My mac mini is full of movies, shows and music. I would like to use my WD drive for Mac to store all my iTunes library on the external drive. will this work? will suffer from slow play back or quality of video? My Mac mini is hooked up to a Plasma TV so it is really used for entertainment … my dream scenario is somehow I get the iTunes library to be stored on the external drive. I have a back up on Time Capsule in case the WD drive … how can I get this set up to work? thanks in advance.
I followed the instructions I found for copying my iTunes library on to my new MBW, on the Apple Discussion Forum here:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1449
This all seemed to work ok and there was no apparent difference when using iTunes with my library stored on the MBW (I have to admit I only tried music and book, no movies)
However I having chosen the “Shared Music” folder for my new iTunes library on the MBW, I noticed that the stucture of the way in which everything was stored was completely different to my old iTunes library, as instead of folders broken down by artist name, there was now a separate folder for each different format (Audiobooks, Music, Video. etc) and although all my album, book cover photos were still there, I couldn’t see the various items that you normally find in your iTunes folder.
As a result, I was reluctant to delete the 60gb iTunes library on my laptop (which was the principal reason for getting the MBW) because if I do and I find something amiss afterwards, I’m wondering if I can do the reverse and copy it back on to my laptop.
But in answer to your query, yes when I had the iTunes library on my MBW selected in my iTunes preferences, everything seemed to work fine.
Be sure to let me know how you get on 
Hope this is of some help
Kind Regards
Bernard
Sorry I’ve just noticed that I have a My Book World, connected over my wireless network to my laptop. Whereas I assumed your My Book for Mac is connected direct to your computer.
Nevertheless I assume that the process will not be any different and the only difference I noticed was that iTunes took a couple of seconds longer to load, but I would guess that this is merely network related and if yours is connceted direct (via Firewire), I imagine you won’t notice a similar (very slight) lag
TTFN
Bernard
PS. Sorry, I thought I was searching in the My Book World forum, not the My Book for Mac forum, although I guess in truth there could also be a My Book World for Mac forum if any admins are reading
Well … It worked! I did not have the folder problem you mentioned. It asked if I wanted to reorganize my file and folders and I unchecked that option and it appears to be working. It does make me nervous about deleting the files but I do have nearly everything backed up on my time machine. Thanks for the link and the help.
I don’t know why but that Apple Support Doc that I copied the link to specificallly says at the beginning to check the option to “keep files organised”
It’s now occurred to me (9oobviously!!) that this is why the new lay out of the Shared Music folder on the My Book is now shown in the different formats but I’m guessing that there is a specific reason why this is necessary so you might want to check this out before you go any further. Sorry I can’t be of more help but I’m pretty new to all of this myself
TTFN
Bernard
DO NOT BUY WD MY BOOK DRIVES if you plan to store anything of value. I and a friend started buying My Books to build music and video libraries to work with iTunes and AppleTV. He has had all 4 of his drives fail and I’ve had 4 of five fail. I work in the software industry and deal with a large amount of hardware and the WD My Book has the highest failure rate of any drive I’ve ever used or seen. In my personal use, it is the only drive I’ve ever had fail. The only WD external drives I own that haven’t failed are the Passports. They seem to work endlessly. Just avoid the My Books.
