How do I transfer All songs out of iTunes to External HDD

[RyBoy]

Hey guys, it would take forever to get all songs out of all the mismatched folders on my computer. So how would I transfer all of my songs in iTunes to an external hdd? Please help!

 

[QueBert]

Do you need to keep the directory structer the same? If not, just do a search for *.mp3, select all then copy to external HD. Then you could load Itunes back up and add the external HDD to your itunes library.

that is my ghetto solution, but it's gonna be eeeeeeasy 🙂

I had a similar problem last year, so I spent a few weeks, lots of hours. tagging all my mp3's and making a directory structer. Now my mp3's are organized. Was worth the effort

 

[n0cmonkey]

Copy the iTunes Library folder to the hard drive.

 

[RyBoy]

I have a bunch of duplicates, like two or three for a lot of songs, is there a way to just search and get one of each?

 

[RyBoy]

bump?

 

[UlricT]

ok...
1. If you haven't sorted your music according to some specific folder structure, you should use iTunes to sort it automatically (assuming you have yoru ID3 tags set). You can do this by going into Preferences -->Advanced. Set a default folder, and check the box saying "Keep my folder organised". This will copy all your music in iTunes to the specified folder.
2. iTunes has functionality to display only the duplicate songs... edit-->show duplicate songs. Use this to remove unwanted copies.
3. Now you have all your music in a specified folder, and all duplicates removed, you should just be able to copy them over.