kadavy.net » Music

How to Transfer iTunes from One Computer to Another

David Kadavy — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 05:36:01 +0000

[UPDATE - 01/19/2010] – Some of you have left such helpful comments on how to move iTunes to a new computer, I wanted to point them out:

If you are a Windows user and don’t want to go through all of this hacking, you can buy iTunes Transfer software at my partner site. It will help you back up your library – with playlists – and transfer it to your other computer.
If you’re trying to transfer music from your iPod to your computer, unfortunately, Apple won’t let you do this freely, but you can buy iPod to Computer software for PC (free trial download), or iPod to Computer software for Mac at my partner site that will allow you to do this.
if you just have the hard drive of your old PC, Ben has shared with us how to make the transfer
if you aren’t keen on messing with XML files – and play count isn’t important to you - Oden has a simple process, involving smart playlists, for retaining song ratings when you transfer your iTunes library.
Collin has a simple way to find out those duplicate songs that you may end up with when transferring your catalog.
Aaron devised a clever way to transfer while retaining playlists in your collection.
If you are transferring between Macs, pbaron has a method involving FireWire mode.

[Original post]

Since I’m moving, I wanted to transfer all of my music from the iTunes library on my work computer to the iTunes library on my home computer. This is pretty simple – just transfer my music from my work computer’s iTunes library onto my Firewire Hard Drive, take it home, and transfer the music onto my home computer – but I rely on all of my song ratings, accumulated over thousands of hours of listening to iTunes while I work, to populate my iPod Shuffle with songs from the “My Top Rated Songs” Smart Playlist. I couldn’t find any information on how to transfer my iTunes music, while still retaining my song ratings, but I finally figured it out.

Move Your Music Library

Before you do this, you’ll have to first transfer the actual files to your new computer. You may choose to burn CDs, DVDs, or use a thumb drive; but using a FireWire cable is easiest for large libraries, unless you have a portable hard drive.

Move Your Metadata

Here’s a video tutorial I put together. Written instructions are below.

Export the source iTunes library as an XML file (File>Library>Export Library…). This will create a file that holds information about the location, song filenames, and *song rating*!
Replace the file paths in your XML file with the path that the songs from the source library will be in when you import them. This path may point to your FireWire Drive, a DVD you have burned, or a temporary folder on your hard drive that you have copied your music to. Just to be sure of the new path, copy one of the files from this location to your library, export your destination library, and look at the file path to that song in the resulting XML file. To actually replace the file paths, I did a Find/Change in TextWrangler but you can just use TextEdit (Edit>Find>Find…).
Set the preferences in iTunes in your destination library to “Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library.” This is under “Advanced.”
Import your library (File>Library>Import Playlist…).
Delete redundant files. If you’re like me, you have some duplicate songs in your multiple libraries. This is a tedious task, but I plan to do it over time.

Of course, you can prevent all of this by being organized in the first place. I probably should have just had an iPod that I synched with my home computer and brought to work.

If you need help getting the actual files over to your new computer, this video will show you how to copy your music to your new computer using iTunes Home Sharing:

UPDATE: If you’re looking to transfer music from your iPod to your computer, I’ve put together a short guide here. I hope to improve upon it soon, but please share your findings in the comments.

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Introducing “8 Things This Week!”

David Kadavy — Wed, 20 May 2009 23:06:54 +0000

In an effort to give my poor little fingers a break, I’ve started producing some video. It’s a little show called 8 Things This Week, and it’s already on it’s second episode.

So, to all of you kadavy.net subscribers (I love you, BTW): yeah, sorry for not telling you sooner, but you probably already know if you’re following me on Twitter. No, sorry (or don’t worry – depending on how you look at it), I won’t be updating you here every time a new episode comes out. Please subscribe to my YouTube channel, where you’ll see the show, as well as a few bonus videos here and there.

From any given episode of 8 Things This Week, you can expect to get a cool tip or two, some random observations from my week, and an amusing song; and hopefully a laugh or two. Please pass it on to your friends, let me know what you like, let me know what sucks, and let me know if you want me to just stop altogether.

The first two episodes are below:

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A Mood-Based iTunes Star Rating System

David Kadavy — Sun, 24 Jun 2007 18:10:53 +0000

As I was trying to assemble a dance playlist for a recent party that I hosted, I realized the shortcomings of the traditional use of the iTunes rating format: the only songs I rated were the songs that I _liked_ – resulting in a large mass of 4-star and 5-star songs – some of which were not uplifting enough to dance to. Thankfully I found enough danceable ones to make the party a success, but clearly I needed a better way to categorize my music.

