iPod and New Computer

Wednesday, June 30, 2004

If you’re sitting there with a new computer and scratching your head trying to figure out how to get all your music from your iPod and iTunes library on your old computer, scratch no longer! This is how you do it.

Update: And if you want to get your playlists on your new computer, you have to do this.

And you should also read this tip on Keeping iTunes Organized!

{ 41 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Leslie Turek 07.24.04 at 5:58 am

This is an odd coincidence, as I was faced with just this problem yesterday. Not seeing your post at the time, I found a solution on an Apple chat board somewhere, which was different but worked fine. The idea was to connect your new computer to your old one, using a firewire connector, and then booting your old computer with the “T” key to make it just look like a disk on the new computer. Then you could just drag and drop all the folders under music/iTunes. It took about 15 minutes to transfer my 5GB music library. Sweet.

2 Barbara Davison 09.24.05 at 11:03 am

Hi,

I need help. I have had my computer stolen. I have a new one but have no idea how to get my ipod music back to the new computer. Apple will not help me because of copyright. Any thnoughts. Thanks.

3 Nick 02.22.06 at 9:27 pm

Yeah me too. I’ve tried a bunch of krap programs that are supposidly so “simple” and easy to use. BS!!! I’m soooooo sick of this! I didnt pay 400 dollars for a 40G POS that i cant even add songs to anymore. Well i could, but I would have to loose the 500 songs that I already have and love. Serious BS, a glimmer of light would be nice.

4 Sashidhar kokku 01.09.07 at 8:11 pm

The 2nd link to restore does not work.

5 Zach 03.24.07 at 9:51 am

The fix for all this is very easy. First create a new folder on the desktop. Next, connect your ipod to your new computer. If/When itunes opens and prompts you about the ipod being connected to a different library, DO NOT CLICK ANYTHING. At this point you cannot do anything in itunes. Now open My Computer and click on your ipod. You must enable viewing of hidden files to see a folder named “iPod_Control”. Open this and then open the “Music” folder. Hit ctrl+a then ctrl+c. Now close this folder and open the folder you created on the desktop. Now hit ctrl+v. *NOTE this may take up to several hours, depending on how much media you have on your iPod.* Now go back into itunes and eject your iPod. Disconnect it from the computer. Go to file: add folder to library in itunes. Add the folder you created on the desktop, this process may also take a while. Now all your music should be in itunes.

Hope this helps, sorry for any unclarity in the directions, post for more information if neccesary.

6 Kat 03.30.07 at 8:08 am

My old pc died but a friend was able to download my music library onto a back up hard drive. When we connected it to my new pc though, we could not find the music. Should I try the way Zach above suggested? Thank you

7 Kay 04.13.07 at 7:58 pm

zach. i love you. everyone do what zach says!!!

8 Dana 04.17.07 at 3:38 pm

Hmm,
Sounds easy, but - will it synch the same? Will everything just “work”? Will it just recognize *my* ipod just like that?

Thanks!

9 Nancy 05.22.07 at 7:08 pm

Zach: Thank you sooooooooooo much.

10 Petteie 05.26.07 at 6:24 pm

Zach is a superstar! How come some of the song names are copied over as weird 4 letter codes? Any way to prevent that?

11 Paul 05.31.07 at 10:35 am

Thanks Zach. worked a treat.

12 Emily 06.05.07 at 5:11 am

I’m going to try Zach’s method, sounds like the only method so far that may work for me since my old computer is unable to connect to the internet and does not have itunes 7 version on it. I do have one question before I try this: should I have itunes already loaded on the new computer, or should I connect the ipod before loading itunes? thanks!

13 Andy 06.07.07 at 9:06 am

I don’t want this music on my computer i simply want to add more songs from my new pc onto my ipod how can i do it?!?

14 Nancy 06.07.07 at 11:24 am

I wish I could use this to copy a TV series that is half on one computer and half on another. It works great with music!

15 Ashley 06.17.07 at 6:51 pm

okay I used zach’s method to put all my songs onto my new computer from my old computer but now all the songs i downloaded from my old computer have exclamation marks and it says the songs cant be found since i didn’t download them on the new computer and so i cant listen to them on this computer. How do I fix this?

16 angela 08.16.07 at 1:44 pm

Help Zach! I did everything you said but it isn’t adding the folder to the library! Help!!

17 Deborah 09.02.07 at 6:04 pm

Hey Zach..same here. All worked well except the file will not transfer to my library. What to do…what to do..

18 marina 09.05.07 at 7:01 pm

THANK YOU!!!!! I don’t know if this will help others, but after doing everything Zach said, I did one more step that worked. I clicked on my new info in my new folder and selected all my music. After selecting them they instantly went into Itunes. Then when it asked if i wanted to erase old info and add new playlist…I said YES!!! Since it was the same stuff. I am elated…it finally worked. THANK YOU SO MUCH! I have been playing with this for hours

19 David 09.13.07 at 2:55 am

Zach is the man. However, I also had a hard time transferring songs from the folder to i tunes. I figured out that it was because my new folder (folder 1) contained a bunch of smaller folders within it. I solved that by creating another folder (folder 2) on the desktop, and manually moving the contents of each of the smaller folders into it. Folder 2 now had all of my songs, but without small folders. Then i added this folder to itunes, and it worked out.

