Problem importing music on iTunes

Howdy Manu Bresson,

It sounds like you are importing to your iTunes library correctly but once the the media is in, and you try to play it back later it seems to be missing. From what you describe it sounds like the setting to copy the content to the iTunes library is not checked, so when the external drive is disconnected the content cannot be found. You can change that with this info:

Locate and organize your iTunes files

1. Windows: Choose Edit > Preferences.
2. Click the Advanced pane.

...

"Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library." Select this option to store all of your media files in the iTunes Media folder. Since they're all in one location, you can easily transfer or back up your media.

Thank you for using Apple Support Communities.

Regards,

Sterling

The "missing file" error happens if the file is no longer where iTunes expects to find it. Possible causes are that you or some third party tool has moved, renamed or deleted the file, one of its parent folders, or the drive it lives on has had a change of drive letter. It is also possible that iTunes has changed from expecting the files to be in the pre-iTunes 9 layout to post-iTunes 9 layout, or vice-versa, and so is looking in slightly the wrong place. In the case of a library moved from one system to another there are also potential permissions issues. See Repair security permissions for iTunes for Windows.

Select a track with an exclamation mark, use Ctrl-I to Get Info, then click No when asked to try to locate the track. (Due to a bug in iTunes 12 you currently have to say No twice!) Look on the summary tab for the location that iTunes thinks the file should be. Now take a look around your hard drive(s). Hopefully you can locate the track in question. If a section of your library has simply been moved, a folder renamed, or a drive letter has changed, it should be possible to reverse the actions. If the difference between the two paths is an additional Music folder in one path then this is a layout issue. I can explain further if that is the case. Either way if you post back both paths I may have suggestions.

In some cases iTunes may be able to repair itself if you go through the same steps with Get Info but this time click Locate and browse to the lost track. It may then offer to attempt to automatically fix other broken links.

If you've organized your media manually, or another application like Windows Media Player has moved/renamed the files then the chances are that subtle differences in naming strategies will make it hard to restore the media to the precise path that iTunes is expecting. In such cases, as long as the missing files can be found somewhere, you should be able to use my FindTracks script to reconnect them to iTunes. See this post for an explanation of how it works.

tt2

The extension .m4a is used for AAC audio files.

The general path for songs that iTunes uses is <Media Folder>\Music\<Artist>\<Album>\[D-]## <Name>.<Ext> where Artist is replaced by Album Artist if not blank, [D-] is an optional leading disc number, file and folder names are limited to 40 characters, and any character that is invalid in a file path is replaced with an underscore.

It helps me understand what is wrong if I can see the full and exact paths that are shown in iTunes and found by exploring the folders yourself. For example if iTunes showed:

file://localhost/F:/Music/The Beatles/Abbey Road/01 Come Together.m4a

but the file turned out to be located here:

F:\Music\Music\The Beatles\Abbey Road\01 Come Together.m4a

then I would assume that iTunes had somehow switched from the old layout that puts artist folders directly inside the designated media folder to the new version which puts all music items in a common Music folder within the media folder, reorganized the media, but then forgotten (or been unable) to record the preference that the library was now in the new layout and so still tries to use the old one.

Could you possibly post back the two different versions of the path that relate to one broken track, and also the path to the media folder found under Edit > Preferences > Advanced?

tt2

"When the external hard drive is plugged in to the computer, I can listen to my song. When I unplug it, iTunes says it cannot locate the file."

That's the problem, I suspect. You've added the songs to the iTunes database but not set it up to copy the media files to your system's internal drive. iTunes has a record of the song with information to look for it on the external drive - when the latter is not connected, then iTunes can't find it.

Assuming that you want to have your music available when the external drive is not connected, set the two preferences highlighted in sterling r's response above. Then (with the external drive connected) select File > Library > Organize Library... (press Ctrl-B first if you don't see the iTunes menu bar). You'll see this dialog:

Check the Consolidate files box and click OK. iTunes will then move all the media files included in your library to the folder specified as your media library location in Edit > Preferences > Advanced - by default this will be C:\Users\username\Music\iTunes\iTunes Media). Once this process is complete you'll be able to disconnect your external drive and still be able to play your music.

You're welcome. 🙂

Apologies for missing the salient point that hhgttg27 spotted. 😊

For the future you might like to clone the now working library on C: back to the external drive using the method shown in Backup your iTunes for Windows library with SyncToy. That way you can connect the external drive from time to time and update it with any changes made in the main library.

tt2

Glad its working now - and can't emphasize enough that you should heed tt2's advice about making and maintaining a backup of your library.

🙂

tt2