Syncing from my iPhone back to my iMac

Question

Syncing from my iPhone back to my iMac

Hello all,

Due to a recent hard drive failure and subsequent replacement in my iMac I now have some music, podcasts etc on my iPhone that is not on my iMac because my last backup is a couple of weeks old.
Is there any legit way to get the music off the phone and back into my iTunes library? Or will it just be wiped out?
Also, are podcasts treated the same as music, or will these transfer back across with no problem?
All of my music is part of my iTunes library but none of it is 'purchased' through iTunes. I buy CDs and import them as mp3. The only purchases are the weekly free singles.
Is it possible to connect my iPhone to the iMac and halt any auto sync with iTunes before it happens? (In a bid to prevent it wiping off the music I have on there).
And lastly, now my Contacts, Calendars, Bookmarks and Apps are quite a bit out of date on the iMac will they sync fine from the phone onto the computer? (I'm just paranoid that it might go wrong and lose some data).

Cheers for your help.

iMac (5.1) 20" widescreen, 2.16GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 3GB RAM, Mac OS X (10.6.4), iPhone

Posted on Nov 2, 2010 9:15 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

us3r.3rr0r

Level 1

50 points

Nov 3, 2010 5:05 AM in response to simon.goodwin

Hey,
First thing you need to do is authorize your Apple ID with your iTunes on the new mac, use the same Apple ID you used on the original drive. That should allow you to transfer the apps from your iPhone to the mac. The Apple ID you sign in with on iTunes should be the same Apple ID you used to purchase the apps on your iPhone.
The app data is stored in the iPhone backup not the app itself so do a backup if you want to save the app data.
You will not lose music from the iPhone doing a sync with the new iTunes unless you tick the sync music box in iTunes.
You can disable auto syncing in iTunes by going to the iTunes menu > preferences > devices tab. In here you'll see a tick box to disable auto syncing.
As for the last question which device has the most update info? iPhone or the mac?

Hope this helps.

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Answer 2

Nov 5, 2010 4:52 AM in response to us3r.3rr0r

us3r.3rr0r wrote:
You will not lose music from the iPhone doing a sync with the new iTunes unless you tick the sync music box in iTunes.
You can disable auto syncing in iTunes by going to the iTunes menu > preferences > devices tab. In here you'll see a tick box to disable auto syncing.
As for the last question which device has the most update info? iPhone or the mac?

Thanks for the tips, that should sort me out.
I do have one question though, you mention 'doing a sync with the NEW iTunes'. Obviously you are referring to iTunes 10, but is it different in iTunes 9 (that is what I am using)?
And lastly, my iPhone is the most up to date so I was asking if the iMac would try and over-ride the data on my phone with it's out of date info in the Contact, Calendar and Bookmarks. I assume it won't if I have disabled auto sync like you suggest, but what about when I do want to sync the two? Will one over-ride the other?

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Answer 3

Nov 5, 2010 5:46 AM in response to simon.goodwin

Hey,
What I mean by 'New iTunes' is the current iTunes on your mac, the 'Old iTunes' being the iTunes you lost when your hard drive was replaced. Version of iTunes doesn't matter.
So your mac has the out of date info? If so what I would do is delete all the contacts, calendars and bookmarks from the mac, make sure they are ALL deleted. Then tick sync contacts, calendars and bookmarks, if you get any pop ups just select the 'Merge' option. Contacts and calendars will ask you, not too sure about bookmarks. Just read the whole popup before clicking on anything and keep an eye out for anything mentioning 'replace on iPhone'. Do a backup before doing ANYTHING just to be safe.
Hope that helps
Post the results :-D

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Answer 4

Nov 5, 2010 6:21 AM in response to us3r.3rr0r

Thanks again us3r.3rr0r (user error - I just got that, brilliant).
I will do that tonight when I'm home, like you say, after a backup.
I just wish getting my music back was simple, but at least it's nothing major, mainly imported CDs and some free mp3s off musicians websites (which have expired now, bum).
I'll let you know how it goes.

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Answer 5

Dec 3, 2010 4:29 PM in response to simon.goodwin

Interestingly all my music synced back over.
The music I had purchased (freebies directly off the iTunes store) re-downloaded onto my machine and therefore over onto my phone.
And even the songs I had imported into iTunes (after downloading them free off musicians websites) transferred back from the iPhone onto the iMac, which is exactly what Apple say will not happen. But it did and I'm fine with that.
So, all back up and running with no data lost.
Plus all my contacts, calendars, bookmarks, notes etc were fine too.

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