LL, 95% of my music is in mp3 format and some are left in the reg, they all play when they are in itunes folder. You don't have to convert them I did because I put them on an IPod and because I would burn them to a cd for the car and I could get 22 songs on the CD instead of 10 or 12. I convert them to MP3 by using Roxio, but other software will do it also. I make a playlist in Itunes...under file, "new",name it, then copy and past the songs from my music folders to the playlists in ITunes. It may take some practice. I have a playlist for my favorite songs. When I hear one I really like, I copy and paste it in favorites. It will then be in my favorites and in songs. If I had it to do over I would copy and paste them straight to the playlist and they automatically goes to "songs". I had a lot of duplicates leaning how to do this. If I want to listen to one particular singer or all songs I click on the right option and I set the controls to random. You can delete any songs from the playlists. It will ask "from the computer or just the folder". I would suggest when you get this set up like you want it back the music folders so you don't have to do this all again. If you buy a new computer and need to install Itunes again it will/should install with your folders just like they were. Aren't computers wonderful? I don't travel any more and don't need an ipod so I bought a radio with an ipod dock and can listen to a thousand songs in random if I want. The radio is a Memorex and sounds as good as my Bose. Very nice. I love music, I call it therapy for the soul. My taste in music has changed over the years, I love some of all music.

PolarPrincess - If you have a USB port, buy an external hard drive that connects to the USB port and copy ALL of your data (pictures and other personal files) to it. Then your data is safe and you can clean up the rest of the system. If not, burn them to CD for safety. THEN: 1 - Empty the Trash 2 - Search for files on the entire system, using this search pattern" *.bak (those are temporary files that can be deleted) 3 - Delete all of those files. 4 - Empty the trash again. 5 - Search for all *.tmp files and delete them 6 - Empty the trash again. 7 - Run the Windows XP "check disk" utility as described here: http://www.updatexp.com/windows-xp-chkdsk.html It may take quite a while ... 8 - Then try running the defragmentation program.

Import the songs into iTunes: Insert the CD, and wait for iTunes to show the songs in the CD, and then click on "Import." The songs will automatically create a Library of songs within iTunes. Once a library is created, if you now connect the iPod to your computer, iTunes will automatically transfer the songs to the iPod. Of course, you can also download music from the Internet with iTunes. There is a PC as well as a Mac version of iTunes. The CD that comes with the iPod has both versions, but it's a good idea to update the application every now and then. For iTunes to do all that, you must set its "Preferences." There is something else about the iPod, and soon other products: Some car stereos (look at the Crutchfield catalog) are iPod ready, while others require an optional electronic box. If you use one of these radios and have an iPod, you no longer need a CD changer. All you have to do is to connect the iPod to the radio, or to the control box, and the radio's display show the songs being played. You can scroll to whatever song you have in the iPod from the radio display. If you have 10,000 songs in your iPod, you can drive across the US listening to your music. The control box, keeps the iPod's battery fully charged. Other companies should jump on this technology any time now.

You should use CD-R CD's, since they are cheaper. Just let the iTunes application burn the CD for you. Does your eMac have a CD burner? If it does, first create a "Playlist" in iTunes, and name the Playlist as you wish. Drag the songs that you want, into the new Playlist folder. The songs will be either in the "Music" folder in iTunes, or in the "Purchased Music" folder in iTunes. You may want to drag the songs from the Music folder and leave the Purchased Music folder alone. Once you have dragged about 18 songs to the new Playlist, make sure each one has a check-mark on the box next to each song. To check-mark all the songs in the Playlist at once, press and hold the "Apple" key, and with the mouse pointer "click" on the first box. Now all the songs should be selected. The next step is to click on the iTunes "Burn CD" box (just follow the dialog after you have clicked in the Burn CD option). This CD should play on most CD players.