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Apr 4, 2015 9:31 AM in response to hhgttg27by giddne,May I ask for your assistance as well, please? On Win7, I have a similar situation with a little twist, that is giving me a headache. I have a library of about 1000 albums/cd's etc. on an external drive. I have copied that Itunes library to C:\Users\Username\MyMusic\iTunes on the new HD. The twist is that I do not have the .itl or .xml file associated with this library. So what I have done is started iTunes while holding the shift key and chose create library. The process starts and I think it's running fine but it only captures 800 or so albums. There is about 200 missing and it also says there are unknown titles. When I look at the actual files in the folder, they are all there. I uninstalled iTunes as per article "Remove and reinstall iTunes and related software".... and tried again but got the same result. When I copied the iTunes folder to the new HD, there was an empty 'Automatically Add to iTunes Folder' and an empty 'iTunes Media Folder' in iTunes. After running 'Create Library' it now it has 5 files - extras and genius.itdb, library.itl and library.xml and sentinel, just as you display. But I'm thinking these files represent the incomplete library. How do I correct this? What am I missing?
I would really appreciate your help. Thanks!!
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Apr 4, 2015 12:07 PM in response to giddneby hhgttg27,Your issue is not related to problems with iTunes installation so reinstalling isn't going to make a difference. If I understand correctly, you have:
- Copied a previous iTunes Media folder from the external drive to your computer, so that it is now C:\Users\Username\My Music\iTunes\iTunes Media
- Installed and run iTunes, using the shift-start method to create a new library - what is the location of this new library? If there is an existing C:\Users\Username\My Music\iTunes folder - even if it does not contain a library database file - iTunes won't allow you to select it, defaulting the new library to be C:\Users\Username\My Music\iTunes 1.
- From the "first use" screen in iTunes, selected the Scan for Media folder - iTunes has then found a subset of your music and added it to the new library, with some items being lists as "Unknown Artist" and/or "Unknown Album".
Some questions and things to check:
- When you look at C:\Users\Username\My Music do you see just one iTunes folder or more than one (a second one typically named iTunes 1)?
- You refer to an empty iTunes Media folder - where is this located?
- You also refer to these files having been created when you ran iTunes - which folder are these located in?
- iTunes Library.itl
- iTunes Library.xml
- iTunes Library Extras.itdb
- iTunes Library Genius.itdb
- sentinel
- What format are your media files? The "Unknown Artist"/"Unknown Album" scenario can arise when you have WAV files in your library - since these have no ability to embed metadata within the media file, these are wholly dependent on the iTunes library database to hold details about artist, album, track/disc numbers, etc.
- What are your settings for these options in Edit > Preferences > Advanced?

- There may be issues with files/folders being set to read-only when copied from an external drive that's been connected to another system. In Windows Explorer, right-click on the iTunes Media folder that you copied from your external drive, click on the Read-only checkbox so that it is clear, click OK and click OK again in the next dialog, with the Apply changes to this folder, subfolders and files radio button selected.
- Finally, see turingtest2's notes on Repair security permissions for iTunes for Windows and make sure that you have full control over the iTunes Media folder that you copied from your external drive.
These last two points are probably not relevant unless your iTunes database is pointing at the copied iTunes Media folder (which I very much suspect it is not),
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Apr 4, 2015 1:48 PM in response to bzales1by hhgttg27,"Here's what my iTunes folder looks like at the moment... Somehow I have double the iTunes Library files as you do.
But, everything is in here now, so that's something"
Looks like you have some superfluous/duplicated files but otherwise everything looks OK ...
- This is (or should be) your active iTunes database file.
- This is a duplicate or alternate copy of the database file, actually named "iTunes Library.itl.itl" (the view you are using is hiding file extensions). Just in case this happens to have more up-to-date content than the active file I'd suggest moving this into the Previous iTunes Libraries folder and renaming it to iTunes Library 2015-04-04 so that you'll know in future when this was moved.
- When you're working at this level of detail I'd suggest configuring Windows so that the file extensions are displayed - to do this, in Windows Explorer (assuming Windows 7 or 8, it may be different in Vista and definitely is in XP) select Organize > Folder and search options, click on the View tab, uncheck the Hide extensions for known file types option and click OK.

