How do I get my old songs onto my new laptop?

How To Use Your iPod To Move Your Music To A New Computer

Notes before you start:

This document does not apply to iPod touch.

Windows operating systems don't recognize Mac OS-formatted disks (HFS or HFS Plus formats), so you can't use a Mac-formatted iPod to move your music to a Windows PC. See iPod: How to determine iPod's hard disk format if you're not sure how your iPod is formatted.

You can use the Transfer Purchases from iPod option under the File menu to copy iTunes Store purchases from iPod to another computer. You cannot, however, transfer songs from other sources from the iPod library to iTunes. You'll need to follow the steps below to use iPod as a hard disk to transfer music files from one computer to another. This process will require the use of iTunes 7 or later on all computers. You will need to update any computers with iTunes 6 or earlier to follow these steps. Download the latest version of iTunes. After you have the files transferred, you'll need to authorize any iTunes Store content. If you won't be using your old computer, you can deauthorize it.

If you do not have access to a CD or DVD burner and do not have an iPod, you may also use an external hard drive to back up your iTunes Library from your older computer and then restore it to your newer computer.

Switch the iPod to manual update and enable disk use

The first thing you need to do is verify that you have configured your iPod to enable disk use. To do this:

1. Open iTunes on your old computer.

2. Connect your iPod to your old computer and wait for it to appear in iTunes.

Select your iPod on the left side of the iTunes window under the Devices section to display your iPod preferences.

3. Click the Summary tab in the main iTunes window.

5. Select the "Manually manage music" checkbox. This will also select Enable disk use.

6. A message appears that says:

"Disabling automatic update requires manually unmounting the iPod before each disconnect."

Click OK in the message window.

7.Click Apply in bottom right of the iTunes window.

There is a lot more info on here if you need more help: http://support.apple.com/kb/hT1329

Here's another forum post I found for your problem: https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3991

Apple's iTunes software is, in the main, designed to transfer data to their devices but not in the other direction. In general if you try to connect and sync an Apple device to a new library iTunes will want to erase all the current content and replace it with items from the new library.

Should you be in the unfortunate position where your computer has been lost, stolen or damaged and you have no viable backup of your library then you can use the following steps to attempt to recover most, if not all, of your media and other information from your devices.

If you still have the computer, but it is in a non-bootable state, then it may be possible to extract the hard drive, put it in an external drive bay and recover data from it that way. That approach may well be easier than what follows, though it depends in part on the mix of purchased vs. ripped media and whether or not your device holds all your media, or just part of it.

1. Preparation

Before you connect any device to a new library go to the Devices tab of the the preferences panel via Edit > Preferences (Windows) or iTunes > Preferences (Mac) and ensure the box next to Prevent iPods, iPhones, and iPads from syncing automatically is ticked. You can now safely connect the device to your computer without the danger of media being automatically deleted or overwritten.

If this device contains contacts or calendar items that are not already on the computer you are using, and that you wish to recover, then make sure you have at least one contact & one event in the applications that will sync with the device (e.g. Windows Address Book or Outlook under Windows, iCal & Address Book on a Mac).Dummy entries will do, but there must be at least one if the data is to be retrieved from the device in step 7 below.

2. Transfer purchases

You can transfer your iTunes Store purchases into a new library, after connecting the device, with the menu item File > Transfer Purchases from <Device>. You should be prompted to authorize the computer to your iTunes account if you have not already done so. If your device holds content from more than one account you will need to authorize each one.

See also: HT1848 - iTunes Store: Transferring purchases from your iOS device or iPod to a computer.

My answer was too long so go here for more: https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3991

There is also software you can download to recover your music back from your iPod.

https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3991 scroll to the bottom and there is a list.

Despite the fact that, I dont know for definite, one thing you would try is seeing if underneath a settings menu, seeing if you can flip off the auto-sync. From there, you will be equipped to tug/drop the songs/graphics/some thing else you had on the iPod over to your computer.

1. Open the laptop chassis, remove the hard disk, and then open new computer chassis, connected old hard disk to new laptop.

2.Enter the CMOS setup main menu, use the cursor keys to select the IDE hard disk auto-detect function

3.Open "My Computer", you will find more drive letter than before, Tip:if new disk have C、D、E.Now d: is old disk's C;, E、F、G are new disk D、E、F;H、I are old's D、E.Know that you can copy data from disk to anothers.

An iPod can be synced with only one iTunes account at a time. once you switched to a new iTunes account or a new computer. You have to authorize your iPod to it at first, then you can upload music and video from iPod to computer. you can refer to this guide that helped me before for how to transfer files from iPod to computer

http://goo.gl/fEA2j

hope this helps.

Bring your old hard drive into best buy, they will help you.