83020030
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Q: Help with moving my iTunes library to an external flash drive?

Hello,

 

I want to move my iTunes library to an external flash drive. The path it accesses is "/Music/iTunes/Previous iTunes Libraries/iTunes Media"

However, I just discovered that iTunes accesses two main music folders - the folder above and another one in "/Music/iTunes/iTunes Media".


I understand that it is not recommended to manually consolidate/move files in Finder because this may "break" iTunes. I also do not have enough disc space to "consolidate" all of my files into a single iTunes Media folder (hence why I bought an external flash to move my music to.)


Any suggestions on what to do? Thanks.

MacBook Air, OS X Yosemite (10.10.2)

Posted on Jan 21, 2016 4:22 PM

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83020030

Q: Help with moving my iTunes library to an external flash drive?

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  • by Kenichi Watanabe,

    Kenichi Watanabe Kenichi Watanabe Jan 21, 2016 4:44 PM in response to 83020030
    Level 8 (38,416 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 21, 2016 4:44 PM in response to 83020030

    You can move the entire iTunes folder (using Finder) to an external drive (including a USB flash drive that is large enough), then launch iTunes with Option key held down to open the iTunes library file in that external drive iTunes folder. 

     

    Open a different iTunes Library file or create a new one - Apple Support

     

    What you should not do is only move the iTunes Media folder to another location (outside of iTunes); that's when you should use the Consolidate command in iTunes to have iTunes copy ("consolidate") your media files (from wherever they are currently stored) to the new iTunes Media folder location (as designated in iTunes preferences Advanced pane). 

     

    You can actually store your media files wherever you want.  In iTunes preferences Advanced pane, there is a checkbox for Copy files to iTunes Media folder when adding to library.  If that checkbox is not checked (when adding media files to iTunes library), iTunes uses the media files from the location you added them to your iTunes library.  So, if you add song files that are stored on an USB flash drive to iTunes library, iTunes links to those song files from that location; iTunes does not make its own copy for the iTunes Media folder.  However, it is recommended that you let iTunes keep things organized in ONE consolidated iTunes Media folder, if possible.