System Rebuild Guidance Please

[zapatero]

I have had to completely rebuild my desktop (PC) system and would greatly appreciate some guidance regarding the sequencing of tasks. I need to:

1) Download and install the latest version of iTunes to my new system, and

2) Move my music and podcasts library from my old system to the new one.

Please tell me which task should be done first to minimize the likelihood of problems? If there are knowledge base articles, or forum threads that already address this question I will be happy to refer to them.

Thank you very much,
~~zapatero

[Jesse Hollington]

The short answer is that it really doesn't matter which order you do this in. When you install iTunes, it won't actually touch anything in your iTunes library -- it merely reinstalls the application. If you run iTunes before copying over your old library database, it will create a new, empty database, but you can easily overwrite this when you copy your old data back in.

Probably the simplest and most logical procedure is to reinstall iTunes and then copy your iTunes library database and content into the proper location before you run iTunes. However, it won't hurt to install iTunes after you've already copied this data in either.

See Transferring your iTunes Library for more specific information.

[zapatero]

Thank you for your helpful response, Jesse!

I understand that there is a new version of iTunes on the way. It would probably save some nuisance for me if I would wait for that release. Do you know when that is scheduled for?

~~z

[Jesse Hollington]

In all fairness I'm not really sure that it matters, and in fact you might find it easier to get up and running on something you're at least slightly familiar with than taking the plunge into a whole new version -- iTunes 11 is supposed to be a major upgrade and looks like it will be the biggest single change to iTunes in years.

There is no specific release date at this point; Apple is saying it's supposed to be coming this month, but it was originally supposed to arrive by the end of October.