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[tangolovers]

I am having trouble exporting a playlist from one machine and importing to another.  The music files are are definitely on different drive letters (souce drive = "C:\Documents and Settings\...", destination drive = "D:\My Music\").  I read a similar post under Media JukeBox but it doesn't seem like any further details were ever provided.  

When I import my playlist from another achine I get a message saying:
 "Imported 0 new files. Updated 1 file that had external changes."
The new playlist appears in my "imported playlists" but when I select it there are no songs in the playlist.

I saw JimH's instructions on the JukeBox thread, to "click on a playlist, highlight the music files then do a Find/Replace" - I presume changing the actual location of the music, but I'm not clear on these instructions.   If I do a Find/Replace on the directory path I think it will actually move the music files on the source computer and I'm not sure if that's what's supposed to happen - especially since the destination drive file structure is totally different (no "D").

Could someone please elaborate on the proceedure for doing this... especially being clear what action is being done on the destination vs. the source machine.  Your help would be greatly appreciated!!

Thank you,
Susie

p.s. Initially I replied to a post on Media JukeBox because I don't know how to indicate I'm using MC15 and to have the response appear in this forum.  Sorry for any duplication.

[221bBS]

I suggest that you open the playlist with notepad and do a find and replace.

Edit > Replace

If you only need to change the drive letters just

Find = C:\
Replace = D:\

If the folder structure has changed but the folder structure of the music files remains the same you can also do a find and replace. Lets say your old folder structure was

C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Documents\My Music\Artist\Album\File.mp3

and the new structure is

D:\Music\Artist\Album\File.mp3

In both cases the folder structure of the music remains the same

\Artist\Album\File.mp3

so all you need to do is find and replace

Find = C:\Documents and Settings\tangolovers\My Documents\My Music\
Replace = D:\Music\

[Robo983]

Here is an old link when I was have troubles that may help.

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=43671.msg300506#msg300506

I do not know how much you import and export but using relative paths can eliminate the need to open the file and do search/replace.

It is tricky as the folder levels deep to the music seem to have to be the same on both machines and the folder you export the m3u to has to be the same number of folders deep.

In the end if you do a lot of this it worth it to set it up. You just have to map the music folder to a drive letter on both PCs so that the folders have the same depth.

[tangolovers]

I suggest that you open the playlist with notepad and do a find and replace.

Galactic Citizen... I have no idea how to open a playlist in notepad.  Are you talking about exporting first as a text file?  What kind of format file and how would I create the one that you suggest opening with notepad??

Then, back to my original concern... I have two computer with different directory structures and I'd like to avoid moving my actual music files.  From your suggestion to do an edit/replace on the drive/path, I think it will be moving the actual location of my music files, am I right?  Am I missing something here or are you talking about changing only the pointers in the playlist file to point to the correct location on the 2nd computer?  I sure wish someone could clarify this?  I don't know why this seems so difficult to understand, but it is.

Thanks for your help!
Susie

[MusicHawk]

The idea is fairly simple, but the details can make it complex.

The idea is to use Find+Replace to change the file path of every music track from what it is on PC1 to what it is on PC2. How much the two PCs differ determines how much of the path must be changed.

The ideal situation, which many (including me) seem to do, is use exactly the same path on every PC. This eliminates the need to change the path. On all my computers, my music library is on drive M:, and exactly the same path on drive M. I just copy my library from PC1 to PC2 and because everything MC cares about is identical, it "just works".

Or, if the PCs must have the library on different drives, it's good to use the same folder structure, so Find+Replace must only change the drive letter (C: to M:, for instance).

Or, if the PCs use different drive letters AND different folder paths, it's still very good to have the paths be identical at some point, so only the part that differs must be changed.

But if the PCs are not at all consistent in paths and folder names across tracks, there's virtually no reasonable way to use Find+Replace. There are other techniques, such as having MC start with the library as it exists on PC1 then re-import it on PC2, but potential risk of something going amiss.

