[ianbuckley]

I have just gone through Hell the past 4 days.

After all the excitement of receiving my first Mac, a rMBP, a week ago I set about the task of transferring my iTunes from Windows Vista to Mountain Lion. Back came the unpleasant memories of when I ran out of disk space on my old laptop and decided to transfer my iTunes Media Folder to NAS. Despite extensive planning and research I ended up loosing all my digital music and several photo libraries.

This wasn't going to happen this time.

I spent two days internet trolling to equip myself with the needed knowledge and awareness of the pitfalls to avoid. I am no dummy, having spent more than 40 years it the IT industry many as a PC systems consultant and build several computer systems for myself.

As the iTunes Media Folder was to remain on the NAS half the battle was over. So I thought. Consolidate and organise. Just change the default location of the MAC iTunes Media Folder via iTunes Preferences and replace the iTunes Library with the one from my PC.

Reloaded iTunes but shock no Music or Apps displayed in my library. Everything was still on the NAS but iTunes had not picked it up. I remember reading about pathnames in the iTunes index being different on OS so I just added the Media library to iTunes again via the File option. Two hours later all my Music was back in iTunes albeit without some of the artwork. Only 10% of my Apps were present.

At this point I decided to restructure my media layout. Fool me. The NAS has a structure of Public share and within that three further shares: Shared Music, Shared Pictures and Shared Videos. iTunes expects everything to be within the Music folder under iTunes.
My iTunes Media Library had pointed at NAS>Public>Shared Music. I decided to change it to NAS>Public with the idea of moving the videos into the Shared Videos and the Pictures in to the Shared Pictures. Two hours later, my music reappeared in iTunes. Great I thought. Now to separate my pictures and videos. My media files were all over the place, some in music and some in Shared Music. Many had two references with duplicate Artist and Album folders and .APPLE DOUBLE filenames! Drats.

Times to abandon the reorganisation idea and go back to the original setup.
Changed the pointer to iTunes Media folder back to NAS>Public>Shared Music and then Consolidate and Organise. Oh dear. Files and references all over the place again. Two more hours of carefully deleting files. Organise and consolidate. Why is it taking so long? What is it copying to were?
Check Media File locations. Yes, still on the NAS in the right location. Check using Mac Finder. WHAT!!!
All my media is now also on my new rMBP SSD and nearly filled it. Checked iTunes preferences and it has reset itself to my default Music library on my Mac. Grrrrrrrrrrr!
Delete media files from Mac, change reference back, consolidate, organise, pray.

YES. Finally everything in its right place and with the correct pointers, except for the missing 200 Apps.

Connect iPod Touch to iTunes and Transferred Purchases from iPod to iTunes. Apps restored to iTunes although the total numbers are different on iPod to iTunes.
Time to sync.
"Device synced to more than one iTunes, do you want to sync with this iTunes?"
Fair enough. OK. One hour later 1906 photos missing and Apps on iPod rearranged in random order and no longer in folders. "I Just Don't Believe It."

Next two hours spent rearranging Apps via the iTunes interface. By the way iTunes decided to automatically change the Photo Library to iPhoto from my previous setting. Why not? It has very much chosen to act as it likes despite my careful attentions. a further two hours, I am beginning to loose track of time now, and photos finally back again.

This is were I am currently. Artwork still to sort out, inconsistent counts for Apps, (iTunes also telling me there are 6 updates waiting to download but it also tells me there are none to update when I enter the store), Books and Podcast to sync.
I still have to ensure that the iPod does not automatically WiFi sync with the old PC iTunes as the option to sync with both PC and Mac appears in the iPod setting. This can only be changed by connecting the iPod to the PC and unsetting the option at the PC end. I can just see it deciding to automatically sync despite the settings and cocking everything up again.

PS. My grass is also now a foot high.

[bpsmith]

If moving between computers I usually just copy the media wherever I want it to be located, still on your NAS in this case, and then untick Copy Files To iTunes Media Folder When Adding To Library in the Preferences. Then ditch the XML file for the old iTunes library. Finally open iTunes, with the XML file located in the default position on the Mac hard drive, and just drag all of my media back in stages split between Music, TV Shows, Movies and Apps. Very straightforward and no issues. :-)

Syncing your iThing is trickier as its only meant to sync to one machine. I usually make sure I have all saved and start from scratch on occasions like this.

[Jase Winter]

My brother recently moved from a windows laptop to a MBP and as i've moved my library between PC's and macs countless times I helped him out, what usually works for me is to simply replace all the itunes library files on the new computer with the old ones and ensure Itunes knows where to look for it in preferences. This didn't work straight off for him but simply opening iTunes while holding option gave him the option to select the library which worked and all was good.

Previously i've exported the entire library then imported the xml file, trouble with this is it tends to double up playlists, not a major issue of course but annoying.

iPods and iPhones are a little annoying when it comes to syncing as you have discovered, they can only be synced with one computer at a time, not usually a major problem but can be a pain when moving to a new PC. Using the method I generally use this never seems to be a problem as the iTunes library hasn't changed and knows the devices are synced with that library.

A tip for your apps, simply delete them all from iTunes, log into the store and go to the purchases section, select apps, select download all. Deleting them makes sure that there's no apps in itunes that don't actually have the file on the computer. Job done.

[enigma1701]

This just shows how the simple to use iTunes really does suck!

Sorry I know that doesn't help with your problem!

[bpsmith]

Originally Posted by enigma1701

This just shows how the simple to use iTunes really does suck!

Sorry I know that doesn't help with your problem!

Then stop trolling?

[ianbuckley]

Originally Posted by bpsmith

If moving between computers I usually just copy the media wherever I want it to be located, still on your NAS in this case, and then untick Copy Files To iTunes Media Folder When Adding To Library in the Preferences. Then ditch the XML file for the old iTunes library. Finally open iTunes, with the XML file located in the default position on the Mac hard drive, and just drag all of my media back in stages split between Music, TV Shows, Movies and Apps. Very straightforward and no issues. :-)

Yes, this is basically what I did except I should not have had the copy option set. I was expecting problems with XML file as the one copied from the PC would have different path references within it, but adding he media folder via the "add folder to library" FILE option corrected this.

A tip for your apps, simply delete them all from iTunes, log into the store and go to the purchases section, select apps, select download all. Deleting them makes sure that there's no apps in itunes that don't actually have the file on the computer. Job done.

Thanks I will try this.

My biggest gripe was that iTunes was resetting my options back to the defaults on some reloads.

One more question:

I have unset the option to Sync via WiFi on the PC but it still shows on the iPod Touch as an option to Sync Now along with the Mac. Does the PC have to be un-authorised to remove this.?

[amcluesent]

in iTunes, disable both Keep iTunes Media folder organized and Copy files to iTunes Media

Delete index content of iTunes libraries, but don't delete music files from disk!

Select Add to Library, and select the top music directory from the shared drive and let iTunes rebuild its index of files on the NAS

[bpsmith]

Sound advice!