How to extract songs off your iPod using iTunes
Question ” How do I extract songs that are on my iPod into my music library on my computer? “
Well, for this problem, we are going to use a software application which you should/would have if using an iPod, the good ol’ iTunes. Below is a simple 4 step process in which we can accomplish our goal.
Step # 1: Convert your iPod to act as a drive on your computer
As soon as you plug in your iPod to your computer, the OS would recognize the external device and install the drivers needed for it. Now go to ‘My Computer’, and see if your iPod is being recognized as a disk drive. Your iPod should fall inline after any extra hardrives or Cd-Roms and should read ‘Removable Disk’. If your iPod is showing up, great! You have completed step 1.
Step # 2: Enable ‘View hidden files’ on your iPod
This next step requires us to actually see what is on the iPod through windows explorer. Double click on your iPod icon.
Once it’s opened, go to Tools > Folder Options and click the View tab. You’ll see a bunch of different options for the way Windows displays files. In the Hidden files and folders section, select “Show hidden files and folders”, then click OK. Then close that window. Now we are able to view hidden files.
It is a little bit different if you are using Windows Vista
First double click on your iPod icon in Windows Explorer. Then click on Organize ->Folder and Search Options. In there click on the View tab then enable the show the hidden files and folders option and click OK.
Step # 3: Enable your iTunes to view the hidden songs on your iPod
After you enabled the ‘View hidden files’ option, you will see a new greyed out folder in your iPod drive. The folder name is Ipod_Control. Once you enter this folder, you will see three hidden folders: Device, iTunes and Music. The Music folder is the one storing all the music on your iPod. However the files are also hidden and your iTunes can’t see hidden files. So, right click on the Music Folder, and select properties. There should be a section that says attributes. Uncheck the hidden box and click apply. It will then ask you how you want to apply these changes. Select the “apply changes to selected subfolders and files” and click ok. Now your files should be visible for iTunes to see them.
Step # 4: Import songs through iTunes
We are going to now import the songs through iTunes using the consolidate feature in iTunes.The consolidate option is under file tab in iTunes, then Librarywith a little arrow beside it. Move mouse over that and you should see the option to consolidate library. This will copy all you songs in your iTunes Library to My Music->iTunes->iTunes Music, so if you ever need to find any songs file from your iTunes Library you will go to My Music->iTunes->iTunes Music.
Before we do this, if you are using iTunes 7, make sure that your iPod is set to manually update. If not, click on Edit tab, and click preferences. Choose iPod and first tab, Music. On the third selection you can tell your iPod to manually update. Now we are ready.
Next choose file from top menu, and add folder to library… Now browse to the iPod that is acting as a hard drive, click and open iPod control, and you should see a music folder now. When music is blue select ok, and watch all your songs from your iPod be imported into iTunes. Now that these files are in iTunes you see that the funny letters and numbers for each song do not show up anymore. Now we have our songs in the library and the actual song files are still on the iPod.
Note: If you were to disconnect your iPod the songs would not play in iTunes.
To copy all songs in your iTunes library to your computer we will use the consolidate feature, which will bring all songs from your iPod to your My music/iTunes/iTunes Music/ folder and sort the artists into folders nice and neat.
You are all set… congratulations!
Update from our user RS
By using the technique outlined in this article, if you copy the songs from your ipod to your itunes library you have to consolidate your library after. And this means you have to make a copy of your entire iTunes Library and most people have over 20gb of songs and they only want to copy the ones from their ipod.
To copy only the songs from your ipod.
After you checked off the box to see the hidden files in the Ipod_Control Properties. Go back to iTunes and click on Edit->Preferences->Advanced and check the box Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library.
After this you can continue the steps above and click on File->Add Folder To Library->My Computer->Removable Drive (iPOD being regonized as a hard drive)->Ipod_Control->Music and then click OK.
The songs from your iPod will be in iTunes and the names of the songs will appear eventually. And you will be able to play the songs without your iPod plugged in.
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Hey guys! For all of you who are having a hard time finding the “Consolidate” option…i really had to search for it….it’s under file, and then when you look down there’s an option that says Library with a little arrow beside it…mouse over that and TA DAAAA there’s the option to consolidate! You’ll know its working because a little thing pops up that says copying and has a progress bar on it. It does take a while, especially if you have a lot of stuff on your ipod…but now that I know this, I’m going to start getting music from my friends!
I hope this helps! other than that this worked great! I feel dumb that it took me this long to do! haha!
So once you consolidate your library to your iTunes Music folder, that means you can delete all the doubles off your iPod and change names if need be? Because I deleted the doubles out of my Music folder from the iPod disk drive folder, but they’re still on there. Help please?
I just finished extracting the songs off my wifes i pod (Her computor crashed). Thanks for the tips, she only had about 200 songs on hers. Now I need to extract from my i pod. I have over 5,000 songs @ about 20 gig. How can I transfer them to an external hard drive because I don’t have enough room on my computor.
Thank you SOOOO much!!!!