If you're going to do a bunch of work, consider doing it just ONCE by changing both PCs to have identical MC library paths and ideally identical drive letters. I suggest not using the default library paths of MC or Windows. My library on every PC is M:\data\music -- nothing special about this, except it assures I'm in control of where this is. (Note that different versions of Windows put "My Documents" and "My Music" and other user data in different places (and in different folder names), which many years ago led me to ignore this and set up my own \data directory and put everything I care about in it.)

[tangolovers]

Hello MusicHawk,

Thank you for all the trouble you went to to answer my question (and all those before you too).  I totally get how to do Find+Replace if you are talking about selecting all or a subset of music files then selecting Library>Rename, Move & Copy Files>Find & Replace.  I've done this many times and it physically relocates my files.  This is NOT what I want to do in this particular case.  My current file structure looks like this:

On PC1 my files are on C:\Documents and Settings\Owner\My Documents\My Music\...
On PC2 my files are on D:\My Music\...

I do not wish to change where the files are located on either computer. 

I would greatly appreciative if someone (anyone) would directly answer my question and which is this:   When importing a playlist to another computer (PC2) can I tell MC15 where to find the "My Music" folder or to redirect the pointers in the playlist WITHOUT having to physically relocate where my music is stored?

Thank you kindly,
Susie

[Alex B]

p.s. Initially I replied to a post on Media JukeBox because I don't know how to indicate I'm using MC15 and to have the response appear in this forum...

Here's my recent reply from the other thread:

When individual playlists are exported the "Store paths relative to exported playlist location" option does the trick.

For example,

If your files are in D:\Media\Music\[Artist]\[Album]\ export the playlist to D:\Media\Music\ (with the option ticked).

The stored paths will then start from .\[Artist]\...

If the path on another computer is e.g. E:\Stuff\Audio\[Artist]\[Album]\ the same playlist will work assuming the files are available in .\[Artist]\[Album]\
EDIT: on this computer the playlist must be stored in E:\Stuff\Audio\


If the intention is to replicate a complete MJ media library on another PC (including the playlists), you don't need to start from the scratch by importing individual playlists to a new library. It is possible to restore the complete library and quickly fix the paths inside MJ.

[tangolovers]

Halejujah!!   Thank you Alex B....I'm so relieved someone finally understood what I was getting at.   Who knew a little check box could make all the difference in the world.  I knew there had to be a more straight forward way of doing this.  Worked like a charm!!

Thank you,
Susie  

[ishai]

Is that exist also in MC 12 ? (the trick)

[Alex B]

I have received a couple of PMs from Ishai:

Hello Alex
I purcahse a MC 15 and that installed on my new computer which is OS windows 7
I used MC 12 on my old machine which held OS windows XP

how can i transfer all my music and playlists that i have on my old version to my new comp new MC version in a way that all playlist will be valid and not empty.
the problem is that my music in my old comp is in a few defernt paths
i already tried to export and import nmusic and playlists and actualy the playlists are now only a titles with no music connecting
i would appriciate if you could assist me since it is a great problem to me (the use of the MC is a part of my job)
Best Regards and many thanks

Hello Alex
i visited your explanations in:
 http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=58608.0

but i didnt understand i should i manneged taht and also were to store the relevant music files

is there any structure feature in the side of my MC 12 and in the other hand in the MC 15 with which i could handeled that ?

thank U again

Ishai

We agreed that we'll continue the discussion in the forum.

Is that exist also in MC 12 ? (the trick)

The option to create relative paths is already included in MC12. Have you actually tried it?

For example:

1. Assuming you have your music files in D:\Music\... ,  export a playlist to D:\Music\  (remember to tick the relative paths option)
2. Copy all files from D:\Music\ to E:\Media\Music\  (the E: drive can be on another PC).
3. The same playlist will work correctly from E:\Media\Music\

However, for the complete media library a better option is to create a library backup file and restore it on the new PC. The file paths can be fixed with the Rename, Move, & Copy Files tool. You can find more info in the link in this post:
Notable threads - Topic: Are my tags lost after relocating video files?