How Do I Recover iTunes Music on Hard Drive?

Restore your iTunes Library from a hard drive.

iTunes allows users to recover, or restore, music libraries that have been backed up to an external hard drive by simply dragging and dropping the file(s) to the desired location on their internal hard drive. You can either use the default iTunes folder location or one of your own, although Apple recommends using the default. Allow several minutes to several hours for your music to copy, depending on the size of your audio files and their rate of transfer.

Instructions

1. Quit iTunes, if opened. Plug one end of your hard drive connector cable into your hard drive and the other end into the proper computer port. Turn on your hard drive.

2. Open a new Windows Explorer screen (if on a PC) or Finder (if on a Mac) and navigate to a location on your internal hard drive you want your iTunes music copied to. The default locations for iTunes music are:

   Windows Vista or Windows 7: \Users\username\My Music

   Windows XP: \Documents and Settings\username\My Documents\My Music

   Mac OS X: /Users/username/Music

3. Open a new Windows Explorer or Finder window and locate your external hard drive. Drag and drop your iTunes music from the external drive to the desired location on your internal drive.

4. Open iTunes while holding down the "Shift" key (Windows) or the "Option" key (Mac). Click the "Choose Library" button when prompted by the pop-up iTunes window.

5. Select the iTunes folder on your internal drive and click "Open" (PC) or "Choose" (Mac). Choose your iTunes folder to automatically restore your library.

References

• Apple Support: Restoring Your iTunes Library

Resources

• Apple Support Home Page