This can help avoid any confusion when looking at your files and trying to determine what their actual names are.
- When you're working at this level of detail I'd suggest configuring Windows so that the file extensions are displayed - to do this, in Windows Explorer (assuming Windows 7 or 8, it may be different in Vista and definitely is in XP) select Organize > Folder and search options, click on the View tab, uncheck the Hide extensions for known file types option and click OK.
- These are duplicate or alternate copies of the iTunes Library Extras and iTunes Library Genius files (these have the file extension .itdb). You should be able to delete these.
- This is the XML version of the iTunes library database that iTunes generates for use by third-party applications. You can leave this as it is or delete it - iTunes will always create a new version of it anyway (iTunes never reads this file as part of normal operations - it just writes it every time the library database itself is updated). Because this file uses XML markup rather than the more compact structure of the database itself, this is always much larger than the database file - even though it actually contains less information. For example, in my master library I have:

The .itl and .xml files should always have a very similar date/time stamp - usually the same but occasionally the .xml file might be updated 1-2 minutes later than the .itl.
Assuming that everything is now working as it should be, this is definitely the right time to create a new backup of the complete iTunes folder, and set a schedule for when you will repeat that process.
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Apr 4, 2015 2:35 PM in response to giddneby giddne,First let me thank you for your help. I really appreciate it.
Let me address your questions
- I copied my Itunes folder from my external drive to C:\Users\Username\MyMusic\iTunes on the new HD. There was an iTunes Media folder on the external drive but it was empty. I did NOT copy it to C:\Users\Username\My Music\iTunes\iTunes Media but to the path as above - NOT in iTunes Media - just in iTunes.
- Since there was no database base file I figured that I would have to create a library instead of choosing a library. You are correct that when I was going through that process it was suggesting the 'iTunes 1' folder but I kept removing the "1" because i didn't know any better. It let me continue using just iTunes so that's where the library is C:\Users\Username\MyMusic\iTunes.
- I did NOT select Scan For Media - I held the shift key, opened iTunes and I clicked on create a library. Again because without a database file I thought that was my only option.
- When I open the itunes folder, all the music is there. If I look at an album in itunes it may show Unknown Album but in the iTunes folder, the album title is there. Another example is, in iTunes an album will show 1 song, yet in the iTunes folder all 13 songs are there.
- When I look in the iTunes folder there are 397 folders there. One of them is 'Automatically add to iTunes' - it is empty. One of them is iTunes Media. That is where the 5 files that I mentioned are, along with the iTunes Media and Album Artwork folders
- All the music files are MP3
- Based on your comments regarding iTunes 1, maybe I should try again accepting iTunes 1 as the default. Is that worth a try?
Thanks again HH.
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Apr 4, 2015 3:09 PM in response to giddneby hhgttg27,The process you describe will end up with an inconsistent/non-standard folder structure. Given that you don't have a full library on the external drive (and assuming that all your media is still available on the external drive), I'd suggest starting over:
- With iTunes not running, either delete the complete C:\Users\Username\My Music\iTunes folder or move it to your desktop (to be deleted later when the process is complete) - either way, there should be no iTunes folder in C:\Users\Username\My Music before going on to the next step
- Shift-start iTunes and pick the Create library... option - this should allow you to create the new library in the standard folder location, i.e., C:\Users\Username\My Music\iTunes).
- Before you do anything else, check the settings in Edit > Preferences > Advanced:

- This should be set to C:\Users\Username\Music\iTunes\iTunes Media - if not (and assuming that you created the library as above) click on Reset to change it to the default (depending on your version of Windows this may appear as C:\Users\Username\Music\iTunes\iTunes Media or C:\Users\Username\My Music\iTunes\iTunes Media - the latter is actually an alias for the former)
- Unless you have a specific reason to use your own file and folder names within the library, check this option. This configures iTunes to name media folders and files based on the metadata within your media when you add it to the library.
- This one should definitely be checked as this ensures that all additions to your library are copied into the standard iTunes Media folder structure.
- Now press Ctrl-B if the menu bar is not visible in iTunes, select File > Add Folder to Library..., navigate to your external drive and select the iTunes folder that's on there (assuming that all your media is contained within this) and click Select Folder.
