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"I have several 'favorites' playlists. Sometimes I'd really like to have iTunes play a bunch of those playlists together--playlists of playlists. Is this possible in iTunes, and if so how?"

Another way I accomplish this is to just create a folder (in iTunes) and put those playlists in it. Selecting the folder is the same as selecting the sum of the playlists inside it.

zbell, on 09 March 2012 - 06:49 AM, said:

Ditto, my library has a combination of folders containing playlists and smart playlists as well as smart playlists that include other playlists. It all depends on how I want to use them.

For example I have a folder called "iPod" and in it are several smart playlists selecting a balanced number of rock/pop, jazz/blues, classical, etc. plus one for freebies from Amazon and iTunes. Then I have a smart playlist in the same folder called iPod Standard that that simply combines all of the genre-based playlists but excludes the freebies so I can choose whether to have them in the mix or not by choosing to play all the tracks on my iPhone or just the ones that I copied from CD or purchased. Then I configure the iPhone to copy the iPod folder and all the playlists in it. Voilà!

Is there a way to rip a CD and have iTunes understand the album is the playlist rather than having tow create the album manually?

Playlists are also great for giving variety to podcast listening. I have a playlist that synchs to my iPhone. Into it I place the podcasts I like. For variety, I alternate short (under ten minutes) and long. I put the ones I want most to hear near the top and I often alternate ones on technology with those on politics.

It's a much more enjoyable way to listen to podcasts than listening to all from one source and then all from another.

A little warning with exporting playlists: once the playlist is imported into another iTunes library (usually on another computer) the results can be different than the original. This is especially true for smart playlists. You can avoid this by creating a regular playlist, dragging all of the songs from the smart playlist to that, then exporting the regular playlist.

Imagine exporting your default "My Top Rated" playlist. Songs that are rated greater than 3 stars on one iTunes library won't necessarily be the ones with the same ratings on the new one. There could be more or less songs on each library with those ratings.

But with smart playlists you won't end up with broken links (!) like you can with regular playlists. Differences between the two song files (usually just missing files on the library getting the import) will get you that.

Although it's not always what you want to do, dragging songs onto the USB drive is the only way to ensure you'll have all of the songs on the receiving computer. You'll still need to modify library information about songs that isn't contained in the metadata -- like rating.

I have the last type of smart playlist explained (plays is 0, live updating) and it's always worked in the past with the kind set to Audiobook. I haven't used this in a while (my smart playlists are still there as I left them)...does it no longer work or am I misunderstanding the point of changing the kind to Music?

quakerotis, on 09 March 2012 - 08:07 AM, said:

In fact: is there a way to just drag and drop a folder thereby turning it automatically into a playlist? without having to go through the tedious operation of 1. creating the playlist; 2. writing the name of the said folder as the playlist's name; 3. dragging and dropping the songs from the folder into the playlist. What should be a very simple operation becomes complicated by three steps every time one wants to listen to songs in itunes

I think it sucks that you can delete songs from a Genius playlist but you cannot insert songs into a genius playlist...Not so genius in my opinion.

iTunes has music files scattered all over my hard disk; how can I make it consolidate them into my Music/iTunes Music/Music folder?

I'm still unclear on how to have all the itunes music I have purchased over the years show up on my desktop, laptop, and iPad. I have also purchased CD's and imported them into one or the other. But each computer has a different set of songs, some are duplicated (because I got frustrated and bought them again.) And some just disappeared. i want ONE file with ALL my music on it. I have purchased all of it, so it's legit. But what's the secret to merging this database?

Getting my first iPad and would like to know how to transfer a playlist or two to the new iPad. Can it be done? If so, what are the steps needed in the transfer. Thanks iTunes Guy, and really enjoy your tips!