After much thought, I have devised an emotion-based rating system. Here it goes:

1-star: Melancholy

These songs are friggen’ depressing, and with no hope of recovery. I was surprised at how few of the songs in my collection really fall into this category, so maybe I need to be more liberal in my categorization. What isn’t a surprise is that most of the songs that fall into this category are either Elliott Smith or Bright Eyes songs: “Angeles” and “Lua”, respectively, for example.

2-stars: Wistful

These songs are actually more depressing to listen to than the 1-star songs because they tend to allude – through lyrics, sound, or both – to things just lost or out of reach. This category seems to be dominated by Stars, Bloc Party, and Arcade Fire: “Lover’s Spit,” “Kreuzberg,” and “Intervention” as respective examples.

3-stars: Stable

Given that most modern music is based on The Blues, these may still be a little depressing, but are generally more soothing to listen to. These songs tend to mix subtle happiness and sadness for an overall “Stable” feel. This is where you start to see some Spoon and The Strokes show up: “Lines in the Suit” and “Automatic Stop,” as respective examples.

4-stars: Cool

Now we get into things that are perhaps danceable and have a generally more active feel. The spiraling bass line and breathy vocals of “Stars and Sons” by Broken Social Scene put that song in this category, and that crazy video-game sounding guitar solo in “Born Under Punches” by The Talking Heads is undeniably “Cool.” “Happy” and “joyous” songs would probably go in this category as well.

5-stars: Indestructible

These are those songs that make you want to dance, run really fast, lift heavy objects, leap tall buildings, etc.. This is where much of my hip-hop collection ends up, with N.E.R.D.’s “Brain” and Dr. Dre’s “Nuthin’ but A ‘G’ Thang” being a couple of favorites; and “Abra Cadaver” (no, not “Kadavy”) by The Hives, and Gang of Four’s “Natural’s Not In It” reppin’ other Genres. The ultimate “Indestructible” song goes – of course – to Spoon with “I Turn My Camera On.”

While there may be some criteria – or even specific characteristics of a song – that I point to to justify my ratings, _it’s music_ and thus this rating system is by no means scientific. I may even rate a song “Cool” today and later decide that it makes me feel “Indestructible” – it may depend upon my mood at the moment I rate the song. I have found the mood-based playlists this rating system yeilds to be pretty reliable. Does it work for you?

P.S. If you change computers, you’ll of course need to transfer your iTunes music library to retain all of these song ratings.

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Vinyl Record Shelf: IKEA’s Tunhem

David Kadavy — Fri, 25 Nov 2005 17:18:56 +0000

The possessions that by far take up the most space in my self-proclaimed lifestyle of minimalism are my books and my records. Until now, I just had a crappy WAL-MART (yes, I went shopping there, but only once, I swear) shelf for my books, and a bunch of cardboard boxes for my records. Besides looking bad, this system also wasn’t very space-efficient, so, since I’m not going to convert my vinyl to CD anytime soon, I decided to search for something much less crappy.

One of the benefits of living in a major metropolitan area is the availability of an IKEA store. For years I have drooled over the elegant and affordable furniture in IKEA catalogs. I never had enough motivation to rent a UHAUL and drive from Omaha to Chicago and back just to own some IKEA furniture, as some people I knew had. So until now I had to settle for either a) wannabe modern furniture or b) midwestern traditional, pardon my English, rubbish – either way from Nebraska Furniture Mart since they pretty much monopolized furniture in Omaha.

Another great benefit of living in a major metropolitan area, especially The Bay Area, is there are more than enough people to make Craigslist useful. So once I had decided on a piece of IKEA furniture I wanted I searched Craigslist and luck had it that there was some guy in Cupertino selling his old one for half the price of new.

The shelf system I got was IKEA’s Tunhem Bookcase. As I could tell from the dimensions, it had the perfect depth for records and plenty of height for all of my most prized possessions. When I went to pick it up, I was amazed at how lightweight it was, yet it had the appearance of solid wood. Assembly was easy: I put it together without any instructions within about forty minutes and didn’t even make any errors that required backtracking, as usually seems to be the case when I’m assembling furniture. Once I was loading my stuff onto it, I was impressed by the flexibility of storage on the unit. The shelves can go on countless increments, and always have the appearance of being solidly tacked into the sides. After experimenting a little, I found a configuration that allows the Tunhem to be a book shelf, an entertainment center, and a record shelf all at once – with room to grow. Isn’t it grand?

