Help identifying missing files

[tstenz]

OK, so your suggestion is to Remap Music Folders from "C:\Music\MusicBee\iTunes\iTunes Media\" to "C:\Music\MusicBee"?

That does nothing, because this tool does not recognize the iTunes folders as part of the current path.

[redwing]

Then check the spelling if the path is correct.

[tstenz]

OK, sorry for being an idiot, I got the paths changed.
Still getting the "source file could not be found" error, even though the path looks entirely correct to me now.

[redwing]

Try selecting one file> right click> Send to> file rescan. Does that make a difference?

[tstenz]

No, but after doing that it allows me to point it to the correct locations, so I should be able to run Locate Missing Files to fix them...

[redwing]

OK. Also you could try Tools> Advanced> Rescan all files.

[tstenz]

OK, awesome. I have a good idea of what files are actually missing now, so maybe I can prevent it from happening in the future:

1) I edited some artist names in MusicBee which caused path problems; is there a setting I can turn on so that those changes are applied to the folder itself? (if not retroactively, in the future?)
2) Is "automatically sweep and organize new files" the setting I want to turn on if I want everything I add to my library in the future to be copied to the same directory?

[redwing]

I edited some artist names in MusicBee which caused path problems

Have you enabled auto-organization? If so what template are you using?

[tstenz]

Yes, Artist\Album\Title

[redwing]

What wasn't working as expected? Any specific example where editing artist name caused the path issue?

[tstenz]

I'm not sure what happened, to be honest. I did some minor cleanup like adding/removing periods, and I seem to remember them working fine initially (this was 2 weeks ago), but a couple days ago is when I started noticing some that weren't playing.

Those files are still there though; the only ones that are completely missing are ones that I deleted because I thought they were copied to the same location as the rest of my library.

[redwing]

If you turn on auto-organize, I recommend continuous monitoring for the whole music files folder in library settings so that any file location change resulted from tag change would be immediately recognized by MB. Probably it should work without monitoring, but it helps.

Also there's no auto-copy option with MB for imported files unlike iTunes. Have a look at this guide: https://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=22406.0

[redwing]

Is "automatically sweep and organize new files" the setting I want to turn on if I want everything I add to my library in the future to be copied to the same directory?

As I said no copy option with MB. "automatically sweep and organize new files" is used when you want to get new files organized. It's different from auto-organize in that they won't move following tag changes.

[tstenz]

I see.

Well, thanks a ton for all of your help and for putting up with me. Hopefully I learned enough that I can figure this out myself next time.

[redwing]

No problem! Glad you got it sorted out.