How Do I Store My iTunes Library on an External Hard Drive?

Intro
I don't know about you, but the single largest set of files on my Mac is my iTunes Library, meaning all my music. And I'm perpetually struggling with having enough free hard drive space, so it makes sense to try to move these files to an external drive.

This article covers the steps of moving your iTunes library to an external hard drive, and discusses why you may want to have an ipod or a second external hard drive at your disposal if you choose to stow away your heavy iTunes library externally.

The good and the bad
One thing that I’m sure many people with limited space on their internal hard drive(s) will find wonderful about storing their iTunes library on an external hard drive is the potentially huge amount of internal hard drive space saved. I know there are some ethically challenged folks with over 100Gbs of music on their drive. You can find out how big yours is by opening iTunes, and chose one of the sub-libraries (Music, Movies and Audiobooks). Now you can read the individual sizes of the sub libraries at the bottom of the window.

An obviously bad thing about having your iTunes library stored on an external hard drive is the inability to listen to your music when the external hard drive is disconnected. The obvious solution to this is to listen to your music from your iPod when your library is disconnected. If you don’t have an iPod, storing your library on a dedicated portable hard drive could solve the problem. However, if you e.g. use your laptop on the couch, this could be a pain, and I therefore recommend the iPod way of getting around this problem.

Moving the tunes
So how do I move my iTunes library? The process can be split into the following five steps:

1. Getting set
2. Change library location
3. Consolidate library
4. Copy files
5. Delete old library

Until step 4, this is the official method provided by Apple. But since their method does not move the whole library, we will do something different (step 4).

Getting set
Launch iTunes, and from the iTunes menu choose Preferences. When the preferences window is open, click the Advanced tab (highlighted below). Select the "Keep iTunes Music folder organized" checkbox (highlighted below) and we’re set. You may also want to check the Copy files to iTunes music folder box as well. That will keep you future music imports organized as well.

Change library location
Now, still in Advanced tab, push the “Change” button (highlighted above). An open dialog will pop-up. Navigate to the desired location on your external hard drive, make a new folder for your library, and click the “Open” button in the lower right corner of the dialog. Then click “OK” in the Advanced window.

Consolidate library
What’s left now is to bring your music files together in your library if they aren't already. To do so, From the Advanced menu, choose Consolidate Library. A message appears that says: "Consolidating your library will copy all of your music into the iTunes Music folder. This cannot be undone." Press the “Consolidate” button, and iTunes starts moving music files to your library. Expect this to take a while if you've left your music files strewn all over your Mac.

Move files
Quit iTunes, and open your iTunes folder (default is Users / Username / Music / iTunes). Next, select the files shown below, copy them (shortcut: command-c). Then navigate to your new iTunes folder, and paste them (shortcut: command-v).

Delete old library
First, make sure everything works just as usual. Browse your library, check that no album art is missing, the songs play like they should.
If everything works, delete the old iTunes folder, and you’re done!

My insecure setup
I moved all of my media libraries to my external hard drive recently, but after doing so, I realized that my brand new and extremely space saving setup was seriously insecure. While having a great time finding the best way to move the libraries to an external hard drive, I had completely forgotten about backup.

I only own a single external hard drive, and that meant that my libraries were now on the same hard drive as the backups of the libraries! That left my libraries completely vulnerable to an eventual hard drive failure. I would not recommend having such a setup to anyone, since hard drive failures happen time to time.

As you may have guessed by now, my libraries are at the moment back to their default locations.

The alternative setup
The above mentioned insecure setup can easily be avoided by keeping your libraries and backup on two separate hard drives. If you have an iPod, your library is probably stored there already, and you don’t have any kind of security problem. Other choices could be getting a second external hard drive or to opt for a RAID 1 setup with two disks if you want to save an USB port.

Further Thoughts
If you don't have a spare drive around or hooking up to your laptop is a pain, you can explore some other options. First, if you have an iPod, iPhone or AppleTV and your library fits on there, sync it and leave it on that device to play from. Don't forget there are a wide variety of speakers with remotes to make your life easy in this way.

Next, if you have another Mac (or PC), even an old beater that is not up to much else, you can run your iTunes there, or use it to stream you music to your new Mac via the Shared Music on a network. You may even want to move this old Mac to a room that you'll listen to music more often in.

Lastly, always use your first extra drive as a backup, not only for your iTunes Library, but all your crucial files. This leaves you the option to put music on another device like an iPod and then take it off your Mac.

Got any suggestions or question of your own? Let us know in the Comments section below!

Bjørn Friese is studying Social Science and English in Denmark, and has an ever growing passion for computers and being creative.

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Your Comments:

I use an AirPort hooked up to a USB drive and access all my files wirelessly. Called AirDisk, this technology worked horribly in 10.5.1, but Apple has fixed the network connection problems in 10.5.3, and it works really well now.

