itunes movie playback on external hard drive

I Have a Mac mini (Late 2012) running OS X Yosemite; I purchased an external HDD and have moved my downloaded itunes movies and TV programs to the external hdd in the interest of creating more drive space on the mac mini internal hdd. How do i playback the movies from the external hdd and is it now safe to remove the movies from the internal hdd? I learned how to copy the files over to the external hdd from an apple discussion support forum. I am quite certain that i did that correctly as the files are shown on my external hdd. I have the VLC App installed and I am able to see the files from the external hdd but the files will not play. Any ideas out there. I am not completely new to Mac but need some help. I was a Windows guy since Win98, converting to Mac in 2013...I am loving the Mac and OS X system. Again, thanks for the help.

Welcome to the Mac-Forums. Good to have you along.

What you have done, I suspect, is move your iTunes Library (or part thereof) to the EHD. As these were downloaded movies & TV programmes, they are part of iTunes and you can only view through iTunes.

So, what you have to do is direct iTunes to where these items are now situated - ie, on your EHD.

To do this, make sure your EHD is attached, open iTunes > iTunes Preferences > Advanced and the first item is "iTunes Media Folder location". This should still point to your Mini. Click "change" and then migrate your way to the EHD and to the Media Folder you created there.

The only problem you might encounter is if you haven't copied the Media Folder properly in the first instance.

Luckily, you still have the original Folder on your Mac Mini. Keep it!! Do NOT delete anything yet from the Mini.

Please post back on the results of following what I outlined above.

Ian

Ian,
Thank you for the assistance...i have probably not done something correctly. I was going to attach 3 screenshots but i don't see how to do attachments on this site. Here are the instructions from another site that i followed when copying the movies/tv shows to my EHD.
1. iTunes prefs-advanced
2. make a note of current iTunes media folder location (mine is; /users/williamcloonan/music/itunes/itunes media)
3. Tick "Keep itunes media folder organized"
4. Tick "Copy files to iTunes folder when adding to library"
5. Set iTunes media folder location to the external drive where you want files to be (my EHD)
6. Click OK
7. Select the files in itunes you want on the external
Right click - Consolidated selected items. In my case the drop down menu says "Consolidate files" I suspect this means the same.

After finished, go to itunes prefs Advanced and reset the itunes media folder location to the original location.

Followed the above instructions to the best of my ability, however, i received a splash screen prompt asking me "if i wanted to save the original files, or something like that" I chose yes.

I understand what you say about viewing the media through iTunes as the media was downloaded through iTunes. When trying to view a movie, I opened iTunes>iTunes Prefs>Advanced>"iTunes media folder location" which is the EHD. But i think where i may have made a mistake, I cannot find a Media folder on the EHD, only a listing on the EHD showing a "movie folder, TV shows folder, etc. When I open the movie folder it shows the movies that i copied, included the size in GB, which looks correct. But the movies are grayed out.

I also read somewhere that if i "press the option key" while opening iTunes i will be asked to select my library. I tried this and was given an option to select my EHD which i did...but no positive results. I imagine there is a simple solution, i have missed a step somewhere.

Thank you,

Right, here we go.

I'm sorry for the delay in replying. I know it's only 5 hours or so since you posted, but when you're trying to sort something out, it can seem a long time.

First the good news. You very wisely elected to "save" your original files, so all your iTunes content is intact.

As far as I can see, you followed the correct procedure. So no need to beat yourself up over this

I think the problem might be that you copied part of your iTunes Media rather than all of it. I understand that you were given the option to select what you wanted to copy. It's just that I feel that copying all of something is less prone to failure than copying a part of it.

This is what I would do:

It depends on how much space you have on your EHD and assumes that you can satisfy yourself that the iTunes content on your Mac Mini is definitely intact and working.

If you are certain that iTunes on your Mini is normal, I'd be tempted to format the EHD and start again.

Alternatively, if there is plenty of space on your EHD, then there are two ways of copying your iTunes Media Folder to it.

1. You can go into Finder and navigate to your iTunes Media Folder (usually found under Mac HD > users > your name > music) and either drag & drop that folder on to your EHD or, Cmd + C the folder and Cmd + V on your EHD (ie copy & paste).

2. Follow the steps you outlined in your post up to and including number 6. Then choose to copy the entire folder to the EHD rather than some of it.

Then reset the iTunes location to your EHD, whichever method you chose.

I'm a bit obsessive about backups of crucial stuff, so I use Time Machine + a cloning software app + copy/paste my iTunes Media Folder to an EHD. This may seem over-the-top, but I'm paranoid about losing stuff. Hence my determination to help you.

Ian

By the way, the Option Key tip should have worked.

Saturday morning here in Japan...just now replying. Thank you for your response. My EHD is 3TB so no worries there...I'll try the reformat route and copy the entire iTunes folder to the EHD. I'll repost upon completion.

