Adding Music to your iTunes Library
All iPod's also function as external USB drives. When you plug your iPod into your system (Mac or PC), it mounts the drive as an external
drive and allows you to move files to *and* from it.
The first thing I'd like you to do is launch iTunes. We have to modify the way music files are added to it.
Natively, iTunes keeps track of a song by setting a pointer to it in your directories rather than copying it into the iTunes music directory.
We need to change this so every song that gets added to your iTunes Music
Libray gets copied into your iTunes music directory.
This is rather simple and it's the best way to keep all of the songs in your music Library together and easy to find... particularly if you ever have to move from your present computer to another. This way all the music, photos and videos will be in one directory.
With iTunes running, go to the "file" menu, select it and pull down to "Preferences". This will bring up a "pane" with 7 tabs accross the top.
Click on the "Advanced" tab. This will bring up a screen that has three tabs. The "General" tab comes by default and it's the one we need.
Click in the box to check the "Keep iTunes Music folder organized"
Click in the box to check the "Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library"
Now click "OK" at the bottom of the preferences screen to save these chages and exit.
Now plug your iPod into your computer and wait a minute or so.
Now go to the "Start" menu, click it and drag up to and release over "My Computer" in the second column. This will bring up a window that shows all the drives on your system. Double Click on the "C" drive to open the drive in that window. Resize the window so it fits in the right hand side of your screen and scoot it over to the right side of your screen.
We need to do this again, so go to the "Start" menu, click it and drag up to and release over "My Computer" in the second column. This will bring up a window that shows all the drives. This time double Click on your iPod drive (it may the 'E', 'F' or 'G' drive) to open the drive in that window. Resize that "iPod drive" window so it fits in the left hand side of your screen.
In the iPod window you will see the "add_to_library" folder. Select it with a single click and drag it over onto the "C" drive window, it will make a copy of the "add_to_library" folder onto the "C" drive.
The folder copy may take a few..... up many minutes, a 20GB folder will take well over an hour because the drive in the iPod is a relatively slow laptop drive.
When the folder copy to the "C" drive is finished, we go back to iTunes to add that new folder to the Library.
In iTunes, pull down the "File" menu to "Add folder to Library" and release the mouse button to select it. This will bring up a "Browse For Folder" window. Click on the 'plus' symbol to the left of the "My Computer". It will present a descending list of drives that are on your system. click on the 'plus' symbol to the left of "Local Disk(C:)" and you will see a descending list of directories on your C drive.
From that list click ONCE on the "add_to_library" folder to merely select it. It will cascade open, but the folder name alone will be highlighted. We have the "add_to_library" folder selected, so click "OK" at the bottom of the "Browse For Folder" window.
It will close and iTunes will now start reading and importing the songs into iTunes. This process will recursively go through every directory in that folder and add all the songs. Then it will begin to copy them into the iTunes Library. This may take quite a while depending on the number, but you can watch the activity occuring in the "play window" of iTines itself.
When the import is finished, delete the original "add_to_library" folder/file off of your iPod drive. (right click on it and pull down to delete. Then empty your "Recycle Bin" to actually delete the files from your iPod.
After a day or so of using the new, fuller iTunes Library, making playlists and moving them over to the iPod to try them, you can delete the "add_to_library" folder on the C drive.
We are deleteing the folder off the iPod first so the empty iPod drive space can be used again for playlists, photos, videos and music to be moved to it from iTunes. iPod's make dynamic use of the drive space, so if it's not being used as an external drive, the disk space is re-allocated to iPod music file use.
I'm in Sonoma County... Northern California wine country.
If you live nearby, are traveling through or live in the San Francisco Bay Area bring your iPod to me and I can do the work while you wait or go wine tasting for a while. Send me an
email just to make sure I have on hand whatever parts your repair will require.
Call or email me
with questions or to set up a repair. You can also call, I am here most days from 8am to 8pm
Toll Free 1-877-iPod-Pro (1 - 877 - 476-3776)
Send the device to:
Frank Walburg
2145 Service Court
Santa Rosa, Ca 95403-3139
Methods of payment
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