spiteful1
Level 1 (0 points)

Q: understanding libraries and files

Help me understand the difference in itunes between libraries and files.  I have a 250 gig harddrive on my pc and its almost full. It shouldn't be near that full.

 

 

My ipod indicates about 50 gig of music which is about right.  I think I have duplicate (or triplicate) files and or libraries on my laptop. 

 

How do I clean it all up?

i tunes, Windows XP

Posted on Aug 10, 2012 10:02 AM

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spiteful1

Q: understanding libraries and files

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  • by turingtest2,

    turingtest2 turingtest2 Aug 10, 2012 10:21 AM in response to spiteful1
    Level 10 (88,247 points)
    Apple TV
    Aug 10, 2012 10:21 AM in response to spiteful1

    An iTunes library comprises of a database with some supporting files and an artwork cache, plus a media folder. Take a look at this post for some background. Ideally all your media should be in your media folder, and iTunes should be connected to everything in the media folder. Depending on how you have added content to the library and the settings for "Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library" it is possible for there to be duplicate orginal copies of files outside of the media folder. It is also possible to accidentaly create duplcates within the media folder though these are more likely to be obvious within iTunes.

     

    What is the size of your iTunes Media folder? How does that compare to the sum of your content in iTunes for Music, Movies, Podcasts etc.?

     

    If you have dupes within iTunes then I've written a script called DeDuper for deduping automatically. See this thread for background.

     

    See also:

    HT1660: iTunes: What are the iTunes library files?

    HT3847 iTunes: Understanding iTunes Media Organization

     

    tt2

  • by spiteful1,

    spiteful1 spiteful1 Aug 10, 2012 10:47 AM in response to spiteful1
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 10, 2012 10:47 AM in response to spiteful1

    I will check out the links you reccomended. 

    There are four areas:

     

    1)  My Music   c:\Users\dedwards   (7)  this has 28,273 files @ 183 gig

    2) Public Music (none)

    3)  dedwards(14)  c:\users 40,776 files @ 192 gig

    4)  coast to coast podcast  c:\users\dedwards\mymusic\itunes\itunesmedia\mymusic\podcasts (3852 files @ 50.7 gig

     

    My ipod when synched has 10104 files @ 43.3 gig (which seems about right).

     

    I am thinking that I may have duplicate and or triplicate music files????