Point iTunes to media on another drive

[Wildgift]

Here’s my issue. I have iTunes now on a NAS and it’s slow and for some reason not finding new files. I want to use a music library that I use for Roon on a usb drive as my itunes library as well. I can’t seem to find out how to do this. i DONT want to copy my songs from the NAS to the external. Is there a way to do this or an app to use so my external is not overwritten but to keep my playlists and ratings? Now, my iTunes library is a mess, because it’s full of missing songs and non updated Songs.
thanks!

 

[HDFan]

have iTunes now on a NAS and it’s slow and for some reason not finding new files.

Which NAS? Since iTunes doesn't run on a NAS you mean you have your media on the NAS, have a NAS iTunes compatible app running, and have pointed iTunes to it?

I want to use a music library that I use for Roon on a usb drive as my itunes library as well.

Having iTunes media being served by the NAS and having Roon get it's media from a USB drive is not going to work well. Changes made to the iTunes NAS media/libraries are not going to show up in Roon if it is pointed to a copy of the media on a USB drive. If you point Roon to both locations then it is going to be a mess.

You may be able to run Roon on your NAS. Although they recommend an SSD and fast cpu, I've had good results with slower hard disks and celeron cpus (quad core).

Roon Server on NAS

Roon Server requires a more powerful processor than most media servers due to our architecture. Historically, most NAS devices have not been powerful enough to deliver a first-class experience with Roon, but an increasing number are becoming capable. ...

kb.roonlabs.com

 

[Wildgift]

Which NAS? Since iTunes doesn't run on a NAS you mean you have your media on the NAS, have a NAS iTunes compatible app running, and have pointed iTunes to it?



Having iTunes media being served by the NAS and having Roon get it's media from a USB drive is not going to work well. Changes made to the iTunes NAS media/libraries are not going to show up in Roon if it is pointed to a copy of the media on a USB drive. If you point Roon to both locations then it is going to be a mess.

You may be able to run Roon on your NAS. Although they recommend an SSD and fast cpu, I've had good results with slower hard disks and celeron cpus (quad core).

Roon Server on NAS

Roon Server requires a more powerful processor than most media servers due to our architecture. Historically, most NAS devices have not been powerful enough to deliver a first-class experience with Roon, but an increasing number are becoming capable. ...

kb.roonlabs.com

it’s a synology D218. I’m running a roon on a rock. And do not want to run roon on a Nas. Right now, my Roon music is attached to an external USB hard drive attached to the rock, and I want to keep it that way. So, I’m looking for a way to point iTunes toward that music and abandon the Nas library and use it simply for back up. Right now, I’m running iTunes on a Mac, and it’s pointed toward the Nas. All of the data library files are on the nas. So, I want to be able to use one music library – – the USB attached to the rock.

 

[HDFan]

I’m running a roon on a rock.

What is a "rock"? As you want to point iTunes to its' USB drive, the issue becomes iTunes support on the "rock".

 

[Wildgift]

A Rock is an intel NUC, used for Roon's core. It's a small dedicated computer for Roon's database. My external HDD is attached via USB and is visible over my network. All the files are in a folder called "music". I'd love for that to be my itunes library, but i'm not sure how to do that. Is it as simple as deleting all the songs in itunes, and then pointing itunes to my external HDD where my roon library lives? Will that messs up my roon library?

thanks!

 

[marioman38]

With iTunes quit, Hold the Option key while you click the iTunes icon. You'll need to click Create Library, and import all the songs from your NAS.

 

[Wildgift]

With iTunes quit, Hold the Option key while you click the iTunes icon. You'll need to click Create Library, and import all the songs from your NAS.

Thanks. I want to import from hdd usb. Not nas

 

[mpainesyd]

You should be able to "point" your iTunes library to files on any drive that is accessible to your Mac. I have music on my local drive and movies on a USB external drive (they used to be on a Time Capsule until it died). When I add movies to the external drive I then drag the icon (from Finder) onto the iTunes window to add it to the library. Note that in iTunes Advanced Preferences I have "copy files to iTunes media folder" unchecked for this. I also need to edit the Video Info as they all import as a "Home Movie".

Failing this, try creating an alias to the NAS file on your local drive and drag the alias onto the iTunes window to see if the current version of iTunes is able to resolve aliases. It used to work many years ago when I tried it.

MacOS Articles - dummies

MacOS powers all your delicious Apple devices. When you need a hand with using the Podcasts App, enabling Dark Mode, or anything else, check out these user-friendly guides.

www.dummies.com

 

[HDFan]

My external HDD is attached via USB and is visible over my network. All the files are in a folder called "music".

I assume that you want to run iTunes and Roon on the NUC, and that they are both available on that platform and that the USB music files are identical to those on the NAS so that they can be erased from the NAS (better, used as a backup) once the files are served from the USB drive.

Adding to what Wildgift and mpainesyd say above I would make a backup of your iTunes library (just in case), then create a new library. Import all of the media from the network visible USB disk connected to your NUC making sure that "copy files to iTunes media folder" is not checked. [If the USB drive is directly connected to the NUC, can't you just accesss them directly rather than via the network?]

In Roon you set it to monitor the USB drive music folder and the iTunes xml file on the nuc.

You may lose all of your Roon Playlists.