Had iTunes on my old HP PC with music library of about 40 GB stored on Network Associated Storage (Netgear Ready NV+). Usually controlled this using SONOS...worked great. New ripped CD's were deposited in right files in NAS iTunes volume. Everything great.
Then my PC got stolen. Now have new HP PC with iTunes 8.0 and want to access the NAS hard drive iTunes music files. But nothing seems to work.
In iTunes Edit/Preferences/Advanced/iTunes Music Folder Location I use browse to insert the network location \\102.168.1.8\iTunes. iTunes hangs up. Always hangs up when I try this.
When I press on the left sidebar Shared iTunes Server...nothing happens.
For whatever reasons, the new empty iTunes software does not see and will not access the NAS iTunes folder.
BTW, Apple tech support tells me they do not support iTunes. Lovely.
BTW, should have mentioned...Windows (XP Pro) does see the NAS. The NAS and its folders can be seen on My Network Places (which includes the iTunes and other files).
Also in Itunes Preferences Advanced iTunes Music Folder location, the NAS iTunes path is also shown, but as I said, iTunes would not accept the network path, and hangs up.
So it seems, Windows sees the NAS iTunes location, but iTunes does not.
I would try browsing to the network location rather than inserting it. If it shows up in "my computer" then you should be able to browse to it. If it doesn't show up in "my computer" you need to figure out how to get it there. Perhaps you need to give it an alias which makes it look like any other drive?
Once iTunes sees it it still won't play the files until you add them. Naming a music folder in iTunes advanced preferences only tells it where to put files it adds in the future, not where they are now. To add them you can either use the iTunes menus or just drag and drop the file folders into the iTunes library.
I think Herman is onto it. You have identified the location to place music and where to look for music (to play), but now you have to run your search for music from iTunes to populate the music into iTunes.
As for Apple not supporting iTunes, this does not at all surprise me. Over the past 10 months my house has converted from PC to Apple - 4 laptops and 1 desktop. I called a couple of weeks ago because one of my batteries just died and found out via the internet that there was a problem and that Apple will replace the defective ones, even when out of warranty (which mine wasn't).
Apple technical support refused to even discuss anything with me until they could confirm my computer was under warranty (which I could not do during my first call). They would not respond to a single question, unless I was willing to give them a credit card number to charge me for asking a few questions about a defective product.
Overall, I have been completely unimpressed with Apple from a service perspective, though their operating system is light years ahead of MS.
The iTunes application in your new computer has not yet mapped its library (database) to your NAS drive (location). Try File/Add Folder to Library... and navigate to the folder in your NAS where all the music files reside.
When the mapping process is complete, go back to Edit/Preferences/Advanced/iTunes Music Folder Location > Change...and once again navigate to the same folder in your NAS (assuming it's the same folder you wish to add music files in the future).
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