^_^Thank you so much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hey…..this has worked up until i try to consolidate….i am unable to do it as i get an error msg saying unable to find original file??
Plz help!!
Thanx
If it says unable to find original file that means you must have deleted that song out of your library folder. Delete it off of your library.
Worked great thanks, saved me heaps of stuffing around. I had a ipod mini from 2001 and had heaps of albums i have lost now.. Transfered it over to my iphone now, all is sweet… had a little trouble consolidating but got it sorted all with the current software… The consolidate function is in the file tab in itunes, then library, then consolidate library… If that helps anyone… Peace out
I can’t seem to complete step 1 because whenever I go to my computer I don’t see my iPod as a disk drive, even though my ipod is plugged in. I have an iPod Touch g2, I have tried to enable the disk drive, but I don’t see the option. I go to the Summary page and scroll down but it doesn’t say anything. I also tried to look at the preferences, but it doesn’t say anything about enabling the disk drive.
same problem
Hey It worked great- but i want to consolidate my library now, and ive done it before and im wondering if it will copy all my music again or not? im hoping it will just copy the ones which arent allready in it – i dont want 2 copies of everything…
Can anyone tell me what happens?
thnx
its easier just to copy the removeable disc folder and paste it into your documents, then just unlock the hidden files like said above and then when you put the songs on itunes, they still work even though the ipods not connected.
your welcome =]
I have an ipod touch 2g with 2.2.1 software. I am able to find my ipod in the my computer section but that is as far as I can get. I have set it to show hidden folders but there is still nothing there. Could someone please help me!? I am using Windows Vista. I would appreciate any help you can give me!
I am having the same problem. I have Itunes on my laptop, but my brother just got a laptop and its his Ipod Touch. I cannot find the hidden folders even though I turned them on. Did you get a solution to this problem?
To Consolidate you Library
File -> Library-> Consolidate Library
This will copy all you songs in your iTunes Library to
My Music->iTunes->iTunes Music, so if you ever need to find any songs file from your iTunes Library you will go to
My Music->iTunes->iTunes Music.
Thanks
The problem with this technique is that if you copy the songs from your ipod to your itunes library you have to consolidate your library after. And this means you have to make a copy of your entire iTunes Library and most people have over 20gb of songs and they only want to copy the ones from you ipod.
To copy only the songs from your ipod.
After you checked off the box to see the hidden files in the Ipod_Control Properties. Go back to Itunes and click on
Edit->Preferences->Advanced and check the box Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library.
After this you can continue the stepd above and click on
File->Add Folder To Library->My Computer->Removable Drive (IPOD being regonized as a hard drive)->Ipod_Control->Music and then click OK.
And you Songs from your Ipod will be in itunes and the names of the songs will appear eventually. And you will be able to play the songs without you Ipod plugged in.
Thanks
Thanks RS. This post will be updated to include your feedback
Np Glad to help, THX
When I go to consolidate my library, it says theres an unknown error (-69). Does anyone know what that means or what to do about it?
i am on the last step. I want to consolidate it. But when I click the tad advance, there is not consolidate as compared to my other itunes on my other laptop. I just downloaded to newest itunes on my wife’s comp and the consolidate is not there. How will I consolidate it? TY
I got it! vista is a little different. The last step so that you dont have to play the songs in your comp without having to connect the ipod is to go to file>library>consolidate. Whoa! You are done!
When I try to consolidate my iTunes library I get the error message:
“There is not enough room on “C:\” to copy all of the requested files.”
How do I get around this? Thanks!
Thank you so much, holy hell. This is so helpful. My ipod has been acting up and it thought that i was going to loose thousands of dollars worth of music off of my ipod but now it is all safe. Thank you so much once again.
To all the people having problems at the ‘click add folder to library’ step, make sure you are clicking on add FOLDER to library, and not add FILE. Evidently, if you use add file and you select a folder, nothing happens. The two options are one above the other.
I did this and most all the files don’t work..
Awesome, it took me a while but it worked out at the end. THANKS. YOU ARE THE BEST! I would buy you a beer if i could
Thank you Valery.. glad the tips worked out for you
Excellent answer and very thorough! Thanks a lot!
Thank you so much!
This is one reason I dislike iPods, but you made this process so simple, it’s not even an issue anymore. I just purchased a new laptop because my old one (containing all my music) crashed. I was really upset because I thought I had lost all my music and was going to have to pay, on top of the cost of a new computer, upwards of $150 for extraction software. But no-sir-ee. This is absolutely wonderful. Thank you so much! (:
Don’t sweat it. Find out how to manually remove your hard drive from your old desktop/laptop and place it inside of an enclosure. And restore your files as an external drive. Cost: less than 20 dollars!!
I tried to do everything but when going to File/Add folder to library/My cumputer/Drive E /Ipod/Music…. and click ok… nothing happens… did I missed something I did absolutely everything you guys told me… my laptop crashed so i lost all my music from itunes so i just have my music in my ipod.. and i wanna trasnsfer them to my mew laptop… pls. HELP..!!!
ditto : / .. very annoying because i can normally figure this stuff out
I have exactly the same problem, can´t do the last step
I beleive I found where my mystake was. I was trying to copy the Music folder from the Ipod and not from inside the Ipod-Control folder. One I did that, it is copying. Hope this helps you.
