[temjin27]

So like i've seen this question on other forums but its still kinda troubling me:

I have a firewire HD which i am trying to store my media library on, but this kinda conflicts with the whole firewire thing. I moved the iTunes library into a similarly named folder on the external hard drive, but now whenever i discconnect or turn off the hard drive, itunes forgets where the folder is, infact it tries to establish a new folder by creating a FOLDER with the same name as the external hard drive where it finds no music. So when i plug the hard drive back in, not only does it need to be retold where the music folder is, it thinks all the files are misplaced or deleted, so it has a question mark next to each song name in the library.

HOW CAN I GETG AROUND THIS?

its really lame having to tell it where the folder is and having to stop playing music each time it runs across a question mark.

[moonmonkey]

I do the same but also boot off the external disk, works fine.

[skybolt]

Are you saying that you open iTunes, THEN turn on the external? If so, that is your problem. Turn on the external (or plug it in, whatever), wait until it mounts, then open iTunes. I do this and it works perfectly.

Good luck!

[icruise]

As skybolt says, make sure you have the firewire disk on and available before you open iTunes or iTunes will default to using your user folder. I don't know what you mean by "it tries to establish a new folder by creating a FOLDER with the same name as the external hard drive where it finds no music." Where does it create this folder?

I've been using external drives for my music for years with no major problems.

[slugslugslug]

It probably creates this folder in /Volumes (which, IIRC, is just a directory in which non-boot-volume mount points show up). Then, when he/she plugs the HD back in, it can't be mounted at "/Volumes/HDName", so its mount point ends up being "/Volumes/HDName 1", though it appears to be correct in the Finder and dialog boxes.

As others have noted, the trick is not to disconnect and external HD while apps that expect it to be there are running.