The only annoyance is that if I start up iTunes before I mount my external drive, iTunes gets confused and I have to re-link my iTunes folder in the prefs.

 Ubu
 06/27/2008  at  06:05 PM

I've got Time Capsule w/ 500G. I've stored my iTunes library on the TC drive and reference the library there in iTunes. The TC drive is set to mount on load, but iTunes can't find the library until after I go through the finder select the TC drive and see the iTunes folder. At that point when opening iTunes, everything works great.

Does anyone have any suggestions so that iTunes or TC will connect to the drive and find the folder automatically?

 Brian
 06/27/2008  at  07:20 PM

I am confused. If I move my library to an external, can I delete it from my hard drive? And then if I do, what happens when I got to put some more files in itunes for my ipod, and sync again, does it think the library is empty and delete everything off my ipod except the new stuff?

Are you saying that if I have the external hooked up when itunes opens, using the methods above, itunes will look for it on the external and update the library and sync both ways using that, and I can really have NO library on my main computer?

You didn't say anything about deleting off the main harddrive so I want to make sure this is what you mean.

I have an older ibook that has run out of space and I'd love it if this would be the solution. Simply loading it all onto the ipod doesn't work since if I delete the library, next time I sync, it deletes from the ipod and poof it's all gone.

Any help appreciated! I've got a brand new ipod I can't use!

 Karen
 06/28/2008  at  09:50 PM

Oops I meant you didn't mention what happens to syncing once deleted off the main hard drive. Sorry for my confusion!

 Karen
 06/28/2008  at  09:55 PM

1. If you've made sure everything works fine, and you have proper backup of your data, it's perfectly safe delete the old library.

2. Everything should work like usual if you follow my instructions carefully and your external harddrive is connected. Try to avoid syncing your iPod while the external harddrive is disconnected since iTunes will assume you don't have a music library.

3. No iTunes won't update anything since nothing has changed since last time you opened your library. If you have followed my instructions, the one and only music library you got is located on your external harddrive.

4. It's not impossible to have two or more iTunes libraries, but those kind of setups are pretty complicated stuff.

5. I definitely think this kind of setup can solve your problem. Syncing your iPod with your iTunes library located on your external harddrive should be just as easy as if it was located on your internal harddrive

I hope the answers above can help you out. I will be away for a week and will not be able to reply till i get back.

 Bjørn Friese
 06/29/2008  at  07:36 AM

One should also back up the library to DVD. iTunes automatically bridges th e data set across a series of DVDs.
Number them sequentially. Write a date on the last one. Then, periodically, after you have added an amount of new music approximately in size to the space on a DVD, create a new smart playlist using a filter that includes only the music "added after date" equivalent to the date on your last backup disk. This will only copy the last music and can be repeated periodically. Store the disks a secure place, possibly even off site, so, should your house burn down or your entire computer and external hard drive be stolen, you still have your music collection

 jochen
 06/29/2008  at  07:58 AM

Good, Idea, Jochen. I think you could do this with any type of storage. DVDs would be handy if you don't have another extra drive but you have a Super Drive.

 Chris
 06/29/2008  at  08:49 AM

I moved my iTunes library from my MacBook Pro's internal drive to an external FireWire drive to free up disk space on the MBP. It's worked perfectly.

When away from my desk there was a problem with iTunes being unable to find the external iTunes Library. I cooked up a little trick. It may be a bit convoluted, but it works.

1.) In the "Music" Folder I made 2 new folders: "iTunes @ Home" and "iTunes Away".

2.) I moved the iTunes Folder alias, which points to the library folder on the external drive into the "iTunes @ Home" folder.

3.) I unmounted the external drive, then launched iTunes. It automatically makes a new iTunes Folder in the "Music" folder.

4.) Then I labelled the Home and Away Folders and alias with similar colors: Purple for Home, Red for Away, etc.

5.) When I move between home and mobile and run iTunes, I just need to remember to move the iTunes folders between the correct folders before launching iTunes.

The advantage is I can run iTunes and rip music while away, then move the new music to my Home iTunes Library and sync it to my iPod when I reconnect to the external hard drive at home.

 jeffharris
 06/29/2008  at  12:04 PM

Jeff

you can make a new library on your MBP and select which library to load by pressing the option key while itunes loads... I think this would be easier for you!

 Jakov Cordina
 07/06/2008  at  03:29 PM

Can anyone tell me why my iPod Games folder didn't consolodate to my external drive when I transfered everything over? All of my other files (movies, podcasts, etc.) moved fine but the games are still pointing to my internal drive.

Thanks!

 Jenni
 07/10/2008  at  09:12 PM

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