ipod and lost downloads help please.

[SacharissaCripslock]

When I got my laptop I downloaded itunes onto it and connected my ipod. It asked something about something (great memory I have) to do with moving my stuff onto the laptop and blah blah blah. I don't know. I clicked yes.

But only some of my stuff moved. When I click on 'Purchased' there's only about half my stuff there. I have paid for all those films etc but can't find them! When I go into my account details they are all listed but they aren't on my computer/ipod. Woe.

What do I doooooooooooooo?

All my Battlestar Galactica is goooooooooooooone.

You should be able to download them again from iTunes for free? I'm not sure but worth checking the terms?

I think that the "Purchased" section really isn't that accurate and only shows a selection of recent purchases and not all of them.

I've ended up setting up a smart playlist to list the stuff that I've bought over the years.

So it could still be on iTunes, look for it in the movies section and ignore the "Purchased" bit.

Did the message say that all your songs on your iPod would be deleted and replaced with whatever was on the laptop?

If you want to move songs to a new computer, you have to be very careful. Itunes is designed not to let you do this easily.

The about.com website has really good iPod help.

MmeRedWhiteandBlueberry is right and I should have read the original post better.

iTunes on it's own will not move anything off of an iPod and onto the computer that it's running on.

What it will ask you when you plug it in is if you want to automatically mange your iPod. Which means it will be kept in sync with what's on your computer.

If you say "yes" to that question and you've got nothing on you computer then your iPod will be scrubbed so that it looks like your computer, which is what you've told it to do.

So a question is how anything got from your iPod to your computer.

Where did you buy the stuff that is now missing? Was this on another computer?

What sort of iPod is it and if it's an iPod Touch did you buy the stuff using iTunes on the iPod (that is an exception to iTunes not copying off of an iPod, it will copy off what you have bought on a iPod Touch)?

Is the stuff still on your iPod?

I bought it all from iTunes. It's not an iPod Touch, just an err normal iPod, and old one, had it for years. I have no idea what I did. But I think the stuff that was on the ipod at the time is now on my laptop. I though the stuff I had downloaded from the iTunes site (that wasn't on my iPod at that time) would be on my account so that whatever computer I used I would be able to access the downloads from there. IYKWIM. But I was stupid and wrong.

The stuff is definitely nowhere on my iTunes - not in the movies/tv programmes/etc sections.

I can't get it from my PC (where it all was originally) as the PC got a virus and everything was wiped when it was sorted.

It's gone, isn't it? That's about £130 of stuff.

Oh, forgot to say thank you. How rude of me.

But thank you Iggy, Badgers and Mme for taking the time to reply and advise me.

I have seen stuff on various forums & blogs (like this one that although Apple's stated policy is that you can only download music, videos & iPod games once, if you contact them and beg, they may let you redownload. Worth a try...

Incidentally, you can redownload apps just by going back to the app store, don't know why there's a difference.

You can't easily start using another computer. Imagine if it were a friend's computer - if you could dock and synch both ways, they would be getting all your music for free. That's why you can only sync with one Itunes.

If the songs are on your laptop, it is pretty easy to get them off. Go to My Music and find the Itunes folder. You can then copy all of the albums to a flashdrive, external hard drive or DVD. From there you can do the process in reverse to get them onto your new computer. I bought a new computer this week and did this and it worked.

Basically, if you buy things on Itunes direct to your device, you can copy it to your computer. But everything else has to originate on your computer and the syncing is basically one-way.

Rusty, you can redownload apps.

I downloaded something that DD already had (we have the same account), and it let me download for free. It even told me as it was downloading.

MmeRw&b - yes, that's what I said; that apps are the only things you can redownload....