iPod Touch (6th generation) not syncing all music and unable to unsync videos

You're welcome.

If a track was showing an exclamation mark, but then it played when you clicked on it, that suggests that the previous time that iTunes looked for the file it could not find it, but when you asked it to play the song it did find it. That would then remove the exclamation mark.

The possible cause for this phenomenon is that the drive on which the files for that song are located on was either not ready to read or not available at all.

My question therefore is; could any of your music files be on an external drive? If so, that drive must be on, connected (with the same drive letter as before) and ready to read before you start iTunes:

• • it has to be the same drive letter as when the file was added to your library. If it was drive F when you added the track, it must always be drive F. However, if you connect another device, which is assigned drive F and then you start (or connect) the external drive with the music on it, that drive will have to be assigned a different letter, but iTunes will continue to look on drive F. It won't find the file and therefore add the exclamation mark
  • I'm never one hundred percent sure, but I think that iTunes looks for the files (or at least, for the drives) as soon as you start iTunes, so if the drive was not ready, it may show the exclamation mark, but once the drive becomes ready, you ask iTunes to play a marked track and since the drive is now ready (and with the correct letter) it plays and the exclamation mark is removed

akaspeeddmn wrote:

makes sense that all the files should be in the same spot. I'm not sure they are. How do I find out where iTunes is "looking" so that I can make sure everything is in the same spot?

Now you're opening up a quagmire. What iTunes does is always look in the same place that the file was in when you added it to your iTunes Library. That could be the Music folder for one album , the Desktop for another and perhaps the oddly named folder that you're never quite sure what is does. I'll discuss how that happens a bit further on.

One way to work out whether all your music is in one parent folder is to use the Windows Explorer Search feature to look in turn for both *.mp3 and then for *.m4a files. (An m4a file is Apple's audio format, also known as AAC.) Be careful though; if you find any, you first need to determine whether that specific file is already in your library:

• • the file might be a duplicate and the other copy is the one listed in your library
  • if it's the only copy on your computer (and therefore the one iTune is using), if you move it you will have to then tell iTunes where it is now located

I hope you can see how complex this can become (unfortunately).

I'll continue this in sa second post...

There are other methods for determining all this, but I'm not that good at working out how. However, for an individual track (and then in turn, the rest of that album), you can look (in iTunes) at the track's information:

• • right-click a track and choose Song info from the pop-up menu. That displays the Details tab for the track. Switch to the File tab and look for the location information. It will tell you the full path for that file:

In the screenshot above, note that the location of the file for the Kate Bush song is the D:\ drive. In my case, this is correct and I am happy with that (it's an internal drive, inside the PC case).

also curious about import settings? I'm wondering if that has anything to do with why only certain tracks off CD's are in iTunes, or why some songs seem screwy.....

If you use an external drive (as discussed above) I would consider that possibility first. However, over time, it's possible that files do end up in various locations, especially if you were not aware of the importance of keeping them in one parent folder (the Music folder). It's just one of those things. However, to ensure that all future imports from CD are added to the same drive, look in iTunes' Edit/Preferences/Advanced menu. You can set the default location by using the change button:

As you can see, my default location is D:\My Music\iTunes\iTunes Music folder. That's the old location, iTunes now uses the My Music\iTunes\iTunes Media folder, usually on your C:\ drive. Note:

1. 1. that changing this setting only affects future imports
   2. if you add digital files to your computer, for example mp3 files that you obtained elsewhere, you manually place them in whichever folder you want. If you put them on your Desktop, then double-click them to "add them to your iTunes Library", the file location remains on your desktop (see next point though)
   3. an option seen on that panel (above) is Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library. You could use that, which will do as it says, but you then take up a lot more space with the duplicate copies (which will also further confuse you at a later time). I do not use that option

akaspeeddmn wrote:

.... some occasionally show an exclamation point within a circle, which I have deciphered to mean that its a duplicate. I tried to find a way to show tick boxes, have not figured it out yet.

Ah no. The exclamation mark tells you that iTunes can no longer find the file for that track. It does not mean that it is a duplicate. (Yes, it might be a duplicate, but that is not what the exclamtion mark means.)

To make this clear (hopefully):

• • iTunes lists songs and music (tracks) as an entry. Each time you want iTunes to play that track or synchronise it to a portable device, iTunes looks for and uses the file for that entry
  • if the file for an entry (track) is moved, renamed or deleted after it has been added to your iTunes Library, iTunes has no way of knowing and therefore that entry loses sight of where the file is now. Hence, when iTunes needs to use that file, it will mark the entry with the exclamation mark
  • if the path to a file is renamed or deleted, the same issue occurs; iTunes can no longer find the file for that entry

It's a golden rule; place the file in its final location before adding it to your iTunes Library and do not use Windows Explorer to move, rename or delete a file that has been added to iTunes. You can rename the entry's information (title, artist, genre, etc.) inside iTunes. Use iTunes to do this, but leave the file itself alone. If you do change the filename, you will need to help iTunes re-find that file, or create a new entry for the track and delete the old one. But that is making work for yourself.

