Confused about iTunes Folders

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Level 1

30 points

Confused about iTunes Folders

In my iTunes Folder on my iMac, I have some confusing sub folders.

In my iTunes Music folder under my User Name, in addition to my Music Folder where most of my Music Files are stored, I also show the following as I drill down:

In iTunes Music I have the following folders:

iTunes Media Folders:

Automatically Add to iTunes

Books

Downloads

Home Videos

Mobile Apps

Movies

Music

Tones

Voice Memos

Below the iTunes Media Folders there are the following folders shown in another iTunes Music Folder:

Audio Books

Bob Dylan

Books

Garth Brooks

Mobile Applications

Movies

Music

The Who

Tones

Unknown Artists

I dont know why there are a few artist folders shown here. They only include a few tracks in these folders.

The Unknown Artist folder in the iTunes Music folder is the most confusing.

Among other things it show an Unknow Album folder. this folder has over 300 tracks , mostly identified by numbers, not names. I can click on these to hear each track, but I'd like to just delete them. I suspect these are multiple tracks for some reason. So is it safe to delete all of these numbered tracks?

Thanks!

iMac, OS X El Capitan (10.11)

Posted on Nov 28, 2015 10:50 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

ed2345

Level 9

62,486 points

Nov 29, 2015 11:46 AM in response to MarcinOC

The Unknown Artist folder in the iTunes Music folder is the most confusing.

Among other things it show an Unknow Album folder. this folder has over 300 tracks , mostly identified by numbers, not names. I can click on these to hear each track, but I'd like to just delete them. I suspect these are multiple tracks for some reason. So is it safe to delete all of these numbered tracks?

No! Don't delete them. They are probably not duplicates.

When you add tracks to iTunes the normal way, iTunes creates Artist and Album folders according to the tags embedded in the track. If the tags are missing, iTunes uses "Unknown Artist" and "Unknown Album."

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Answer 2

Limnos

Level 10

411,157 points

Nov 29, 2015 6:16 AM in response to MarcinOC

About iTunes library files - https://support.apple.com/HT201610 - Does not mention that a complete working library also includes other files and folders also in the iTunes folder.

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

iTunes 9 [and later]: Understanding iTunes Media Organization - http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3847 - plus supplemental information about organizing to new structure https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6477809?answerId=26404702022#26404702022

Image of folder structure and explanation of different iTunes versions (turingtest2 post) - https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-7392 and making an iTunes library portable.

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