How do i transfer my itunes library?

[VeGt0m]

Hi,

I'm going to do a fresh install of windows 7 on my laptop. How do i transfer my itunes library once windows 7 is freshly installed so that I can sync my iPad with my laptop just like before?

I would really appreciate any help.
Thanks .

 

[Jeeper]

When I changed Macs, I was able to load the entire library into an external drive (used FireWire, way faster than USB) and then dumped it into iTunes on the new Mac. I suspect pc is a little more convoluted than that.

I'm not a pc guy, so I won't guess at what you need to do. I can suggest going to the apple web site, as they have a whole section on transferring iTunes libraries. It's in the support/help section I believe.

 

[VeGt0m]

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1751

Is this what I would have to do?

 

[Jeeper]

That looks right to me, I'm pretty sure that's how I did it. Like I said, if you can use FireWire, it's faster then USB (a few minutes compared to possible hours). Make sure that iTunes is really empty after you reinstall windows, before transferring your library back in. If I recall, when I signed back into my iTunes (store) account on my new computer, I had to authorize it for use (was prompted to click "authorize").

Good luck!

You may want to see if any other members have any suggestions on how this worked for them on Windows 7 machines.

 

[VeGt0m]

Hi, I want to bump this thread I started a little while ago as the time is drawing near for me to do wipe my laptop and do a clean install. Now I just want to make sure that if I copy my iTunes media folder to my external hard drive and then transfer it to the same directory on the freshly installed laptop that all my apps and data will remain intact. This is important to me as I make music using the Korg iMS 20 and I do not want to loose all the tunes I am working on. I also have a lot of other precious app data that I do not want to loose. I would really appreciate some help.

 

[Jeeper]

Transferring the iTunes library will save all the apps, data and other items you use iTunes for. If you've got other files on your computer, make sure to also back them up to the external drive. You can use something like Time Machine, or Carbon Copy Clone.

 

[giradman]

Hi Guys - just wanted to join this thread but cannot offer any personal advice - I'm about to upgrade a laptop to Windows 7 which has my iTunes program sync to both my older iPod Touch & my iPad2, so will have to 'face' the same situation.

I hope that others w/ PCs who have done this process will respond; the Apple help link looks pretty specific and clear but always reassuring to hear from others who have actually gone through the transition -

Concerning the USB vs. Firewire (i.e. IEEE 1394) transfer rates, the issue is a little more complicated that explained by the MUCH faster rate of Firewire (which is usually not a PC standard offered on most machines). Keep in mind that USB has gone through 3 standards, i.e. 1.1, 2.0, & 3.0, the corresponding transmission rates are 12 Mbps, 480 Mbps, and nearly 5 Gbps, respectively; most recent PC systems have at least USB 2.0 (which is pretty fast!) - Firewire has two standards, i.e. 400 & 800 Mbps, so MUCH overlap; therefore does not make a difference if one is using USB 2.0 or 3.0, the latter being the FASTEST transfer rate.

Well, let's hope we all get some GOOD directives -