Itunes 11.1 deleted almost all of my music! WHY?

I have same problem and it is a nightmare for me as I use iPhone for work. I just don't understand how an upgrade should make life more difficult.

See Empty/corrupt iTunes library after upgrade/crash.

tt2

Yes, this is just insanely ridiculous!

I noticed that iTunes was running VERY slow for the last week or so, and then suddenly realized that 200GB of my Library had dissappeared!!!! Not just dead links in the iTunes library, they had been deleted from the drive too!

The files were on a dual redundancy NAS and no errors and no other data missing, just the ones used by iTunes. Luckily I have a recent backup and am restoring the whole directory, but not sure if the same will just happen again.....

First thing I will do is disable the "sync podcast options" since that appears to be the main culprit here, but its unbelievable and unacceptable that Apple can release such a destructive version of its software! I've been in IT for more than 30 years and NEVER heard of software this bad! No messages, no errors, no indication that its even deleting the files, or why its doing so!!!

Do Apple not even bother to test their software before release now?!! It's obvious that its a big and destructive bug, since so many people have been effected, why can't you pick this up in testing BEFORE release, and not release software that just thinks it can delete our files without even telling us!

This new sych option seems a ridiculous setting too! It doesn't indicate exactly what settings on what devices it is syncing, and in particular doesn't say how it handles setting conflicts either!!!

I personally know that my iTunes auto delete settings were not at fault, and in about 70% of the podcasts, the actual subscription was deleted too! not just the files!

we idiots have given iTunes full access to out precious music and video libraries, trusting that Apple will not accidentally delte them. Well, I don't know about anybody else, but I certainly have had my eyes fully opened, and will keep a VERY CLOSE eye on this old and unstable app in the future!

It's like a Bank installing a program upgrade and finding that the new default setting has deleted 70% of your customer accounts! Who else but Apple would think they can, and do get away with such a thing?!

I just had this happen to me. I had never tried the "convert higher bitrate files..." function before, but my classic iPod is full, so I wanted to downgrade the bitrates and re-load my pod. When I started to do this, I noticed that iTunes was deleting the original files after it converted them for use on the iPod! I caught it after about 400 songs, so I only had to re-load those from a backup, but still! The oddest thing was, maybe 75% of the files were deleted but other albums were not. It seemed very random to me.

Is this a bug that was maybe fixed in a newer iTunes? I am still using an older one because I hate the new layout.

I suspect it is a bug, nut I've no idea exactly what circumstances conspire to trigger it, or if Apple have had enough reports to even become properly aware of it, let alone able to reproduce it and work on a fix. You can report problems via the relevant feedback form, e.g. iTunes Feedback, or sign up for a free Apple Developer Connection account and make use of Apple Bug Reporter. They don't generally talk back, but they claim to read everything.

tt2

Well I assume any troubleshooting from Apple is going to start out with updating to the latest iTunes, so I suppose I should finally do that...

I'm having the same problem. I upgraded iTunes on my computer and lost all of my music except for 1 album I recently bought from the iTunes store. But the rest of my music was gone from my iTunes library on my computer. As well as from My Music files. I have no idea how Apple could have missed this bug on the newest iTunes upgrade. This really blows and it's going to anger a lot of people. I still think I'm in denial that I lost files from my computer...so much music is gone. I'm so angry.

See Empty/corrupt iTunes library after upgrade/crash.

tt2

Hi y'all, I thought I'd chime in and let you know that Apple decided to go through all libraries and delete all music that wasn't purchased through iTunes.....even music imported through a CD. That's probably why you aren't seeing much of your music.

If you google things like, "iTunes deleted all my music," you'll find things like this http://www.digitaltrends.com/music/apple-deleted-non-itunes-music-off-ipods-for- two-years-answers-for-it-in-court/

They're just trying to milk money out of us.

Your link refers to something that may have happened a decade ago. It is simply untrue, however, that anything will "delete all music that wasn't purchased through iTunes". Any claims otherwise almost certainly result from users' misunderstanding of how iTunes works, in particular the necessity to copy your complete library when transferring iTunes to another computer. If you do so without copying your existing library database and media files, but sign in using an existing Apple ID on the new machine, then only Store purchases will be seen. Nothing is being "deleted"; unless you subscribe to iTunes Match then Apple doesn't touch and has no responsibility for the non-Store content of your library.

1. Installed 12.1.1.4 to new windows pc, which I then added as a device to the my iTunes account.

2. I have 7 gigs of music on my iPad, which is not on the laptop.

3. Ripped a few cd's and tried to move them to the iPad via iTunes.

4. Realize that all my music on the iPad was now just deleted. Goodbye. GONE.

5. Why didn't I leave well enough alone??

6. I do not waver from my opinion that iTunes is the most convoluted music management system on the planet,

because I cannot for the life of me figure out what the heck just happened.

1, New Windows computer, your your data from your old computer or it's backup.

2. Had you checked it could have been recovered, but the iPad should never have been the sole location for this data.

3. You should have had a warning asking you to confirm that you wished to erase the current content on the device and replace it with content from the new library. Did you get it?

4. Ouch. Is it anywhere else? Old computer, a backup of it, any other devices?

5 & 6. I'll take the fifth.

tt2

Thanks for replying. I don't know why I always get confused by iTunes. It's just not intuitive to me. I'm always looking for a menu to click on to do things and they're all buried or hard to find. The older version of iTunes allowed me to drag and drop from my laptop drive to the iPad, but I couldn't find a similar function on this version. I really liked that, it was very easy.

1. It's a new computer that I've never used before with iTunes.

2. I tried to do a backup of the iPad when I first connected it to the new laptop, but I don't think it took. I was going to try it again but then the music was gone. How can I tell if it backed up? I don't see any obvious files on my hard drive that would represent 7 gigs of music.

3. I did not see any warning that I could see. I right clicked on an album on my PC, clicked "Add to iPad" and like that, my iPad became wiped.

4. I have most of the music elsewhere, but up until now I didn't have the luxury of a laptop with enough storage to back it up using iTunes. It's just the way it was. I used my old laptop to move files to the iPad, but that machine only had a few gigs free.

5. sorry to sound harsh. It just amazes me that Apple thinks everyone wants to have the exact same data on all devices. It really frustrates me.

Again, thank you for replying.

You're expected to keep a backup of all of the data on your computer that matters to you, your iTunes Library, your photos, documents, emails, etc. If you'd lost the iPad, or had it stolen, or it crashed in some fashion, the data would have been just as lost as it has been now by an inadvertent sync. When you move computers you should take your data with you. A backup guards against the untimely demise of one machine before you have a chance to migrate the data directly.

Sounds as if you will be able to gather most if not all of this content back together again. When you see Backup your iTunes for Windows library with SyncToy for a backup strategy. It is written for iTunes, but the same tool can be used to backup other personal data folders efficiently.

An iOS backup doesn't include the media. Again you're supposed to take care of transferring that separately.

Not sure why you didn't get a warning. You really ought to have done. I understand why Apple don't make it easy to copy media from devices as an anti-piracy measure, although it can be done with third party software, but it shouldn't be possible to wipe so much data without having to confirm things. 😕

It is no comfort, but you're not alone in finding iTunes confusing.

tt2