Here’s one I can’t figure out. The set up is this - I have a Mac running iTunes, and this is sharing all my media - including stored TV programmes. These can be viewed on my AppleTV, iPad etc.. It works well. However, I’ve hit a problem that just won’t go away.

It started when I realised that an episode’s filename was incorrect. Now, I could have left it, but the filename contains episode number and title. These are named automatically by EyeTV which because of the transmission times not quite matching up with the set recording times (well done, E4) gave the file the wrong name.

So, what we have is this:

a.mp4
b.mp4

b.mp4 should really be a.mp4 and b.mp4 should really be a.mp4

So I renamed them. Interestingly, iTunes detects this automatically -the Show in Finder option reveals the correct file to me. Since then, I have the correct files in the correct place being referred to correctly by iTunes.

BUT if I try to watch a.mp4 on my Apple TV or my iPad, it shows me b.mp4 - and watching b.mp4 shows b.mp4 . If I tell iTunes to sync unwatched episodes of the programme to my iPad, a.mp4 is not synced, but b.mp4 is in its place. To add insult to injury, the meta data for a.mp4 is shows correctly with the episode data in all devices. iTunes plays a.mp4 and b.mp4 correctly. This problem will just not go away. I have tried:

a) Returning the file names to their originals, removing them from the iTunes library and re-adding them. For good measure, quitting and restarting iTunes.
b) Restarting the AppleTV, restarting the iPad
c) Restarting the Mac
With absolutely no change o the situation. I suspect that somewhere, possibly on my Mac (but maybe now on the various iOS devices) that there is cached data which is incorrectly sending me b.mp4 whenever a.mp4 is played.

Any ideas? If not, it’s well worth noting that you should check your filenames before adding them to your iTunes library as they are clearly “locked down” in some way.

Can you not just remove them from iTunes, fix their names and then put them in iTunes with the correct names?

Mark

Nope. Tried that too.

iTunes does have a cache folder, but I think it's only related to the iTunes Store - a bit like a web browser's cache. I wouldn't have thought it's anything to do with the actual media files, but you could try removing this folder and see if that helps....

Home > Library > Caches > com.apple.iTunes (folder)

(NB: if running 10.7 Lion or 10.8 Mountain Lion, the user Library folder is hidden by default - hold down the Alt key and use the "Go" menu to open the Library folder)

Or you could try running OnyX (or similar tool) on your Mac to clear all caches (system and user) - in fact try all the options under the "Automate" tab. OnyX is here...
http://www.titanium.free.fr/download.php
(make sure you download the correct edition to match your OS)