Best way to backup ITunes

[kingcy]

First off my computer crashed last year and I lost all my music files. In my free time over the last year I have been putting my CDs and other music back on my computer. Now I have a pile of music on my ITunes program and was wonder what is the best way to back it up. Do I just take the ITunes folder and save it to a mem stick or is their a better way. Thanks

 

[sdillon500]

I have all music on an external hard drive. It's portable, safe, and you can grab your friend's music quickly and easily. I like Western Digital hard drives, and you can get one with 500 gb of storage space for about $70 now.

 

[BoilerClone]

My iTunes library takes up too much space to keep it on my laptop, so I keep it on a portable external drive. I have second external drive where I dock my MacBook at my desk where I keep a backup using a free program called "SyncTwoFolders". I select the iTunes folder on the portable drive and the iTunes folder on the backup drive and tell it to sync every week or whatever. Works well for me.

Basically the two things you need to back up are the iTunes folder that stores all your media, and the iTunes Library file that holds the database of everything in your iTunes library (playcount, cover art, playlists, etc.). Sometimes the library file can get corrupt and you have to re-add everything again. When this happens you don't lose all your media, but iTunes forgets where it's at and you lose playlists and stuff like that.

Hope that helps.

 

[cjb1978]

Try Google, it is your friend:

Best way to backup ITunes - Google Search

 

[kingcy]

Try Google, it is your friend:

Best way to backup ITunes - Google Search

CF is my friend also. Why not see what others have to say and maybe if I want I can ask them other questions.

 

[cyfanatic]

CF is my friend also. Why not see what others have to say and maybe if I want I can ask them other questions.

AGREE!

 

[ruxCYtable]

First off my computer crashed last year and I lost all my music files. In my free time over the last year I have been putting my CDs and other music back on my computer. Now I have a pile of music on my ITunes program and was wonder what is the best way to back it up. Do I just take the ITunes folder and save it to a mem stick or is their a better way. Thanks

Spend $70 on an external drive or $6/mo for mozy or carbonite and never worry again.

 

[acoustimac]

First off my computer crashed last year and I lost all my music files. In my free time over the last year I have been putting my CDs and other music back on my computer. Now I have a pile of music on my ITunes program and was wonder what is the best way to back it up. Do I just take the ITunes folder and save it to a mem stick or is their a better way. Thanks

I'm in agreement with most here. My library is WAY too big (over 9000 songs) for my laptop so I bought a 2TB drive for 85 buckeroos and have the entire library there. An interesting side note...

I've got a mac mini that the drive is connected to. The stereo output goes to my sound system and the HDMI output goes to my LCD television. Using my itouch or a wireless mouse I can control iTunes (which I see on the TV) and have my entire music collection available like a jukebox attached to my sound system. Pretty cool. Because iTunes is there, I can make a genius playlist quickly and listen to a nice mix anytime I want.

 

[brianhos]

If it is a mac, just get a cheap external drive and use time machine, that thing is great.