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Animated Album Cover Art for Video iPod

David Kadavy — Sat, 23 Jul 2005 17:13:57 +0000

When a video capable iPod comes out, and you know it will, the concept of a static album cover will soon be outdated. Instead of a still image, short animations or videos will be more appropriate to have flash upon your iPod screen as you start playing an album. Naturally, your iPod will play music videos, too.

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Ripping Vinyl for 99 Cents Per ALBUM: The Hipster iTunes Music Store

David Kadavy — Tue, 31 May 2005 06:16:09 +0000

I’ve found a very affordable way to listen to a wide variety of music for very little money. Sure, it’s great to surf around Amazon or the iTunes Music Store, but there’s no way I could afford enough music to satisfy my craving for virtually any kind of music. Inspired by the music listening habits of a friend, I recently purchased a turntable. With a sense of adventure and a little patience, you too can satisfy your musical cravings with records from a number of sources (usually for less than a dollar an album). Even new vinyl tends to run cheaper than Compact Disk, but some of the older titles you acquire can end up being quite valuable.

This go-with-the-flow approach to consuming music has exposed me to a great deal of music I would never have thought to seek out. I will very rarely, but occasionally I run into an album that I wish to listen to in heavy enough rotation that the vinyl format just isn’t convenient – so I rip ‘em. With the exception of an occasional pop or skip the sound quality is every bit as good as ripping from a CD. With a bit of ingenuity and alot of patience, one can manage to rip their vinyl to MP3 with GarageBand, but I have found that CD Spin Doctor, which is $99 or comes with Toast Titanium (also $99) works best. For Windows users, I’ve heard you can buy VinylStudio for less than $30 to convert vinyl to CD. There are also free – although slightly more complex – ways to transfer vinyl to cd. The cheap Sony turntable I got has a pre-amp and RCA outputs and hooks up to my computer nicely. Keep in mind that if you plan to purchase any 78s (really old records, Delta Blues, for example), that model will not play them.

There are a number of sources through which to get LPs:

Family: Just about everyone has family members with old records that are still sitting in the basement or attic, and in most cases, they never get listened to. This is the cheapest way to get the really prized records such as those by The Beatles, because you don’t tend to find those at thrift stores. Hopefully you can buy these with love.
Garage Sales/Yard Sales: It takes quite a bit of driving around to find a garage sale that actually has records, but once you do, you can generally get them for really cheap. Those selling the records will likely have little knowledge of their value, and even if they do, they just want to get rid of them quick. I have acquired some valuable records for very cheap this way.
Thrift Stores: These are pretty cheap usually. Goodwill charges 63 cents here in Omaha, and Salvation Army charges $1. $1 is getting pretty steep considering all of the sifting you have to do to find anything good (see Record Stores below). You will see lots of Lawrence Welk, Engelbert Humperdink, and probably a few dozen copies of The Gambler. My advice is to grab a copy of “The Gambler,” but avoid the others. Sometimes you will hit a cache of records donated by someone with exquisite taste. My two Kinks records and most of my best Soul/R&B records came from hitting such a pocket.
Antique Stores: Sometimes antique stores will know the value of each of their records, which ruins the bargain-hunting. Most of the time they don’t have them, but if they do, they concentrate more on pricing their other stuff. Thus, you can get some gems for cheap this way.
Record Stores: No, not Sam Goody. There are probably at least a couple of stores in your city that sell vinyl. The price is a little more, but things are filtered out alot better, the condition of the vinyl is better, and the title on the record will match the title on the cover of the album. At Antiquarium in Omaha, there are quality records of every genre. The more desirable titles are 2–8 dollars (if in excellent condition) with the occasional record that goes for 30 or more. There are also loads of LPs that are either less desirable or have a few minor scratches for 50 cents or $1 (Be prepared to defend your musical selections). The downside to record stores is that they tend to know the value of the records, so forget about running into a Near-Mint copy of Revolver for $1 using this method.
Ebay or Other Online Record Stores: If you insist on getting a particular title on vinyl, go for this, but because of shipping costs, it isn’t worth it to me since I aim to not pay more that $1 each for my records.

I have been collecting LPs for just a few months now using all of these methods (except online), and I now have well over 100 records. Many of them I acquired simply out of curiosity and so I’ll soon be selling some of those that didn’t make the cut. I’ll let you know if I find any good ways of selling records.

