iTunes made duplicates of podcasts on the hard drive. Why?

When I have gotten duplicate podcasts, it's been due to the podcast producer changing something in their feed.
I'm not sure why you are getting duplicates, or if this happens on ALL podcasts or just one.



You will need to look for the duplicate in Windows Explorer and delete them yourself. I suspect the new version are named something like podcast1.mp3 instead of just podcast.mp3.
Do a right-click > show in windows explorer to make sure you are not deleting the file itunes is using.

Not sure what you mean about "library optimization".


For some reason itunes thinks you're not getting the podcast, so it downloads a new copy but names it with the 1,2,3 at the end.


If there anything in your itunes/Downloads folder? That is where itunes temporarily stores podcast & store purchase downloads until they are fully received. Then it renames them and puts them in the correct podcast/artist folder. Seems like something is going wrong with this process.

I've never had problems with "major" podcast producers like NPR, for example. Some podcasts from smaller shops have gotten messed up over time; probably they were on a learning curve and figured out how to do something better/differently. A few of them I noticed started using different episode numbering schemes for example, and I got a boatload of duplicates until they settled it down.



edit
You're not constantly consolidating your library, are you?
Also - is your exHD ALWAYS connected before you start itunes, and does it ALWAYS have the same drive letter each time?
WIndows might be changing its drive letter without telling you, when you plug in a camera card or even your ipod.
I have my exHD assigned farther down in the alphabet, so there is never any conflict with new USB devices when I plug them in.

Message was edited by: Katrina S.

Ah, OK. I have also had problems with itunes & podcasts when I started itunes w/o the exHD connected.
It starts downloading them automatically to the wrong drive.
Then when the correct drive is there, it does it again.



Don't know what to say except, never start itunes without the exhD connected.
I actually have a library esp for the case when my laptop is nowhere near the exHD. I can still get to a lot of stuff, as it's also on the laptop's drive, but podcasts, movies, TV shows are only on the exHD.

I had this problem after I moved my iTunes library to an external drive. I got libraries everywhere. Once it even created a new library on the hard drive when the external drive was attached! I had closed the lid on the MacBook with iTunes running, and when I opened it again apparently iTunes woke up before the external drive did - so it started downloading stuff into a new library on my internal hard drive. Weak. It's a crazy mess. Now I basically have to quit iTunes every time I shut the lid.

Also some of my podcasts (also "solid" ones - This American Life and RadioLab) changed things like the exact name of the podcast or the podcast URL. Apparently this is enough to create a new instance in iTunes.

More tips are on this discussion (but my brain glazed over about halfway through): http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2617801&tstart=15

I really wish iTunes would add "show duplicates" for podcasts, not just for music. The only way I know to fix this now is to manually delete the files and then go through the iTunes interface and wait for it to notice the file is missing (it's even willing to play the podcast from the trash, apparently!) and then fix that by hand. What a pain.

+Weak. It's a crazy mess. Now I basically have to quit iTunes every time I shut the lid.+
Set your podcasts to not auto-download. That's the only way I've found around this mess, especially on my Mac. Once a day hit the "refresh" button at the bottom of the podcast window and it will update them all. You don't have to do them one-by-one. It's a lot simpler than what you're doing now, that's for sure.



+(it's even willing to play the podcast from the trash, apparently!)+
Macs are weird like that. Windows won't play them from the recycle bin.