Drag and Drop to any iPod on any Machine Using iTunes

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Posted by kevin in Grab Bag, Hardware at 08:57 | Friday, November 16. 2007

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With all the talk lately of bad iPod and iPhone experiences and iTunes nightmares (See here, here, and here!), I decided to share my system for managing my music and movies to hopefully ease some iTunes pain. I've shunned iTunes management in favor of simplicity. I typically manage music on an album by album basis with play lists tossed aside.

My requirements were simple:

Keep my music away from iPod and iTunes shackles. I want the ability to buy some other player in the future if I so desire.

Have the ability to get all my music and movies back on the iPod quickly should iTunes force me to "restore" it.

Do this without 3rd party software. Floola and Anapod are great for older iPods, but as of this writing, neither support the newer iPod classic that I bought.

Here are the steps:

Setup iTunes for manual management of your device. I'm using iTunes version 7.4.3.1

Rip CDs to mp3 using 3rd party software. I like dbPowerAmp.

Correct mp3 tags and add album art using mp3Tag.

For movies, I use DVDFab Decrypter to convert DVD direct to mp4. (Yes, other players do support mp4)

Save these original files to someplace safe. I don't consider the iPod to be a safe place! Use an external USB hard drive that is at least the size of your iPod.

Now connect the iPod and start iTunes.

Select the iPod device music or video folder ( depending on what you are planning to drag over) on the left hand menu.

Drag and drop the files from the external USB drive to iTunes.

You can now take your iPod and external USB hard drive to any machine that you've installed iTunes on. Just follow the steps above to place your original rips on the USB drive and the "iTunes copy" on the iPod.

The best part about this plan is if something bad happens like a SYNC... Gasp!! You can drag over all the original files to get the iPod back the the original state. What do you think? Got better ways to do this?

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#1 Download Music » Drag and Drop to any iPod on any Machine Using iTunes (Homepage) on 2007-11-16 09:32

So, it sounds like your solution to using iTunes is to use it, but use it in a way that makes it even more complicated than it needs to be, in my opinion.

1. Manual management (IMHO) is just an easy way out for people used to it & don't want to use "Automatic Management". Setting up playlists is painfully easy. Select songs, drag into playlist. Songs / Videos in the playlist get put on the iPod. If you know where to navigate to in order to set up manual management, you should at least be able to do this.
2. Rip CDs to mp3 using iTunes. iTunes has the option, and makes the same mp3 mama used to make. On top of that, ripping with iTunes 99% guarantees that you get the correct CD info, album art, the whole baker's dozen yards.
3. Rip with iTunes & no need!
4. DVDFab Decrypter: Sweet tip, I'll definitely use this one as I've been looking for a DVD solution. For an everything else solution, I'll recommend back Videora iPod Converter. Google it.
5. If you rip using iTunes, the songs are on your computer & on your iPod. No need for an external hard drive (yet).
6. We finally agree!
7. Automatic syncing, remember?
8. So, you want an external drive for your music? Maybe to share between computers? Or to carry around with you? Ok. Set your iTunes library folder to an external drive. That's pretty much it. Have iTunes manage the music & it just works.

I've got 2 laptops, an older desktop & a new desktop that I just got (so I can return the laptops to the university). All of them have iTunes & I use the same external hard drive with the same music on all of them to sync to the same iPod. The only consideration that I had to make is to make sure the drive letter stays the same each time the drive is plugged in, so the library setting "sticks." I consider this a "power user" level feature though, keeping an iTunes library on an external drive.

With this "System" I am able to
Keep my music in iPod and iTunes shackles. I have the ability to buy some other player in the future if I so desire.
Have the ability to automatically sync my music and movies back on the iPod automatically iTunes allows me the choice to Ã¢Â?Â?restoreÃ¢Â?Â? it.
* Do this without 3rd party software that might not work with the newer iPod nano that I bought.

All that being said, it's just the way I do it & it works for me.

#2 Harold De Armas on 2007-11-21 10:58

Harold - thanks for the comments and tips.

A couple of follow-up points:

If I add mp3s directly to iTunes that for whatever reason have none of the tags filled in or are incorrect, there doesn't appear to be an automated way to correct this. The mp3tag program mentioned above (or something similar) would need to be used prior to adding.

I think iTunes adds album art as a data file instead of including it as an mp3 tag. This is user preference, but I think having it in the tag makes the file more portable. (And I really don't want an iTunes store account!!)

I like the idea of having the library on an external HDD as you described it. I'd be willing to try that. However, I'm pretty picky about the file names of my mp3 files. I don't see much flexibility in file naming formats with iTunes. Maybe there's a plug-in or something...

And finally, it's nice to just drop items onto your iPod without needing your library in hand. I think manually managing is the only way to do this.

#3 kevin on 2007-11-21 12:48

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