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User profile for user: Benniator
Benniator Author
User level: Level 1
8 points

How do I get iTunes to recognize that the previous location of my movie files is permanently gone?

The external hard drive I had connected to my Airport Extreme, which I used as a download location for my iTunes movies, died recently. Now my iTunes library doesn't show artwork for movies and tries to locate a file which no longer exists when I try to play movies. How do I get iTunes to recognize that there is no physical file anymore and let me stream the film without attempting to locate it first?


I have removed downloads for movies, no luck. I have changed the media folder location in hopes of creating a blank slate, no luck. I know I could just download the films to a new HDD and solve the problem, but I have no interest in downloading a few terabytes of films again. I'd rather just stream from my computer like they were never downloaded. What can I do to essentially reset my library?

MacBook Pro 13", macOS 10.14

Posted on Jul 16, 2019 2:48 PM

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User profile for user: turingtest2
turingtest2
User level: Level 10
274,476 points

Posted on Jul 17, 2019 7:18 AM

Select and delete the broken entries from the library without deleting from your purchase history should that be offered. Close iTunes and reopen. You should see cloud links to your unhidden purchases.


tt2

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User profile for user: Benniator
Benniator Author
User level: Level 1
8 points

Jul 17, 2019 3:22 PM in response to turingtest2

Thank you for the reply. That fixes half of the problem. Removing the download (or deleting the film without hiding it from my purchases) and restarting iTunes allows me to stream the files, but the title art still shows up as broken. iTunes is still trying to access the HDD to pull up the artwork and I'm not sure why.


Regardless, I just found that hiding the movie from my purchases and unhiding it from the account page will completely reset that particular movie, artwork included. I was hoping there was a box somewhere to check or uncheck to fix them all at once, but at least I found a solution, even if it's unwieldy.

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How do I get iTunes to recognize that the previous location of my movie files is permanently gone?

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