Help! My iTunes Library has been split between two folders on two different drives

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Level 1

7 points

Help! My iTunes Library has been split between two folders on two different drives

Hi,

{First of all: Mac OS 10.13.6 High Sierra, latest version of iTunes as of 6/27/2020, external hard drive connected via USB} I have a full backup of my system through Time Machine as well.

Okay, so I have, through iTunes Preferences, designated a specific location (/Volumes/Projects-1/iTunes Media Folder External/Music) on my external drive to house my music, and have designated iTunes to "Keep iTunes Media File organized" and "Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library" checked/selected. I did this when I set up my Mac upon purchase in 2018, and before adding any music to the library.

I'd say about 90-95% of all albums purchased through iTunes and ripped from CD have correctly been added to the proper file on the external drive as desired. However, there are some random albums, both from iTunes and ripped from CD, that have been routed to the original iTunes medial library on the primary internal drive (/Users/johncartwright/Music/iTunes/iTunes Media) by mistake. The albums that have been misdirected are full albums with all tracks in order. I see no evidence that some tracks are in one folder on one drive and others elsewhere, which is good, I think. Also, for a given artist/band I have examples of some albums in the desired locations and others by this same artist/band in the wrong location.

I've searched here and across the internet for a solution, but cannot find a scenario exactly like mine, and I don't want to risk messing things up by following advise to a problem that isn't exactly the same. How can I migrate the misplaced albums to the desired location and prevent this from happening in the future?

Many, many thanks!

J

Posted on Jun 27, 2020 2:20 PM

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Answer 1

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turingtest2

Level 10

272,955 points

Jun 28, 2020 4:37 AM in response to BassTone5

You have what I refer to as a split library, where the database is on one drive, and the media folder is on another. If iTunes is ever launched when the external drive isn't ready iTunes will reset the path to iTunes Media inside the folder where the iTunes Library.itl database it has open is located. Thereafter new content ripped into the library or downloaded from the iTunes store will go into that folder until you notice and set the media folder path back again.

You can use File > Library > Organize Library > Consolidate Files to bring in copies of the tracks that are on your system drive. You would then delete the originals, i.e. delete the folder /Users/johncartwright/Music/iTunes/iTunes Media.

To prevent it happening again, and also make the library easier to backup and move around in future, see Make a split library portable - Apple Community.

tt2

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