Maintaining a collection on a network drive

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I use iTunes on a Windows 10 laptop for my music collection and I also have a Sonos system which has access to the iTunes library.

I have tried locating the iTunes library on a NAS but did not have a particularly good experience with that, so moved it back to the laptop itself. This means, of course, that when I use the Sonos system, the laptop has to be active to serve the music.

Therefore, I am considering maintaining a duplicate copy of the iTunes library folders on the network drive and pointing the Sonos system at that.

I don’t require the NAS copy to be permanently in sync with the original – a scheduled copy two or three time a week would be sufficient.

To minimise run time, it would be useful to simply update the copy with changes. But if this were not possible I guess I could consider completely refreshing the copy each time – although at 50GB it would not be snappy!

Can anyone recommend a software solution that would allow me to do this? Ideally, it would be a scheduled solution which is capable of waking the laptop from sleep thereby permitting automatic overnight operation.
Thanks

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DC,

I would recommend a combination ofRoboCopy to do the actual work and a Scheduled task to fire off RoboCopy when desired. I use this method to create a backup of my documents folder (only the things that changed) every evening at 18:30 while I watch the news.

Here’s the .cmd file with the RoboCopy command I use (of course you’ll have to modify the directories involved but the switches are what you need).

Code:

Echo Off
REM  Updated: 12/29/14
Echo.  -------- Copying BEKDocs to N: drive -------
Robocopy "G:BEKDocs" "N:BEKDocs" /MIR /XJD /R:5 /W:15 /MT:32 /V /NP /NDL /NFL /LOG+:G:BEKDocsBatchBackupTasksRoboCopy.log 
Echo.  -------- Copy Completed              -------

If you don’t want to know what was copied you can delete from /LOG to the end of the line. Drive G: is my Source files and Drive N: is the backup copy, change to meet your situation.

Here’s the exported Task.xml file you can modify this and save as and .xml file then import it into the Task Scheduler and you’ll be good to go.

Code:

  
    2014-12-28T15:56:44.7043389
    [COLOR="#0000FF"][SIZE=2]DellXPS8700RetiredGeek[/SIZE][/COLOR]
  
  
    
      2014-12-28T[COLOR="#0000FF"][SIZE=2]18:30:00[/SIZE][/COLOR]
      true
      
        1
      
    
  
  
    
      [COLOR="#0000FF"][SIZE=2]DELLXPS8700RetiredGeek[/SIZE][/COLOR]
      InteractiveToken
      HighestAvailable
    
  
  
    IgnoreNew
    true
    false
    true
    false
    false
    
      false
      false
    
    true
    true
    false
    false
    false
    false
    true
    P3D
    7
  
  
    
      C:WINDOWSsystem32cmd.exe
      /c [COLOR="#0000FF"][SIZE=2]G:BEKDocsBatchBackupTasksDataBackup2N.cmd[/SIZE][/COLOR]
    
  

The items highlighted in large blue text are the ones you need to change to meet your situation. It should be fairly obvious what your values should be. Or you can create the scheduled task from scratch using the items in the file as guidance to your selections.

HTH :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Many thanks RG for your comprehensive reply.

I’m sure it will suit my requirements exactly.
DC

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The is also the SyncToy (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=15155), which should be able to do this.

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The is also the SyncToy (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=15155), which should be able to do this.

I thought even the latest version of Microsoft’s SyncToy (which needs other core components, including .NET 2) had been deprecated a long time ago. However, I just installed SyncToy and it seems to work fine. I had to install .NET Framework 3.5 (which includes .NET 2 and has to be downloaded) from Windows Features before I could get the SyncToy installed but after that it was plain sailing.

Hope this helps…

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Thanks for your comments cafed00d and Rick Corbett – but, having read up on SyncToy’s capabilities, I believe I am better off with RoboCopy.

As I understand it, SyncToy will synchronise bi-directionally – which is not what I want. If the NAS copy of my data gets corrupted for any reason, I do not want to risk the corruption being passed back to my laptop. I want the NAS version to be regularly updated to reflect the laptop version.
Thanks

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Thanks for your comments cafed00d and Rick Corbett – but, having read up on SyncToy’s capabilities, I believe I am better off with RoboCopy.

As I understand it, SyncToy will synchronise bi-directionally – which is not what I want. If the NAS copy of my data gets corrupted for any reason, I do not want to risk the corruption being passed back to my laptop. I want the NAS version to be regularly updated to reflect the laptop version.

You may well be better off with Robocopy. It’s excellent, very robust and provides far more options than SyncToy. You may find the addition of a GUI helpful too in building Robocopy’s parameters, either the Microsoft one (which is very basic) or another freeware one, e.g. Better Robocopy GUI which explains each parameter as you select it.

For info, SyncToy provides 3 ‘actions’. The default is Synchronise (bi-directional). You want one of the other 2 ‘actions’:

45234-SyncToy-modes
Click to enlarge

Hope this helps…

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Thanks Rick – I’ll definitely check out the better RoboCopy GUI.

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