Q: My iTunes will no longer run. When I plug in my iPod, the message says iTunes cannot run because it has detected a problem with my audio configuration. If I reload iTunes, will that wipe out all of my libraries? Do you have a suggestion?
– Carol
A: Reinstalling iTunes is certainly an option, and may be the best first step to ensure that there is no some corruption in the application itself.
The good news is that you can uninstall iTunes and reinstall it without risking your iTunes library, as these files are not removed during an uninstall operation, nor overwritten during a reinstall of iTunes.
Of course, if you want to be completely safe, you can visit your “My Music” folder in Windows and either backup or move the existing “iTunes” folder out of the way. To do this, just copy the entire content of the “iTunes” folder to another location (even another folder on the same hard drive) before uninstalling and reinstalling iTunes.
This way, in the event that a problem does occur during the reinstallation of iTunes, you can simply copy this folder back to its original location and overwrite what is already there.
Alternatively, if disk space is tight, you can move the folder (and its contents) out of the way before uninstalling and reinstalling iTunes. In this case, iTunes will create a new “iTunes” folder in that location when you reinstall it, with a new, empty library.