- iTunes will now start adding the media that's on the hard drive to your library, and copying all the media files into its iTunes Media folder and its subfolders. If you selected the Keep iTunes Media folder organized option as shown above, this will create folders using Artist (or Album Artist) and Album values, and if necessary rename files using track number and song name. So, for each artist represented in your library you'll end up with a folder called C:\Users\Username\Music\iTunes\iTunes Media\Music\artist_name containing one or more folders called C:\Users\Username\Music\iTunes\iTunes Media\Music\artist_name\album_title where the latter contain the actual media files for each album.
When this process has finished you can how start checking your library to see whether:
- all media has been added to the library
- all media correctly identified (artist, song title) and grouped correctly into albums
If you find that either of these is not the case, we can look into it further; however, the steps above will at least bring your library into a consistent, standard structure as a baseline for fixing any remaining issues.
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Apr 5, 2015 10:54 AM in response to hhgttg27by giddne,Well maybe we're getting somewhere. I tried again last night and the results were the same.
Based on your comment regarding - security - I thought I'd take a look around. These images are taken from the external drive.
When there are details missing, it won't show in iTunes. Sometimes just the Title or Artist info is missing or sometimes it is everything except the title. Or sometimes everything is there.
These are images from the folder for these 13 songs. Some songs are shared and some are not?
I sure hope this provides some insight as to what is going on. I apologize for the poor images but this is my first time using paint. I really appreciate your work and time on this. It's Sunday, it's Easter - enjoy your day. No big rush. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you
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Apr 5, 2015 12:22 PM in response to giddneby turingtest2,When the tag information is missing iTunes will place the songs in the Unknown Artist Unknown Album section of the library. If the tracks you've tried to add show up there, but are still arranged in sensible artist and album folders I have a script called TagFromFilename that may be able to fix the missing information. If iTunes hasn't add the files, and they are mp3s, then try checking them with mp3val.
tt2
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Apr 6, 2015 1:22 PM in response to turingtest2by giddne,I'd like to thank both of you, turingtest2 and hhgttg27 for working with me on this issue. Turing, I ran MP3val and it said repair completed but none of the tag info shows. I guess because all the songs appear in the unknown folder, under each artist. Hey it was a worth a try. Even though I lost parts of my backup, I still have each and every CD. So I can get back to where I was.
Thanks for your help.
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Apr 6, 2015 4:11 PM in response to hhgttg27by gusdiaz,I'm getting the following when attempting to access the link:
You don't have permission to access "http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204318" on this server.
Reference #18.d52b1208.1428361829.106897a2
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Apr 6, 2015 4:51 PM in response to gusdiazby hhgttg27,Working fine for me ... maybe just a temporary glitch on Apple's servers?
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Oct 26, 2015 12:10 PM in response to hhgttg27by mothership2000,I'd appreciate some assistance too if you are willing...
I recently transferred all of my music files to an external hard drive. When I opened up itunes I was able to find all of my music but my extensive playlists were lost. This thread helped me quite a bit and I have taken your steps below and now have a working and up to date library with my playlists.
"Not exactly ...
- Rename or move the current/active library database file
- Copy the old library database file to the iTunes folder and rename it to "iTunes Library" (so it becomes the current/active database)
- Shift-start iTunes and select the library database copied in step 2
When we refer to "the iTunes library" this actually has several components:
- the iTunes database - the iTunes Library.itl file
- the iTunes media folders and their contents (plus any other media files that are in other locations)
- the Album Artwork folders
- other supporting files in the iTunes folder"
My question is this- how do I now get itunes to open up my new library automatically instead of having to shift-start itunes every time. I'm concerned that when I plug in my ipod or iphone the itunes will update the devises with the incorrect version. Is it possible to fix the link?
Thank you in advance!
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Oct 26, 2015 1:08 PM in response to mothership2000by turingtest2,Once you have used shift-start-iTunes (option on a Mac) to connect to a new library iTunes will open that same library each time it starts, unless that library cannot be found in which case it will present the choose or create option automatically. The only exception to this would if iTunes is prevented from updating its preferences file in some fashion, as has occasionally happened with some builds of some anti-virus software, or incorrect security permissions in the application data folders.
tt2