@Ian, still no luck on playback from the EHD. I copied the entire iTunes library to the EHD this time. Upon clicking on the EHD Everything appears to be there...however when i press the option key while opening itunes, it asks which library, I choose the EHD...after a second or so a message tells me that no library can be found. I have probably done something NQR (not quite right). Wish there were a way to post a screen shot in this forum. Can't find a way to do that.

On another note, i also use time machine and a Time Capsule (2TB). The thing that i don't like about the TC, it took forever to back up my system.

Early evening here in Sasebo, Japan...so it is time for another kind of entertainment...Cheers and beers to you Ian. If you think of anything else that i am not doing correctly, let me know as time permits. Thank you for your assistance.

@bcloonan,

I'm so sorry things aren't working out. I know how you used the Option key method - I presume you also attempted to redirect iTunes via iTunes > Preferences > Advanced > Change Location > Navigate to Folder on EHD?

If so, I am rather stumped, I admit. Maybe some of my senior colleagues could chime in with other suggestions.

Your very kind remarks seem undeserved at the moment.

Ian

@Ian, I feel that i may have found the problem. I found a website named appleinsider.com, a quick tutorial showed me that the very first step that i should have accomplished was as follows: "To begin moving your library, open iTunes, click File in the Menu Bar and select Library>Organize Library - check the box that says consolidate files and click ok, This will make sure all the music, movies and other files are actually located in the iTunes Media Folder that will be moving to your EHD. I found the box was unchecked, upon checking the box i receive an error message indicating that my Mac HD does not have enough space :-( I've no idea on a path forward from here...apologize for taking up so much of your time. My Mac HD is 500GB and i only show 3.5 GB Free, 270 GB are movies and music!

Remember, you are trying to teach an old dog new tricks here...hahaha

@bcloonan

Well spotted. I thought you had done this because I noted a comment about consolidating your library in your post #3; but that may have been after you moved. You and the instructions are correct. Organising & Consolidating your library is a crucial first step. I keep mine that way all the time even though I don't need to copy my library. (As I mentioned in an earlier post, I Copy/Paste my entire iTunes Music/Media Folder to another EHD on a regular basis as an additional BU to my Time Machine and cloning software BUs and I use iTunes Match which stores a copy in the cloud).

Now to your new problem. There is a general rule that you need to keep a minimum of 15% of your HDD space free for the OS to work properly and, of course, your entire game plan was intended to remove 270GB (possibly more if you move your whole library).

So, it looks like, thanks to your research, that you now have a secure way of copying your iTunes library to an EHD, testing it, then deleting the original. To do that, the Mac needs more temporary storage space. Is there anything of reasonably large size that you could temporarily move to an EHD to free up space - move your iTunes stuff - then move back to the HDD?

And no need to apologise. I give my time because I want to. As do all the others on the Mac-Forums. I'm just sorry things have taken so long.

Ian

@Ian, I brought up a finder window and have been able to gain back over 160 GB by deleting some items no longer needed...I read somewhere that after installing a program that one can delete the .dmg file...so I did.

Going back into iTunes I tried the "consolidate library" again and am still receiving the message telling me "there is not enough room on my Mac he'd. I know in the Windows world I can go to a folder with "hidden files" and things no longer needed can be deleted. On my Windows Box I use "CCleaner" to get rid of the detritus left behind. How can I do that in OS X Yosemite?

bcloonan said:

I copied the entire iTunes library to the EHD this time. Upon clicking on the EHD Everything appears to be there...however when i press the option key while opening itunes, it asks which library, I choose the EHD...after a second or so a message tells me that no library can be found. I have probably done something NQR (not quite right).

Click to expand...

Here's a pretty detailed article that explains how to move the iTunes library to an external drive…with the specific purpose/goal of saving space on the computers internal drive:

http://appleinsider.com/articles/15...ur-macs-itunes-library-onto-an-external-drive

HTH,

- Nick

To all who have been lending assistance to me on moving my iTunes library to an EHD, thank you. I believe that i have succeeded in doing this. However (there is always a "however" it seems), I then tried to delete the large movies from the IHD but it appears they are still there. I dragged and dropped them from the IHD into the trash and then emptied the trash, but they are still taking up space on the IHD. I am thinking that dragging into the trash doesn't actually delete them. Do I need to go into "Finder" and do this tasking?

@ferrarr, i downloaded and installed the recommended program from Onyx and it appears to be working fine...thank you.

@Nick, thank you for the link to appleinsider.com

@ferrarr, I finally figured it out...went to "finder window"...drilled down until I located the movies, tv shows...and zapped 'em. I now have my space back. To all on the forum thank you. Cheers and beers

That's what I thought was happening but wasn't quite sure when I read the thread.

The problem that you were having is a function of how iTunes works. If you are working in iTunes, select a song or movie, then delete it your are actually deleting a pointer to the actual file. Notice that in many cases iTunes will put up a dialog asking if you want to delete the file.