Once again, one of the great advantages of buying vinyl is that the cheap price makes it affordable to try out music you wouldn’t drop $10+ an album for. Also, some of these records are either unavailable on CD, or if they are, can only be acquired for $30 (my Commodores record is more than $100 on CD).

Here are some of my newest discoveries made possible by the affordability of vinyl:

Roger Miller: The Return of Roger Miller (not available on cd)

This album features this country music star’s best-known song, “King of the Road,” and is packed with other catchy and clever songs of child-like simplicity. Memorable lyrics from “Hard Headed Me”: She said if you aim to keep me, cut your foolhardy ways…How long is forever, that’s how long she’ll be gone.

I got this record for 63 cents at Goodwill. I bought 32 records that day for a total of $19.92. Some people with very good taste had parted with their records.

The Beach Boys: Holland

From recommendations from friends, I already knew that Pet Sounds was a piece of musical genius not consistent with the popular image of The Beach Boys. I had not heard about Holland, though, and I have yet to speak with someone familiar with it. How this got passed up as a notable album is beyond me. They abandon their trademark screeching falsettos for warmer, low key vocals. They recorded this album, through great logistical challenges, after moving to Holland in 1972. Favorite tracks: “The Trader” and “California Saga: Big Sur.” I got this one from family.

Marshall Crenshaw: Marshall Crenshaw

Unlike books, you can judge LPs by their covers. I just liked how this one looked, but it turned out sounding good, too. Very poppy a la Elvis Costello or Buddy Holly. This album is from 1982, but Marshall Crenshaw is still actively recording and touring. Best track: “There She Goes Again.” I picked this up at The Salvation Army.

The Call: The Call (apparently not available on CD)

The Call‘s self-titled 1982 release is dramatic rock I would characterize as a cross between U2 and The Clash. I got this during the aforementioned trip to the Goodwill (I got some really good music that day).

So if you’re looking for a cheaper way to get music, or if you’ve grown tired of all of the new releases, try vinyl. It brings adventure and affordability back to music, and you don’t have to sacrifice your iPod.

(Yes, the title is a play off of 43 Folders’ Hipster PDA)

[UPDATE June 7, 12:38PM] Thanks to this article on digitizing vinyl, I have discovered that CD Spin Doctor will be included in Roxio’s Boom Box – Essential Software for Your iPod, which will be available for $50 starting June 24.

P.S. If you change computers, you’ll have to transfer your iTunes music library, to retain all the vinyl you’ve ripped to iTunes.

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At An iPod Bar in Des Moines

David Kadavy — Tue, 17 May 2005 05:25:05 +0000

So I’m on a business trip in Des Moines at a bar called The Lift (it has Wi-Fi), and it is the first implementation I have seen of iPod DJing. People hand their iPods to the bartender with a fifteen minute playlist on it, and free of charge, he plays each iPod in the order it was received (except tonight, since it’s “Ladies 80′s,” and ladies go first). One of my friends had this idea awhile ago, and we were pretty surprised to see someone was already doing it. His idea involved an automated system though, but that may not be worth it until iPods have Bluetooth or something similar. I told them I was blogging about their bar, and they took a picture of me. It should be included with the other iPod night photos soon.

Cheers!

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The WIRED CD: Rip. Sample. Mash. Share.

David Kadavy — Mon, 25 Oct 2004 01:19:56 +0000

This month’s Wired includes a CD full of music with Creative Commons licenses. You can download the tracks for free, share them all you want, and even sample music to create your own tracks, which you can then share and even (for most of the tracks), sell.

Artists on the CD include Beastie Boys, Chuck D, The Rapture, and I was please to see the greatest band on the planet, Spoon in the mix.

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Saul Bass inspired Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra Concert Poster for One Percent Productions

David Kadavy — Thu, 29 Jul 2004 02:49:51 +0000

I just completed my latest fun side-project: a poster for Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra, and more importantly, for One Percent Productions, who organize the absolute best rock shows in Omaha (the music scene is the best thing about living in Omaha). So here is the poster that will decorate the streets of Omaha (and Lincoln…this happens to be for a Lincoln show).

Yes, it is a little Saul Bass inspired. It started out as a visual interpretation of the music. I had some blobby forms to represent the sounds of the horns, some dots for percussion, and the still surviving vertical bands are what the organ sounds like. I felt it should look a little political too, a fact you can’t ignore if you hear their music.

A little disclaimer: the political nature of this band has nothing to do with me doing for a poster for them. The opinions they express are not necessarily mine.

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