I'm very slowly trying to get to grips with iTunes, and wondered whether someone might be able to shed some light on the following problem; All my music and videos is stored on an external hard drive which I leave at home. However, I do borrow cd's from colleagues which I rip onto my local laptop hard drive. Usually I wait until I get home before transferring the new music to my external drive, and then add it to iTunes and sync my iPhone4. Is it possible to sync the media on my laptop as a 'one-off', and then transfer it later to my external drive? The last time I tried to sync when my external drive wasn't connected ended up with me wiping all my media from my iPhone, which was slightly annoying to say the least. I'm not sure whether this is because I've set the external drive as the 'home' drive where all my media is held. I would guess there's some form of manual sync option, but if this is the case how would I switch it back so it syncs automatically when I'm at home? Sorry for the long drawn out question, hope it makes sense and someone will be able to help. Cheers.
iTunes syncing without external hard drive
- Thread starter Andy Grange
- Start date
John Duncan
Well-known member
Andy Grange:However, I do borrow cd's from colleagues which I rip onto my local laptop hard drive.
Um...first thing that springs to mind is to have 'Home Sharing' turned on, and load CDs onto the library of your laptop. Then when you're home, connect it to the network, and you can import music from that library into the main one (which will store it by default in your external hard drive).
Um...first thing that springs to mind is to have 'Home Sharing' turned on, and load CDs onto the library of your laptop. Then when you're home, connect it to the network, and you can import music from that library into the main one (which will store it by default in your external hard drive).
OK, thanks. Do I need to initially enable this whilst my laptop is connected to the external hard drive? As soon as I open iTunes up I get the (!) icon next to all my music, I don't want to wipe my iPhone and have nothing to listen to for the rest of the day!
Also the home sharing function seems to be for sharing music over multiple devices rather than the other way round (music from multiple locations to one device), does this matter?
Also the home sharing function seems to be for sharing music over multiple devices rather than the other way round (music from multiple locations to one device), does this matter?
John Duncan
Well-known member
You may have to start again to get everything syncing the way you want. Before you start, however, not sure where the (!) is coming from - on which machine? And which machine do you sync your iPhone to?
Sorry, I may have confused you. I'm using a single machine, and connecting to my external hard drive whilst at home. What I'd like to be able to do is sync whilst I'm not at home; the (!) icon is appearing as iTunes knows my external hard drive isn't attached and the media is therefore not available.
I'd just like to be able to add the odd album onto my iPhone without being reliant on carrying my external hard drive around every time I want to sync (I work away from home quite a bit you see).
I'd just like to be able to add the odd album onto my iPhone without being reliant on carrying my external hard drive around every time I want to sync (I work away from home quite a bit you see).
professorhat
Well-known member
Basically, the answer is no - if you're storing all your music on the external hard drive and this is the library you want to sync your iPhone with, then you need to have this plugged in when you want to sync, there's no way round this.
The only way to achieve what you want would be to have two libraries, one stored on the external hard disk and one on your laptop (you can create a new library by holding down Shift as you open iTunes). You would then need to move any music you want on your iPhone from the library on the external drive to the library on your laptop. Then sync your iPhone with the library stored on your laptop.
Now, when you are away, this library will still be available so you can sync with it to your hearts content.
The only way to achieve what you want would be to have two libraries, one stored on the external hard disk and one on your laptop (you can create a new library by holding down Shift as you open iTunes). You would then need to move any music you want on your iPhone from the library on the external drive to the library on your laptop. Then sync your iPhone with the library stored on your laptop.
Now, when you are away, this library will still be available so you can sync with it to your hearts content.
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