AVHappy
Level 1 (8 points)
Wireless

Q: iTunes partly on external drive

Daar reader,

 

I've bought my first Mac Book thuis week and plan to migratie from a Windows environment to an Apple environment. Next to the Mac Book, I've also bought a Time Capsule for back ups. I've got a WD 2 TB external hard disk from my Windows environment. Via the Time capsule I want to make thuis my central library for music and other Information. This van be connected via USB to the Time Capsule.

 

My question is now, how can I configure iTunes such a way that iTunes looks for the library at an external hard disk, though at the samet time I'd like to have some favorite albums on my local hard drive in de Mac Book. This to have some music when I am not at home. How does itunes know to look at two different libraries? When I import new CD's how can I make clear to do this to the external versus internal library? When I left the house, will the revérence to the external location be lost or connect automatically when I am back home again?

 

As I am completely new in Mac, appreciatie simple instructions as a lot is new to me.

 

Currently I have not made any changes to iTunes.

 

Many thans for the help in advance.

 

Kind regards,

AVHappy

MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Late 2013), OS X Mavericks (10.9), Time Capsule

Posted on Dec 15, 2013 5:20 AM

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Q: iTunes partly on external drive

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  • by Limnos,Helpful

    Limnos Limnos Dec 15, 2013 5:50 AM in response to AVHappy
    Level 9 (54,628 points)
    Mac OS X
    Dec 15, 2013 5:50 AM in response to AVHappy

    What you want is not easy or automatic.  One way is to turn off iTunes maintaining and organizing your media and doing it yourself.  Are you super organized?  Another is to hold down the option key while dragging media to iTunes when wanting to keep it in the secondary location (the main one stays the locatinn in iTunes preferences).  You have to remember to do this each time.

     

    Remember your Windows drive may need reformatting to use with a Mac unless you buy special software. This will erase all data.  Windows uses NTFS format which Macs can only read but not write.

     

    This is starting to get into complexeties.  iTunes has two main components. One is your library files which store all the information about file location. Another is the media files.  Unless you are permanently connected to this Time Capsule (you say you have a Macbook which means you may not always be) you will have to have the library files on the internal drive or iTunes won't run.  You then have media split up.  By the way, if you start iTunes and the external is not connected, all those files will show with broken links.  They will fix again when you restart iTunes with the drive attached (you have to restart iTunes), but it can be distracting.

     

    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

     

    Where are my iTunes files located? - http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1391

     

    If you main need for the external storage is bulky movie files you can consider starting a second separate library and just keep movies there.  I don't see the need to have my movies and music in one library.

     

    Here's some more tips but until you review the above and maybe dcide on a different track I won't post detailed steps.

     

    iTunes: How to move [or copy] your music [library] to a new computer [or another drive] - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4527 - a somewhat bewildering and not always easily understandable set of options.

     

    Quick answer if you use iTunes' default preferences settings:  Copy the entire iTunes folder (and in doing so all its subfolders and files) intact to the other drive.  Open iTunes and immediately hold down the Option (alt) key (shift on Windows), then guide it to the new location of the iTunes Library.itl file in the moved iTunes folder.
     
    For the record there's this reference for iTunes 11 but it really doesn't strike me as having the specifics you need. iTunes 11 for Mac: Move your library to another computer - http://support.apple.com/kb/PH12168 

  • by AVHappy,

    AVHappy AVHappy Dec 15, 2013 10:52 AM in response to Limnos
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Wireless
    Dec 15, 2013 10:52 AM in response to Limnos

    Thans Limnos.

     

    I've gone through the links you sent, so I think I would like to start to have the library file locally, but the actual music data on the external drive. If this works, I can start to figure out how I could get some local albums to my MacBook. As I have nothing installed, music or movies, locally and want iTunes to have the data on the external drive, share do I start? I can't pointe to a folder on the external drive as there is nothing either. Should I Just create a folder music on the external drive and point to that? Next to this, if I could make a differente for movies in the structure that would be great too.

     

    Currently I am copying the data from the external drive to my local drive so I can format this in a Mac format.

     

    Many thanks for all your help.

  • by Limnos,

    Limnos Limnos Dec 15, 2013 10:58 AM in response to AVHappy
    Level 9 (54,628 points)
    Mac OS X
    Dec 15, 2013 10:58 AM in response to AVHappy

    Consolidate is how you move your iTunes media files to a new location.  Consolidate simply looks at everything you have in iTunes and copies them to the iTunes media folder location specified in iTunes prefs -> Advanced.

     

    iTunes 11 for Mac: Change where your iTunes files are stored - http://support.apple.com/kb/PH12165 - more information at: https://discussions.apple.com/message/22026652