Q: iTunes - Two Libraries by Mistake on same iMac, How to Amalgamate and Deal with Duplicates?

I totally feel your pain. I too have a similar setup, a G4 running Tiger wherein I ripped my vinyl to a higher bitrate than my CD copies. I have in one of thses threads a script that was written for me that would rummage across the home network and pull down all the lower bitrate copies and move them, but I had a hard drive snafu, ran out of space and never got around to it..

I DO think however, that you can display the bitrate of the files in the list view options within iTunes and sort the files that way, and move the duplicate files you don't want to the trash. From within iTunes.. Let me go fire up the livingroom frankenbox to check..

Yup.. If you use the View Options you can sort through the master list in iTunes by bitrate..

http://imageupper.com/i/?S0300010100011D1344782818223713

Takes a bit to sort out the tracks but it's workable..

As to joining the libraries that you've gotten them cleaned up, you need to drop all the song files into a single folder and let iTunes sort them into the default location. There is a submenu here:

http://imageupper.com/i/?S0500010010011A1344783379227569

http://imageupper.com/i/?S0500010010021A1344783379227569

Good luck!

Deb.

There's no easy way.  You could add two identical copies of a file to iTunes and it cannot tell they are identical -- that's for you to call.  Oh, there is a "show duplicates" feature in one of the menus, but the problem with that is it isn't very good at deciding what is a duplicate. It used to just go by artist and track name.  Now I think it adds in album name too if you say choose exact duplicates.  Still, the entries have to be perfectly exact.  Same spelling, etc.  The problems are still there though.  It doesn't include things such as bitrate, etc.  The bottom line is, if you really want to guarantee you are keeping only what you need to keep, and thowing away only what is truly duplicated, you will have to do it by hand.

You can check the Dougscripts website for the commerical utility Dupin.  I think that extends the criteria selection more.

You could:

1. Close iTunes
2. Move your <Old Media> folder inside <New Media>/Automatically Add to iTunes
3. Start iTunes
4. Wait while it absorbs the files
5. Use Option > File > Display Exact Duplicates
6. Sort on Date Added
7. Select and delete the files added today, sending to trash (you may want to be certain you have a backup of these older files "just in case")

You will probably still have some duplicates where the metadata in iTunes wasn't exactly the same but this should catch the bulk of them. You can fillet the rest by hand or invest in Dupin or Dupin Lite.

tt2

I don't know how those ended up on the desktop.  Normally they are in your Music/iTunes folder.  Check the modifcation dates of the files on the desktop and compare them with the dates of the ones in the iTunes folder.  I suspect the ones on the desktop are not being used and you can just delete them.

Read this to learn more about what hte various files & folders do.

What are the iTunes library files? - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1660

More on iTunes library files and what they do - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITunes#Media_management

What are all those iTunes files? - http://www.macworld.com/article/139974/2009/04/itunes_files.html

I concur with Limnos.

iTunes placing files on the desktop can sometimes happen if a security permissions foul up prevents it writing to the correct location, but perhaps these were backup copies made while following another set of instructions at some point.

tt2