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Location of music files using Catalina

Can music files be located off of main drive without Music losing track of locations? In the past have had to use a separate app to help iTunes maintain connection to music located on different drives.

Posted on Dec 4, 2019 12:26 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Dec 5, 2019 7:36 AM

Yes, however you need to let Music consolidate to a new path rather than moving the files by hand and then trying to tell Music where they are afterwards. It may be best however to copy the Music library (~/Music/Music - the last Music in the path) to the external drive as <External>/Music, option-start-Music to choose the library on the new path, then use Music > Preferences > Files to reset the media folder to <External>/Music/Media, and finally use File > Library > Organize Library > Consolidate Files to bring in fresh copies of anything stored outside the media folder. Once complete you can manually delete the originals, although I would recommend backing up the library first. Taking this approach means that the Music folder on your external drive is a self-contained portable library, easy to back up and move to another drive or computer when required.


tt2

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3 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Dec 5, 2019 7:36 AM in response to Brett Phares

Yes, however you need to let Music consolidate to a new path rather than moving the files by hand and then trying to tell Music where they are afterwards. It may be best however to copy the Music library (~/Music/Music - the last Music in the path) to the external drive as <External>/Music, option-start-Music to choose the library on the new path, then use Music > Preferences > Files to reset the media folder to <External>/Music/Media, and finally use File > Library > Organize Library > Consolidate Files to bring in fresh copies of anything stored outside the media folder. Once complete you can manually delete the originals, although I would recommend backing up the library first. Taking this approach means that the Music folder on your external drive is a self-contained portable library, easy to back up and move to another drive or computer when required.


tt2

Location of music files using Catalina

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