20 Jessi 09.26.07 at 8:18 am

Does this work even if your Ipod was set to “synch automatically”. I’m so afraid I’m going to lose nearly 5,000 songs!!!! I don’t have my old computer (whuch was a PC), I just have my Ipod (set on my old computer to automatically sync) and my new computer (a Mac). Does anyone see any potential problems? I’m totally freaked out, but I want my music on my computer so it’s at least backed-up!! Thanks!

21 Jessi 09.26.07 at 10:09 am

I tried the “Zach approach” and I am unable to find the “enable hidden files” is this b/c I have a MAC? Where would I find this? THanks!!

22 Nancy 09.26.07 at 11:38 am

Zach’s method worked great for me the first time, but after replacing my hard drive, I was only able to resurrect about half the songs from the same copied files (I stored them on a network drive). I had the same problem Ashley had, where the files had an ! and couldn’t be located. I am happy that I got at least half of my files back, though.

23 DENNIS 09.28.07 at 12:37 am

eh… my ipod shows up as a ipod and as the F: drive but no folder for music

24 Mike Radford 10.06.07 at 6:03 am

I cannot get my new computer to recognise my ipod - one message says that the ipod needs restoring and another that it is corrupted - any ideas?

MIke.

25 Ashley 10.07.07 at 8:14 pm

oh my goodness.

Zach, I don’t know who you are, but you are amazing and I will never forget the great deed you have done for me tonight. You have saved my life and sanity, and I will never forget you.
Love Always,
Ashley and her iPod

26 Adam 10.18.07 at 12:05 pm

I copied the entire Ipod_Control directory to a directory on my C: drive. Make sure the directory is not still hidden. You will not be able to add the folder to iTunes if it is still hidden. Just right click the folder and choose properties, then remove the check mark from “Hidden”. Then it will work fine.

27 mike 11.03.07 at 7:39 pm

hello. ok … almost there. the files copied fine, and anytime i click on a file it plays and itunes recognizes it. BUT … i can’t get the folders to copy to the itunes library. i’m on vista … what am i doing wrong???

28 Nicole 01.10.08 at 2:39 pm

I have windows vista and have tried finding the ipod_control folder.. i made sure to show the hidden files and it’s still not there!

29 Liz 02.03.08 at 7:10 am

Same problem as you Nicole. I have Windows Vista and can’t find the ipod_control folder. Have you had any luck yet? And did you install itunes first before starting the file copying process???

30 Lexi 02.15.08 at 6:51 pm

i am having the same problem with vista…can anyone help?

31 Cecee 03.31.08 at 5:55 pm

I’m so relieved,my old computer was fried, so I had no way to copy the files but from my Ipod. I had to unhide the folders and then it worked…my music is now in itunes on new computer.

32 Molly9094 04.04.08 at 4:20 am

Hi to all, and to Zack who is great! I’m going to try your tip about setting up a file on my desktop to start putting my ipod items into the computer. This is really frustrating and can’t thank you enough.

33 John 04.24.08 at 5:19 pm

Zach:

I’ve got an old nano and a new computer…I can get the music on the nano onto the computer, but now the nano won’t play. Any ideas?

Thanks, John

34 Anne 04.27.08 at 9:00 am

Zach, your advice was a huge help!

I’ve found the folder in Vista. When you’re in “My Computer” and have your iPod selected as the drive, go to Tools -> Folder Options. Under the View tab, you should see a folder that says Hidden Files & Folders. It is slightly indented on my computer. Then select the bubble for “View hidden files and folders,” hit Apply, OK, and the folder should then show up. Hope this helps those of you also working with Vista.
-anne

35 Lo 04.30.08 at 5:36 pm

I have a similar problem. Both my Ipod and computer were stolen at the same time. I have heard there’s a way to get your purchased itunes songs back. Is this true and how would I do that? Thank you!

36 ADAM 06.04.08 at 3:49 pm

does zachs method work for imacs?

37 Tom 06.26.08 at 11:51 am

I am trying these techniques above however my ipod was previously formatted on an imac and when i connect it to my new pc i don’t even get an ipod icon come up in my computer. An icon comes up as removable disk (G:) instead! Damn it, help

38 victoria 07.04.08 at 8:12 am

good advice zack, Lo is a douchebag, molly sounds hot, lexi is sexy, tom can suck a dick, adam….get a job….

39 Chris 07.19.08 at 10:50 am

How do you enable viewing hidden files?

40 smallbod 07.27.08 at 7:15 am

Awesome! worked a treat - doing a small happy dance as i type - thank you!

41 Ivan 08.12.08 at 1:49 pm

“Zach Method” with David’s advice worked for my nano with Windows XP. Like David said, inside my copied music folder there were a few folders labelled F00, F01, etc. filled with the actual music files. Once going into those folders and copying all files to another folder (which i then added to itunes) it worked except for maybe 40 songs, which still had a 4-letter name after I finished. Didnt know what to do about those so Ive been going through and renaming them manually….

Leave a Comment

You can use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>