Don't Let Your iTunes Collection Take Over Your Hard Drive

There comes a point when you realize that your ever-growing iTunes collection of music, video, and podcasts is growing out of control. In fact, it's eating up your hard drive. But some simple iTunes library tricks can allow you to keep your MP3 addition without buying a new computer.

Admit your addiction and assess the damage
Determine how big your hard drive is and how much free space there is left on your hard drive. In Windows, open up My Computer on the Desktop and right-click the C: drive. In Mac OS X, click on Macintosh HD until it is highlighted and select Get Info from the File Menu. If your hard drive is nearly full, then you may need to check your iTunes Library size.

In Windows, right-click C:Documents and SettingsYourUserIDMy DocumentsMy MusiciTunes and select Properties. In Mac OS X, select Home folder/Music/iTunes Library and click Get Info under the File Menu..

Spring cleaning
The simplest way to clean your Library is to delete old video files. Decide whether you really need to keep every episode of the original Knight Rider. Video files take up a lot of space -- almost 500 MB (1/2 gigabyte) of space for one hour-long episode. Cleaning up just a few episodes can give your computer the free space it needs to function properly.

Don't add media to your iTunes Library in the first place
Not everything has to be added to your iTunes folder. iTunes gives you the option to not copy files into your iTunes Music Folder when adding music or video to your library. Go to Preferences>Advanced>General and deselect Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library.

The media files can be stored anywhere on your hard drive or an external USB drive, but keeping them in one folder makes it easier to backup the files.
Music imported directly from CDs or files purchased or downloaded directly from the iTunes Store will still be stored in your iTunes Music folder.

Move your iTunes Library to a second hard drive
If you have installed a second hard drive inside the computer or connected an external USB hard drive, then you can move your iTunes library completely to the second drive.

To move the library, simply copy your library folder to the new hard drive and change the location in iTunes by going under Preferences> Advanced> General and selecting the new location of your iTunes Music folder. Test the transfer by trying to play music or watch a video before deleting your original iTunes folder. If you moved your collection to a USB drive, then the media will only be available when the USB drive is connected. If you want to copy the files back to your iTunes folder at some point in the future, just use the Consolidate Library option under the Advanced Menu.

Be sure and backup
iTunes has a built-in utility to backup your collection to CD or DVD. Select Backup to Disc under the file menu. In the next screen, you can choose to either backup your entire library or just the stuff that you have added since the last backup. The backups that iTunes creates are not compressed or encrypted and can be opened on any computer. Another way to backup your library is to copy the iTunes Music folder that you are using to an external USB hard drive.