Sharing itunes library over network?

Scythe

Scythe

Scythe

Soldato
Joined
23 Jun 2005
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5,455
Hi, i've got 3 computers. Desktop (pc), Laptop(pc) and a mac mini.

I want my itunes library to be shared throughout the network (storing on a NAS). Can it be done?

I want it so any changes made on one computer (e.g adding a song) is reflected on the other computers.

PS i wasn't sure what forum this would fit in. Please move if its unnecessary in this forum.
 
Pretty sure you can do it although you will need one machine on all the time as you need to have itunes running on that machine to share the library.

Just set the itunes library location on the machine you choose to be the "host" to the location on your NAS where all your mp3s are.

If you don't want to have one machine on in the background constantly then you are back to pointing all 3 separate itunes library locations to your NAS but you will loose the automatic updating of all 3 machines and you will have to add new stuff to each machines library.
 
That did occur to me as well but i don't think there's a way to set the location of the .itl file in each copy so you would have to set up a scheduled task (and hope the machines you want to copy it to are on at the time) or manually copy the file to the other 2 machines, again hoping they are on and available.

If you got to go round manually turning the machines on and copying the file , you may as well just add the new stuff to each library :D
 
Is it different to what I thought then?

If you set all 3 use the same iTunes music folder on the NAS it should read the library data file. Although I am going on the Mac version atm as my PC is somewhat dead. :)
 
i think putting the library file on the NAS would work for the PCs but how would the mac go? because the drive letter structure is different?
 
Well I'm just going from my set up where the library file is stored in

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\My Documents\My Music\iTunes

There's no copy of it in among my mp3s on "R:\mp3s" and I don't recall an option to change the default path in itunes anywhere. And I would guess that any attempt to import the library would result in most songs being duplicated and and added to the ITL file in "my documents" anyway.

But fair enough if can find a way to use a library in a non-default location for 3 different machines , go for it :p

EDIT - you posted the work around while i was typing , good to see there is a way to do it but the thought of letting my partner loose to delete/rename/convert to AAC on the 7000 odds songs in my library is more than I can bear to think about :)
 
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Remove write access on the drive for anyone but you? :p

As for setting the location..

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Was just an excuse to post that tbh. :o
 
Actually reading that article further , it's doing what I suggested and using synctoy to copy the files across so you still need the machines on to carry over changes to the all librarys and what happens if one of the "guest" users makes changes to the library by inserting a cd and ripping it or buying something off the itunes store ?


Bit of a kludge really whichever way you approach it .
 
It sure is. Glad I don't have a NAS to do this on. I could see it ending in tears the way I do things. :o
 
Why not move your "my docs" location onto the NAS? That's where your library is stored, so you could keep a lot of docs readily available for whichever machine you're using
 
Sadgeek said:
Why not move your "my docs" location onto the NAS? That's where your library is stored, so you could keep a lot of docs readily available for whichever machine you're using
Click to expand...

The librarys wont update. Im using two platforms, where drive refrencing is different on the two platforms.
 
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