Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Resync iPod to new iTunes Library without Erasing or loosing your music

Intro
It is a mess if you reinstall your computer or lost your iTunes library or you want to add a song from your office computer but your iTunes keeps on saying about "Erase and Resync" your library. Erasing and Resyncing is foolish, because you will loose all your favorite songs on your iPod. Follow these steps to resynch iTunes from iPod.

  • Close iTunes if running and Goto the iTunes folder
    (My Documents\My Music\iTunes\ on Windows XP)
  • Clear your current iTunes library by deleting iTunes Library.itl and iTunes Music Library.xml
    Note:This step will erase your iTunes library only not your music files :)
  • Now plug in your iPod and it will be detected as a removable media on Windows.
  • Goto My Computer and open the drive
  • If it is empty, goto Tools > Folder Options > And tick Show Hidden Files and Folders Option
  • Copy the iPod_control folder to any drive on your computer.
  • After copying now run iTunes and press erase and resync.
  • Your iTunes library would be empty so it is okay to resynch.
  • Now unhide the folder you copied over to your drive by right clicking and selecting the properties menu item, and untick the hidden attribute.
  • Start iTunes
  • Drag that folder to your iPod to resync it.
  • TADA, your iPod is resynced with a new iTunes Library

8 comments:

EX-YU Aviation said...

Thanks. Worked like a charm.

Anonymous said...

But what do you do about the playlist? Wont they be erased. I mean i know the songs will be there but what about the the different playlist sections?

Unknown said...

wow!! seems 2 b interesing buddy...
let me jus try wit ma shuffle...

Unknown said...

amazin...i looked through so many different sites and downloaded so many different applications...this was so simple and straight forward...no hidden surprises..yay
=)

Llàtzer said...

I tried it, and my playlists are gone. The music is nicely organitzed, with the compilation albums group together but the playlists...I need to find a way to import them.

Llàtzer said...

(add up to last post)
BUT, you can import your playlists using any of your backups xml file. Either from a singular playlist export, or your iTunes music library.xml
The only issue I found so far is that I lost most of my covers, and some songs changed their names to the iTunes naming. Like KHIG, SDKE or XSOD. All this silly renaming is backfiring.
I'm very happy though. Thanks Arun!

Anonymous said...

yeah it didnt work. thanks a lot. now all 456 songs are gone. woopee.

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much! That was really easy. I don't have XP, I have vista, so it was a bit different but I figured it out in the end!