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iTunes isn't up to date on my new PC

My old PC died, and I had backed up my iTunes library on an external hard drive. When I loaded it onto my new PC, the songs and playlists were from a few years ago. I know I've backed up my external hard drive just a couple of weeks ago. I don't know how to get the most recent playlists on iTunes now. And on top of that, it's saying it's not able to find the originals of hundreds of songs. I haven't been able to find the right solution online. I'm not super tech savvy, either. My most up-to-date playlists are on my iPod, but I'm afraid if I try to sync it in iTunes, I'll lose all my newer music. Thanks.

Windows, Windows 10

Posted on Jun 5, 2021 6:07 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jun 6, 2021 5:01 AM

The core of an iTunes library is the iTunes Library.itl database. This holds records of all the items that have been added, where they are located, and all playlists. If you're missing playlists perhaps you've chosen the wrong .itl to restore. Search your backup drive for all .itl files and see which one has the most recent modification date, other than the active file you're using now.




The "missing file" issue with exclamation marks happens if the file is no longer where iTunes expects to find it. Possible causes are that you or some third party tool has moved, renamed or deleted the file, one of its parent folders, or the drive it lives on has had a change of drive letter, or you've moved a non-portable library to a different path (see Make a split library portable for details). It is also possible that iTunes has changed from expecting the files to be in the pre-iTunes 9 layout to post-iTunes 9 layout, or vice-versa, and so is looking in slightly the wrong place, or that you've been too aggressive when deleting duplicates. See Getting iTunes & Windows Media Player to play nicely if you're trying to access your media with any other media players.


Select a track with an exclamation mark, use Ctrl-I to Get Info, then click No when asked to try to locate the track. Look on the file tab for the location that iTunes thinks the file should be. Now take a look around your hard drive(s). Hopefully you can locate the track in question. If a section of your library has simply been moved, a folder renamed, or a drive letter has changed, it should be possible to reverse the actions. If the difference between the two paths is an additional Music folder in one path then this is a layout issue. I can explain further if that is the case. If everything is where it is supposed to be try Repair security permissions for iTunes for Windows.


In some cases iTunes may be able to repair itself if you go through the same steps with Get Info, or when playing a track, but this time click Locate and browse to the lost track. It may then offer to attempt to automatically fix other broken links. Although it says something like "use the same location" I think it expects to find the tracks in the same artist & album layout they were in previously, with one systematic change to the path.


If another application like Windows Media Player has moved/renamed the files, or the library has been moved from OS X to Windows, then the chances are that subtle differences in naming strategies will make it hard to restore the media to the precise path that iTunes is expecting. In such cases, as long as the missing files can be found somewhere, you should be able to use my FindTracks script to reconnect them to iTunes. See this post for an explanation of how it works. It might need some tweaking if your media is in a non-standard layout.


If you want me to try to provide specific advice please post back the following details:

  1. The location of the media folder under Edit > Preferences > Advanced
  2. The location of a sample missing track shown under Get Info > File > Location that begins file://localhost/
  3. The true path to the file whose details you gave in 2


Note the addition of file://localhost/ (and the flipped direction of slashes in Windows) is normal for a file that isn't quite where iTunes is expecting to find it.


tt2

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5 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jun 6, 2021 5:01 AM in response to bchi000

The core of an iTunes library is the iTunes Library.itl database. This holds records of all the items that have been added, where they are located, and all playlists. If you're missing playlists perhaps you've chosen the wrong .itl to restore. Search your backup drive for all .itl files and see which one has the most recent modification date, other than the active file you're using now.




The "missing file" issue with exclamation marks happens if the file is no longer where iTunes expects to find it. Possible causes are that you or some third party tool has moved, renamed or deleted the file, one of its parent folders, or the drive it lives on has had a change of drive letter, or you've moved a non-portable library to a different path (see Make a split library portable for details). It is also possible that iTunes has changed from expecting the files to be in the pre-iTunes 9 layout to post-iTunes 9 layout, or vice-versa, and so is looking in slightly the wrong place, or that you've been too aggressive when deleting duplicates. See Getting iTunes & Windows Media Player to play nicely if you're trying to access your media with any other media players.


Select a track with an exclamation mark, use Ctrl-I to Get Info, then click No when asked to try to locate the track. Look on the file tab for the location that iTunes thinks the file should be. Now take a look around your hard drive(s). Hopefully you can locate the track in question. If a section of your library has simply been moved, a folder renamed, or a drive letter has changed, it should be possible to reverse the actions. If the difference between the two paths is an additional Music folder in one path then this is a layout issue. I can explain further if that is the case. If everything is where it is supposed to be try Repair security permissions for iTunes for Windows.


In some cases iTunes may be able to repair itself if you go through the same steps with Get Info, or when playing a track, but this time click Locate and browse to the lost track. It may then offer to attempt to automatically fix other broken links. Although it says something like "use the same location" I think it expects to find the tracks in the same artist & album layout they were in previously, with one systematic change to the path.


If another application like Windows Media Player has moved/renamed the files, or the library has been moved from OS X to Windows, then the chances are that subtle differences in naming strategies will make it hard to restore the media to the precise path that iTunes is expecting. In such cases, as long as the missing files can be found somewhere, you should be able to use my FindTracks script to reconnect them to iTunes. See this post for an explanation of how it works. It might need some tweaking if your media is in a non-standard layout.


If you want me to try to provide specific advice please post back the following details:

  1. The location of the media folder under Edit > Preferences > Advanced
  2. The location of a sample missing track shown under Get Info > File > Location that begins file://localhost/
  3. The true path to the file whose details you gave in 2


Note the addition of file://localhost/ (and the flipped direction of slashes in Windows) is normal for a file that isn't quite where iTunes is expecting to find it.


tt2

Jun 6, 2021 11:04 AM in response to turingtest2

Wow, thank you so much for taking the time to answer my question in such detail! I checked the .itl databases on my external hard drive (which is what I used to put iTunes on my new PC) and weirdly it only has versions from 2012 and earlier. I KNOW I back my stuff up more than that. So I'm not sure what to do about that part.


As of today, there were far fewer tracks with exclamation marks, for some reason. I checked one (file://localhost/C:/Barbara/Desktop/MUSIC_iTunes)_songs/iTunes/iTunes Media/Original Soundtrack/My Big Fat Greek Wedding- Music from Th/01 Stalia, Stalia.m4a) and when I searched for it, all it could find was a .txt file of it. Which is a worry, of course. Also, under "File" it's listed as "AAC audio file", not an mp3. Is that normal?


I'm not sure what you mean by #3 - the "true path to the file". I'm so sorry, but as I said, I'm not super tech savvy.


Assuming I can't figure this out with your (very gracious!) help here, is this something that a Genius Bar could handle? Would I just bring my new laptop and my external hard drive in and is it something they'd be likely to fix?


I'm also looking into a data recovery service for my old, mostly dead PC. Maybe if I can get that working I can "reload" iTunes from there, as it was totally up-to-date.


Again, many thanks for your kind help. If you have any further ideas, I'd love to hear them.


bchi000

Jun 6, 2021 11:50 AM in response to bchi000

The typical path for for a track in the library would be along the lines of C:\Users\<UserName>\Music\iTunes\iTunes Media\<AlbumArtist>\<Album>\## <Name>.<Ext>. The actual location can depend on where you chosen to store your media or how you've migrated your library from a previous computer. If you cannot track down a file called 01 Stalia, Stalia.m4a (with or without the leading track number) then repair of that particular track is unlikely.


tt2

iTunes isn't up to date on my new PC

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