April 15, 2008
How To Migrate iTunes Libarary On Windows
Recently I got a new computer, so I need to migrate my iTunes Library to my new computer. Here is the way how I successfully did it.
- Assume you have all the music files an podcast in one folder. (Mine are organized by iTunes)
- Copy all the musics to the new computer.
- Open iTunes on the new computer, goto Edit->Preference (Ctrl+,), change the settings to your old settings. For me, the most important are “iTunes Music folder location” and “Keep iTunes Music folder organized”, “Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library”.
- Copy two files: “iTunes Library.itl” & “iTunes Music Library.xml” under “[My Documents]\My Music\iTunes\” to the same location on your new computer.
- Open “iTunes Music Library.xml” with a text editor (notepad is OK). Replace all path of old location by new location. NOTE: the path delimiter iTunes uses is “/” rather than “\”.
- Done. Open iTuens to see if it takes effect. All the songs should show up as well as all your playlists.
UPDATE: The coolest thing is when my iPhone connected to my new computer, iTunes recognized my iPhone immediately as if my iPhone is sync-ed with this computer. So I wonder if I can use this method to sync iPhone/iPod with two computers.