iTunes doesn't see my music files after .itl corruption

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Level 1

11 points

iTunes doesn't see my music files after .itl corruption

Hello! It's my first thread here!

I have a rMBP 15" - late 2013 with Mac OS Sierra (didn't update yet to High Sierra since I'm closing a big project), iTunes 12.7.

Yesterday I forced quit from iTunes because it wasn't responding, then turned off the computer.

Today a warning popped out after launching the app saying the .itl file was corrupted and a new one had been created.

The new iTunes library contains all my files & playlists, but every song has the blue "download from cloud" icon (a couple of months ago I have activated iCloud music library).

I still have my "music" folder with all the songs on my Mac, but it seems iTunes doesn't see it.

I tried to open some files in my music folder, and iTunes adds them on the library as they were new songs, they show the icon of "problems uploading to iCloud".

I tried to change itunes media folder, then coming back to the original folder, but did not work.

Any explanation and/or solution (except "download them all again": I have almost 100 GB)?

Thank you for your attention!

MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013), macOS Sierra (10.12.5)

Posted on Nov 18, 2017 3:06 PM

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Answer 1

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turingtest2

Level 10

272,749 points

Nov 18, 2017 4:20 PM in response to Gaghino

I take it that you don't have Time Machine? There are some notes in the user tip regarding iCloud Music Library. It is best to sign out of this while attempting to revert to an older version of your database, then import any media that isn't listed in the restored library, then finally sign back into iCloud Music library. The local library and that in the cloud should merge without duplicates.

tt2

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Answer 2

Gaghino Author

Level 1

11 points

Nov 18, 2017 3:58 PM in response to turingtest2

Thank you for your reply. I tried, but the previous .itl file I have is months old and lacks a lot of stuff, playlists and counts. Furthermore, the songs missing for the previous .itl file still are present with the "download from iCloud" icon, and if I try to add them from my music folder still produces unwanted clones.

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Answer 3

Gaghino Author

Level 1

11 points

Nov 18, 2017 4:04 PM in response to turingtest2

I checked for temps, but nothing good.

I closed and reopened iTunes many times; also restarted the whole thing... nothing.

I really don't understand why iTunes doesn't see the files... it's frustrating.

Thank you for your help, anyway 🙂

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Answer 4

Gaghino Author

Level 1

11 points

Nov 18, 2017 4:14 PM in response to turingtest2

Actually I have activated icloud music library some time ago. Just tried what you suggested. Logged out, all my songs disappeared. Quit iTunes, then reopened; the same. Changed iTunes media folder, quit again, reopened, changed iTunes media folder to the correct one. Nothing... At the new login, iTunes downloads my library from the cloud

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Answer 5

Gaghino Author

Level 1

11 points

Nov 19, 2017 2:36 AM in response to turingtest2

Actually I do have Time Machine, but airport gives me some problems so I deactivated automatic backups and backup only once per month. Thus the TM .itl file lacks more than 1K songs...

Anyway, I replied to your messages late at night (I live in Italy), so I didn't understand well what you suggested. Sorry.

This morning I logged out and forced the creation of a new .itl file by using the corrupted one. This worked, as my whole library was reconstructed. After that I logged in iCloud and the system asked me to merge the libraries. It recognized almost all of my songs, except a hundred or so which were marked as duplicates. I told iTunes to trash the duplicates and to maintain the file in the library. All is OK now, thank you so much!

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