To display the tickboxes (or checkboxes), go into Edit/Preferences/General>List view tickboxes (in some parts of the world, it will say checkboxes instead of tickboxes) and click the box so that there is a tick (checkmark) in the box:

and...

A couple of notes:

1. when I suggest playing the track in iTunes, I mean that one uses the Play button in iTunes to do it. Double-clicking a file in Windows Explorer (or on the Desktop) will play the song, by adding it to iTunes first. But, if the file is then moved for any reason, that entry will no longer work. It will also lead to audio files being stored in various locations on your computer, which will make it more difficult to move your library when you change your computer
2. The significance of the tickbox (checkbox): if you untick (uncheck) an entry in your library, two things happen:
   1. the song will not be played in a sequence. That is, iTunes will skip that song, even if it's in a list to be played. However, if one specifically selects that track, it will play
   2. iTunes' default is that when synchronising tracks to a portable device, unticked (unchecked) tracks are not copied to the device. This feature can be used to quickly remove seasonal music from the device and then quickly adding it back when the season next occurs. The tracks are not removed fromk your library

Let's go through a few things in order out work out what is wrong.

1. 1. if you can't find movies and videos on your iPod, what makes you think you have synced them to the iPod?
   2. do the songs missing from your iPod play in iTunes?
   3. do the songs missing from your iPod have a tick next to the song title in iTunes? The simplest method of checking this is to use the Songs view:

My post was about to go over Apple's 5,000 character limit, so this is a continuation of my first one this evening, ending with the following:

... an option seen on that panel (above) is Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library. You could use that, which will do as it says, but you then take up a lot more space with the duplicate copies (which will also further confuse you at a later time). I do not use that option

You mention "Import Settings", so let me hopefully clarify the difference between the storage location for your files and import settings:

Import Settings; as found on the Edit/Preferences/General tab (under the heading When you import a CD... Import Settings), is where you set the type of file that is created from the CD, i.e. mp3 or M4a etc, as well as the Bit Rate (the quality of the new file)

iTunes Media folder location; is where you tell iTunes which parent folder to use for all imports from CD

It might seem that I'm being pedantic (that's okay with me), but once we all use the same term for one thing, it makes it easier to avoid mistakes.

akaspeeddmn wrote:

My latest conundrum is how do i just randomly shuffle anymore? Anything I've tried doesn't seem to be working :(

The shuffle option only appears on some menus (on the 6th gen iPod Touch). Go into the Music app on the iPod and tap the Library button on the menu bar at the very bottom of the screen. You should see a heading (in bold text) saying Library:

• on the Songs menu; there's a Shuffle button at the top of the songs list, just below the bold heading Songs. Tapping that will star the player in Shuffle mode

Note (regarding the option above and all options below):

• note that when playing music, the Now Playing screen is displayed at the bottom of the screen, just above the permanent menu. (It's a narrow bar, with {from left to right} artwork, song title, pause icon, fast forward/next track arrows). To see the full Now Playing screen, simply tap the narrow bar or drag it upwards
• on the Now Playing screen; the artwork is larger, there are more song details, there are play controls and there's a volume indicator bar. If you drag the Now Playing screen upwards you will see additional controls, including the Shuffle button (and the Up Next list).
  • if the Shuffle button is white with red text, the shuffle is off
  • if the Shuffle button is red, with white text, shuffle is on
  • you can tap the shuffle button on this screen to turn it on or turn it off. Note that the original shuffle button at the top of the Songs menu only turns shuffle on, it cannot turn shuffle off

• Shuffle on the Albums menu: there's a Shuffle button at the top of the Albums menu, but it seems (to me) to simply shuffle songs, not albums. Perhaps it's me, but I expect Shuffle Albums to play all tracks on one album, then shuffle to another album and play all the tracks on that one, before heading off to another album. Apparently not.
• Shuffle on the Genres menu: Shuffle only appears once you go into a specific genre. You cannot shuffle between genres
• Shuffle on the Playlists menu: Shuffle only appears once you are in a Playlist. You cannot shuflfe between playlists
• Shuffle on the Artists menu: Shuffle only appears once you look under a specific artist. You cannot shuffle between artists