MetaChat - Wow. I think I lost all my iTunes music. WTF?

MetaChat is an informal place for MeFites to touch base and post, discuss and chatter about topics that may not belong on MetaFilter. Questions? Check the FAQ. Please note: This is important.

09 September 2007

Wow. I think I lost all my iTunes music. WTF? What the hell happened? The iPod catch: if your music stored in iTunes in your 'puter gets wiped, you can't transfer music from your little iPod back onto your 'puter. →[More:]

Anything I bought that I didn't burn to disc is gone, unless it's somewhere "lost" on my 'puter. Lost where?

This is prolly the way iTunes likes it, so you have to buy lost music again in this situation.

I moved some files onto an external drive this weekend and also defragged. Now the "Music" section of my iTunes is... blank. Nada. ZipZilch.

What the hell happened?!

Ghaaaaah.

Disclaimer: I prob'ly wouldn't have an iPod if an old job didn't give me one, but iPods and mp3 players are pretty cool & addictive.

post by: shane at: 16:27 | 16 comments

Itunes did some weird shit to my music library when I first got my ipod (previously had a Creative product) - and now my music isn't where I think it should be on my computer but it is there.

YMMV since you actually did some hocus pocus to your computer.

posted by fluffy battle kitten 09 September | 16:34

I had the EXACT same thing happen & I was HORRIFIED. But fyi, there are programs that help you to copy from your ipod. So it was fixable.

posted by miss lynnster 09 September | 16:48

THANKS, FBK and Miss L!

Holyfuckinshite, I think I found my music on that external drive and I can recover it.

Oddly, I wasn't as horrified at the loss as I thought I'd've been. But I have a lot of burned CDs of my iTunage, I haven't bought all that much, and I prob'ly could have recovered most. Still, the fact that I took the loss so easily says I know I need to weed all kinds of baggage out of my 'puter, my domicile, and my life.

Anyway, if there's any point to this thread now, it is:

ALWAYS BACK UP YOUR ITUNES, YOUR MUSIC AND YOUR COMPUTER FILES IN GENERAL.

lol.

posted by shane 09 September | 17:15

I moved some files onto an external drive this weekend ...
Sure you didn't move the music files, meaning iTunes can't find it any more? Alternatively, you may have moved the library files, which would have the same effect. Try searching for *.mp3 or tell iTunes to find new music and see what happens.

There are a couple of programs that let you copy from an iPod back to your PC, but I can't think of the name of the one I have used right now. ephod or something like that, I think.

posted by dg 09 September | 17:43

Ah, I see you found it. Nice to know I was right, anyway.

posted by dg 09 September | 17:44

What I did was that I was copying my music files to an external but decided I wanted to put it on a DIFFERENT external. So I started deleting the half copied files. Only... I was distracted so I inadvertently deleted my entire music library instead. All 9000 SONGS. And even my recovery software didn't fix it.

Yeah, that was a bad day.

posted by miss lynnster 09 September | 18:03

Even more helpful hint: don't buy music from itunes (or anywhere else) that uses any sort of licensing or copy-prohibition scheme. Freely copyable or bust!!!

On second thought, that's a really lame slogan. I'll work on that.

posted by deadcowdan 09 September | 18:05

emusic.com will let you re-download music purchased from them. The downside is that you have to use up your subscribed number of downloads every month or the extras go away--I think they have enough new and old music to use up 30 downloads a month pretty easily. Overall, it's a good source for DRM-free indie music.

I still like iTunes though. Considering the only larger retail sellers are Wal Mart and Best Buy, I'm definitely in the iTunes bandwagon.

posted by mullacc 09 September | 18:40

GHAAAAH.

This is still a pain. Opening any "Previous iTunes Music Library" file gives me nothing. Here is what is on my external drive. I'm hoping that copying everything from the external drive "iTunes Music" file back into the old file on my computer drive will repopulate my iTunes, but if not I suppose I'll have to "Add Folder to Library" in iTunes and convert them to AACs, which will take hours. dg, does that sound right?

Miss L, that's heartbreaking. 9000? Wow. Good advice, dan.

posted by shane 09 September | 18:56

iTunes will let you re-download your music too. You have to fill out a form on Apple's iTunes support site.

posted by birdherder 09 September | 19:07

That sounds about right shane - except you shouldn't have to convert any files - iTunes will happily play .mp3 if that's what they are - it just defaults to importing files into .aac, which I change to making it import as .mp3 anyway (preferences, advanced tab, importing tab, import using ...). If you add existing files, iTunes only has to add them to its database. I also tell iTunes not to manage the folders, which may have some effect on copying etc.

iTunes is an evil place to buy music, but iTunes the application rocks my tiny world. Life's funny like that.

posted by dg 09 September | 19:34

Well, fortunately I was able to get most of the songs off of my ipod using a program I found online. So I didn't lose much in the end. Just my mind for a few days.

posted by miss lynnster 09 September | 20:01

Birdherder, thanks for saying that... I think some of the songs I lost might've been ones I bought there so I'll see if I can get them again.

posted by miss lynnster 09 September | 20:02

I'll check out emusic, mullac. Thanks, dg and birdherder. birdherder, do you really herd birds? Good luck, Miss L. Thanks again, all.

posted by shane 09 September | 20:27

Why did I think iTunes wants things converted to aac? It seems to store in m4a format. Maybe there are some formats that are more compact on the iPod when converted to aac?

All recovered!

posted by shane 09 September | 20:30

How scary! But I'm glad you got everything recovered. Backing up mine right now.

posted by rhapsodie 09 September | 21:30

← Managment Advice Taken || Is "natural" or "additive-free" tobacco better or worse? →

HOME || REGISTER || LOGIN