Moving iTunes Library to a new drive, after clearing library contents

[ArthurJS]

Is there a way to accomplish this? I had to uninstall, and reinstall, my iTunes program. I am adding an external drive to house all of my songs and photos. Right now, I have the contents of the library stored on a temporary drive on my Windows Desktop. I tried to recreate the library as things are now, (without the external drive), and get the library restored before I get the external drive (which is in the mail), but it seemingly creates another library directory (the default iTunes music library, which I DO NOT want to create), and as a result, I get messages that my C drive does not have enough room. How can I do this successfully before I get the new drive, and when I do, move the library to it and not have to manually go through song by song, and repoint each one that has an exclaimation point in the library?

Thanks,

Arthur

[jedk]

Welcome to iLounge. We have a faq on the topic which may be of help, and also when it comes to moving your library to the new external drive:
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/moving-your-itunes-library-to-a-new-hard-drive/

[ArthurJS]

I appreciate it, but this article is somewhat pertinant, but does not address the fact that the contents of my library are already cleared, and I need to resync things WITHOUT having iTunes create yet another folder with the same contents-I need to populate the library, and have it link to this folder I already have that contains my songs-and not have it create yet another folder with the same songs-is there anything I need to "turn off" in iTunes, maybe something to do with automatic syncing?

Thanks again,

Arthur

[ArthurJS]

OK-I think if I switch iTunes to manually sync, and then move the directory, and tell iTunes where the new directory is located, that should take care of it? They don't make this easy, do they?!

Arthur

[hotphil]

Ok, I think I'm with you:

You have a folder of music that when you try to add to iTunes, it tries to make a copy of all the files in the My Music\iTunes folder and fills up c:?

You'll need to fire up iTunes and look in the Edit>Preferences>Advanced tab. You'll see two relevant checkboxes. Definitely uncheck the "copy files to itunes music folder..." one and, depending on your preference, the "keep iTunes music folder organised".
You should then be able to add the folder to iTunes with no issues.
Then, when your shiny new drive arrives, follow the http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/moving-your-itunes-library-to-a-new-hard-drive/

[ArthurJS]

Exactly! Thank you-you answered my question! By the way, my new external drive IS shiny-a 300 GB Maxtor One Touch II w/ Firewire-and you are correct-I actually did a similiar procedure once before, and remember turning off certain features-sometimes you don't think clearly when you're working in iTunes for hours!

Thanks again,

Arthur:)

[hotphil]

Hope it goes well.

Shiny rocks!