how to get itunes to recognize songs on an external hard drive
 

I must have a negative IQ if I can't figure out Apple products. I have iTunes on a PC I'm retiring. That instance of iTunes saves music files to an external drive. I installed iTunes in the replacement PC. How do I get iTunes to recognize my library, if that's the correct term, on the external hard drive? Most of the files are mp3, a few were purchased through iTunes. Only music. No videos or other media.

Thanks,
Sixto
87 300D

Did you just try importing them into your library? What error message did you run into?

I got the songs into iTunes as easy as that. I can't tell by glancing or from memory if iTunes sourced songs made it. I have a single playlist that syncs to my iPhone. How can I transfer the playlist?

Thanks,
Sixto
87 300D

So you have an iTunes library on an old PC and you have upgraded to a new PC? If this is the case its pretty simple to fool iTunes. You need to find the iTunes folder on the old PC and place it in the same directory on the new PC. This will only work as long as the old PC used the default location for the music folder. The other option is to simply import all of the music into the new PC's copy of iTunes. You can tell the program where to store the files as well so its easier to use an external HD. The problem with this is you lose all play counts as well as any playlists you have made.

I'm not sure about a PC but with a Mac you just drop the files in, drag and drop. And if you want the songs in a specific folder create a folder on the side bar and drop it in there.

Thanks!!

Now why couldn't I find this advice in the iTunes forums? I removed the new iTunes library that would have required recreating the iPhone playlist, copied over the iTunes folder from the old PC, hooked up the external drive with all the songs. Done! Everything as it should be.

Sixto
87 300D

Did somebody say Mac? :D