Learn how to easily add music and video files into Apple iTunes without launching the application.
Donald Bell
Donald Bell has spent more than five years as a CNET senior editor, reviewing everything from MP3 players to the first three generations of the Apple iPad. He currently devotes his time to producing How To content for CNET, as well as weekly episodes of CNET's Top 5 video series.
If you're an iTunes user who downloads music from all over the Web, you're probably familiar with the annoying task of manually opening iTunes and dragging and dropping your downloads into the library window. It's a pain, especially on older computers where iTunes takes forever to load. But if you don't stay on top of it, you end up having all the new music you're excited about sitting in your browser's download folder instead of loaded into iTunes and your iPod.
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As of iTunes 9, users finally have a way to quickly add their music and video downloads to their iTunes library without having to launch any programs. To do this, first make sure you have the latest version of iTunes installed. Next, locate the iTunes music folder on your computer. On a PC this is typically found by going to My Documents, My Music, iTunes, and then iTunes Music. If the folders are sorted alphabetically, it shouldn't be too hard to spot a folder labeled "Automatically Add to iTunes" sitting near the top.
As the folder name implies, when you add music or video files to this particular folder, iTunes will automatically import the content next time you launch the program.
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Unfortunately, this folder isn't in the most convenient spot, so here are a few tricks to make things easier.
One technique that works on both Mac and PC is to right-click on the folder and make an alias or Shortcut that you can drag to your desktop.
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PC users can also open the folder and add it to their list of Favorites.
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Another technique for quickly accessing your iTunes auto-add folder is to drag the folder or alias down to the Windows quick launch bar or start menu.
