iTunes Match - download all songs?

This might be a stupid question - but I was hoping for some help. Yesterday, I enabled iTunes Match and it was able to match a large portion of my library. that worked well. However, I was on a train home from work last night and put my headphones on my iPhone so I could listen to some music. Uh oh! Somehow during the iTunes Match process, it physically removed all of my songs from my iPhone and replaced them with a reference to each song in iCloud (where I can conveniently tap the button to download should I want to listen). So now I have my entire library intact on my phone, but the songs aren't actually there. This is an issue because I am frequently on trains/subways with no connection.


Is this expected behavior (to remove the physical songs)? Is there a setting to tell it to leave the physical songs on certain devices? Is there an easy way to "download all" songs to get them back?


Thanks in advance...

iPhone 4S, iOS 5.0.1

Posted on Nov 17, 2011 12:09 PM

Reply
110 replies

Jul 20, 2013 9:37 AM in response to Michael Allbritton

Did that, no go. Match turned off, original default music folder and all iTunes files on the local drive trashed.


What I meant (sorry for the confusing explanation) is that to get an .itl on the exteneral HHD, I went to the default ~/Music on my local hard drive, copied the .itl file, then pasted it into the folder on the external HDD, then told iTunes to use that library.


Do I need to some how tell iTunes to create a new .itl file on the HDD rather than copy and paste the default one there?

Sep 18, 2013 12:27 PM in response to Joseph Delaney

I have recently bought a new Macbook and have all my music on my old windows computer, apart from the music purchased from iTunes.

If I download iTunes Match on my Macbook will I will able to download all of the music from CDs etc that is on my Windows? I don't currently have access to my Windows laptop as I have moved.

Is this how iTunes Match works or not?

Sep 21, 2013 1:41 PM in response to Michael Allbritton

I haven't seen anyone else with this issue but I'm hoping someone knows how to help...

I had the full 25000 songs allowed in match plus 1000's of others that I had purchased through itunes (yes.. I am a music hoarder). My external HDD that held the library crashed. I have used itunes match for years and all of the eligible songs were loaded. When I started the library on a new external HDD I'm only able to download the songs in the cloud or from previous purchased library but NOT in Match. Now here's the interesting thing... on my phone I have access to download ALL of the songs, some 28358 of them. Even with 64g on the phone that's not enough room, and since I'm currently overseas with only 3g cell coverage that's not a feasible option. What I would like to be able to do is get the "matched" music from my phone to the computer/library and to download the rest with internet to the computer/library so that I can USB it to the phone at will.

Now.. how the heck do I do that???

Anyone? Somebody? Please??

Dec 4, 2013 5:58 AM in response to eodduck69

eodduck69...


I'm curious what answers you found.


I will tell you that if you create a new library, on any new computer. And then set up Itunes match with the same itunes match username and password that you use for everything you should then see your complete library from the old computer, (except those that didn't make it to itunes match because of a format issue - which could include less than 128kb bit rate, or unaccepted format.)


Downloading songs


Now the songs won't be in the library, it will essentially just be looking at the Imatch cloud, from there you can hit play and you're good to stream to the computer. OR you should see a cloud with a down arrow in it. This means the music is in your imatch library but not on your computer. Once it is on your Itunes library that will turn into a blank space, if you see a cloud with a back slash through it, that means the file format is not supported by Imatch.


So essentially, what you can do from there is select the songs tab and click on each of the clouds with the down arrow and begin to download your music to the new computer.

User uploaded file

The slightly better option is to select Albums view where you will see a cloud at the top right of each album. Hover over the cloud and a down arrow will appear to download it. Clicking there will trigger the download of the whole album.

User uploaded file

I was hoping a similar feature existed for playlists, then I could just select all songs throw them in one playlist and bam hit download, but I'm not seeing that as a possibility.


What I am looking for is the "Download All" feature, it may not exist, if you found it, let me know.


I'm on a Macbook Pro 15" latest edition with latest os 10.9 and 11.1.3 build of Itunes.

Dec 4, 2013 10:25 AM in response to skywardmacconvert

I did make a new library on my computer, I then had to go into match and delete several hundred songs to get to the 25k limit. Once I did that my old library had access to the icloud music, including my existing playlists. Once I had access back to the music in the cloud I could select all in the playlist bring up the "right-click" menu and download them all at once. I suppose you could do the same with the whole library but since I'm very limited on bandwidth I've been selective on what I download.

Dec 29, 2013 6:46 PM in response to Mindplay

MindPlay.... WOW!! you sure are out of touch.. I have an 18+ hour flight monthly and want ALL my tunes on all my devices.. Ipad Air, Ipad Mini, IPhone 5s - well those devices that are not sitting in a drawer at home . You just seem to have drank the kool-air and offer NON-ANSWERS.. obvious tailored to your view of the world. If you cant offer answer to folks questions regardless of your limited view of the real world then....GO AWAY!!!!!!!!!!!

Feb 18, 2014 11:50 AM in response to Jimzgoldfinch

DUH, let me ask a more basic question. I am on iMac > iTunes 11.1.4. > Music. None of the songs has a cloud icon. It is seeing only the library that is already on the hard drive. I'd like to replace with the updated Match version. How do I "see" the Match version to download it? Note: I did subscribe to Match and it uploaded all my "info." Some of the songs at the end of the library show that they did not match, thus, apparently, all the others did.

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iTunes Match - download all songs?

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