Comments on: How To Use Multiple iTunes Libraries

By: Curlydog

Curlydog — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 15:02:46 +0000

Surely a better option would be to create a separate account for each family member. Then each itunes will be safe from interference.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 02:32:55 +0000

I followed your instructions and it worked beautifully for me, but now I would like to know if there is a way to name them so that when itunes opens I know which one has opened without having to do the option key thing and selecting my itunes (or worse have my son fail to do that and delete my stuff!)

By: Tonya

Tonya — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 02:45:47 +0000

I seem to be having the same problem as everyone else. I held the shift key to open itunes so i could create another library and the original is now gone. all of my music is gone. so frustrated. i have tried everything already stated but i have no duplicates of anything and when i open anything in my itunes file it goes to the new library with nothing in it. please can someone please help me fix this.

By: Eric Junker

Eric Junker — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 01:27:03 +0000

I tried this and thought that I had lost my original library but then found that my original files had been backed up. Here is what I did to restore my original library. This on Windows 7, instructions may be different on other OSes.

The original files in C:\Users\\My Music\iTunes were backed up as:
ITunes Library Extras.itdbb
ITunes Library Genius.itdbb
iTunes Library.itlb
iTunes Music Library.xmlb

I had 2 versions for each of the above files, 1 with the b at the end of the filename and one without. I quit iTunes and then deleted the versions without the b. I then renamed the remaining versions with the b and removed the b in each of the file names. If you can’t see the file extensions you will need to change your settings so that file extensions are displayed. Once the original versions were restored I started iTunes and everything was there as I had left it.

By: Michael Murphy

Michael Murphy — Thu, 26 May 2011 03:34:56 +0000

I have the same problem that MANY people have reported:
I followed the easy steps: Created new library.
LOST ORIGINAL!!! BOTH libraries are now empty…all metadata gone.
How can I make new library without losing the old one?

By: newton

newton — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 04:01:31 +0000

Yup, same thing. Lost my original library and had to drag it out of the hard drive and re-do my playlists. Sounds like a cool function but apparently doesn’t always work as anticipated!

By: Beelzebub

Beelzebub — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 19:38:17 +0000

thanks heaps! now i lost my original library!
maybe you should include in your article the importance of saving or exporting your current library before creating new ones. i’m mainly pissed off because i am currently in the process of making “song orders” for my new album.

By: Datanax

Datanax — Sun, 23 Jan 2011 03:37:01 +0000

I have used the shift-key method to create two itunes libraries (me & wife) on one pc, my question is: is it possible to share songs between each library, havent be able to figure it out and have had to purchase songs twice, any help would be grateful!
XP / windows7 itunes10

By: Rob

Rob — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 00:10:19 +0000

So the solution for my problem (two libraries that i wanted to put to two different folders) turned out to be related to the fact that the libraries I’ve used for the last eight years are..well…eight years old. Perhaps it’s something in the files, but after I recreated each library, everything works the way I was hoping it would.

I lost all of my “last played”/”play count” info, maybe some of my cover art (not sure), and had to recreate all my playlists, but it works. Recreating my playlists was the only real hassle. Heh, and if ya know a way I _could’ve_ transferred those playlists…i don’t wanna hear about it. :)

By: Kirby

Kirby — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 23:27:22 +0000

So I created a multiple library for my daughter on my computer, (she dosn’t want my music in her library). When I open her library and go to the preferences it is still listing all the links to my library accounts. Also when I go to a shared computer on our network it does not allow me to drag the music into the new itunes.

By: Steve Roy

Steve Roy — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 02:53:01 +0000

Hi, Libra has moved to a new home at http://www.sillybit.com/libra

By: Rob

Rob — Tue, 19 Oct 2010 19:31:35 +0000

So am I doing something wrong? When I hold down the Option key and select one or the other of my two Libraries (“External Stuff” or “Internal Stuff”), I correctly load up the right library or “list” of songs. But the Prefs still point to the same media folder, regardless of whether I’m using the library of tunes located on my external or internal drive.

If I have to switch Libraries AND then manually switch the location of my media folder in the Prefs, this doesn’t do me much good. I’ve been doing that, and of course iTunes is now getting mixed up about where some of these files actually are.

I have my “Master Archive” located on an external drive, with a library for all those tunes. Then I have a small subset that I keep on my laptop for when I’m traveling, with a library for all those tunes. How can I switch between these?

Since iTunes 5, I’ve been using the “iTunes Library Manager” from Doug’s Applescripts, but it doesn’t work with the latest version of iTunes.

By: shadow

shadow — Sat, 11 Sep 2010 22:40:05 +0000

that’s just great, i needed 2 libraries for my and my sister but now i’m saved, just great, awesome, problem solved,thx

By: Jus

Jus — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 18:00:52 +0000

I have 1 itunes account but have opened it on 2 different user accounts on the same laptop. I have 2 libraries on 1 account. I can not put these together. every time I try to put on stuff from 1 library it warns me I will lose the stuff from the other. The computer is authorised but obviously I can’t do home sharing as it’s one computer 1 account. If I sync with 1 library and lose the other and lose stuff off the ipod can I go back to the origonal library and put the first lot of stuff back on again?

By: Codee:)

Codee:) — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 17:35:38 +0000

thanks so much for the help me and my dad have been trying to do this for hours. hahaha

By: Kawika

Kawika — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 23:22:19 +0000

I never knew that was possible. Thanks for sharing!

By: Tomas

Tomas — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 21:00:40 +0000

I have a MacMini as an entertainment centre, and am expecting delivery of the Airport Extreme any day now.
I plan to hook all external drives to the Airport – and also to migrate the iTunes library there.

The tricky part comes with my MacBook, where I want to have both music stored locally, and on the airport.

Is this doable?? I would appretiate any suggestions…

By: Tomek

Tomek — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 00:56:01 +0000

Shift-clicking in Windows 7 only seems to work when you go through the Start Menu, not the Taskbar. But it works… I just did it, put my itunes library file in the Public folder, and the libraries are now the same across two users!

By: dkoiro

dkoiro — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 22:33:25 +0000

As another soultion, here is another possibility that other folks have recommended.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/itlswitch/

By: dkoiro

dkoiro — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 02:36:52 +0000

I made a typo in the script. I used “d:\my music\itunes” as the itunes location, but used “C” in step #3. Basically, you’re going to enter the path to your itunes directory here. Substitute the path that I list with your actual path. If you don’t get it right, no harm will come, but the result won’t be what you’d expect.