Great. I am done. Thank you very, very much.
does this work for the iphone also?
u are a fucking dumbass….. this is bullshit…. it doesn’t fucking wr…. sock my cock… hijo de la gran puta
Hi,
I followed all the steps and everything worked until i tried to add a folder to library and nothing happened. I am working with a vista dell laptop and a ipod nano. Any help would be really appreciated as I am about to throw both my laptop and ipod out the window!!!!!
You are not alone…
how do i convert my ipod to act as a drive on the computer?
If you are using Vista, just turn off ITunes, plug your devie again and it your IPod will be seen as a hard drive
Thanks, this is what I was needing to know
This really was soooooooooo useful! THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!
Dude I love you. I downloaded some bs program that i didn’t realise only worked for like ten songs and then you had to buy it and I was like:
There must be a more obvious and program free way to do this.
….
there was! WOOOOO
your advice has worked well so far up till the consolidate library part i get an error window that says: “Copying files failed. The file name was invalid or too long” any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanx guys
I am currently attempting this and I sincerely hope it works…I will never go so delete crazy on my computer again; lost almost everything, so I’m desperately hoping your method works. But it looks like it will, so I’m not sinking into despair yet, haha.
Unfortunately nothing happened after I followed all the steps..no files were copied from my iPod…is there a reason for this?
Many thanks! It seems this is a great technique for most people!
doesn’t work with ipod touch…touchcopy is a good program though
Well, it worked for me for the most part, just wasn’t able to get the entire folder so I had to do it manually XP But nevertheless, this was rather useful, thanks!!
OMFG!!!!!!!! U ARE A FUCKIN LIFE SAVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
My Ipod is over 4 years old… its the first generation Ipod Mini and its dieing…
its been good to me over the years but the ship is sinking….
and i desperately needed to make sure the situation didn’t go the same way as the titanic did!
So thank you for allowing my songs to JUMP SHIP! before it was too late! THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
cause it would have been one hell of a tragedy if 4,000 songs went down with her…
One word……. Podlift.
Hi there, well this is fun, your steps are really consices, thank you BUT I’ve done all the steps up to “Now browse to the iPod that is acting as a hard drive, click and open iPod control, and you should see a music folder now” which is all good but my music folder only contains folders with names like “F00″ and “F01″ and so on.
When I click into these I get “No Items Match Your Search”.
I’m using an ipod nano with 4GB of music on it – I’m using stupid Vista 32 bit version (not for long) and itunes 8, any ideas what is going on?!
same thing happens 2 me… help!!! please!!
I love you!
I was so worried I would lose all my writing music! Thanks for this thorough walkthrough. I now have all my old music, and can listen as before. Bless your heart!
Thanks so much…oh, I was going crazy trying to get this done because I got a new laptop and iTunes wouldn’t accept my music. This helped a lot!
Thanks a ton! It seemed nearly impossible to find a tutorial for vista online. My old computer crashed and now that I have my new one I wanted my tunes back. thanks again
thank you so much. ive been wondering how to do this forever!
My hard drive crashed, I had all my music in it (Itunes), but also on my Ipod. I’m about to receive my computer with a new hard drive (no back up), but I want to recover all my music from my Ipod to my computer (to Itunes)
How can I do it without losing all the info in each song?, I have 6750 songs, all of them with artwork, lyrics, composer, album name, etc.
It is Windows Vista
Someone could help me?
Thanks
You have a back up. the original hard drive. Place it inside of an enclosure and extract its data (restore) to your new laptop.!!
Very nice and easy! I lost my pc (with no back-up) but tunes were on ipod now transferred to new pc! Thank you…..
The one step that was tricky was finding the consolidate option. You can find it by going to File > Library > Organize Library > Check Consolidate Library….
Thanks again!
Hi Thanks for process details .
for me I could not find consolidate directly it was like
Library -> Organize library
in the message box then check the check box to consolidate the file
this is very helpful thank again
My Music seems to be everywhere !!! Itunes, My Music, Documents, Documents and Settings and to top it off I just lost all my music on itunes 9 and had to reinstall my music back into itunes but it copied all my music at least 3 times so now i have to delete Duplicates which is going to be time consuming. S—. !!!! Im lost with this and not sure what to do, I want itunes music and want a complete back-up of all my music. Can someone please Help Me. Thanks. Randall
I am trying to do this, but my computer is showing my iPod touch as a digital camera and it only recognizes the pictures. I went into the folder options and clicked for it to show the hidden files, but nothing changed and I have no idea why the music isn’t showing up because it shows up in iTunes when I plug my iPod into my computer. Can you help me?
I have extracted music using this method twice now and both times i have had some songs come up with the names of the songs as 4 random letters. Does anyone know a solution to this problem?