never use iTunes again.  Use open source Miro to organize and play music.  Make sure that you store your music in a folder other than iTunes Media.  Upload 20,000 songs to Google Music that can be downloaded again at any time.  Update your ipod with CopyTransManager.  Never update iTunes ever again. I even went ahead and deleted all iTunes shortcuts. I would delete it off my computer but OSX won't let me.