Can I movie movies to another drive and still keep their Collections and Labels?

Plex Media Server NAS & Devices
1

My Plex server have access to two volumes that conatin movies: A and B.
A was the largest until recently, but now B has been expanded and I`d like to move some movies from volume A to volume B.

All my movies are arranged in different collections and they all have at least one label.

I have tried to just move the movie from A to B. That cleared out all the labels and collections and made the movie seem to be recently added (it was actually added over two years ago).

I then tried to copy another movie from A to B. That seem to keep all labels and collection, and added date. However - I now have two copies of the movie, and once I delete the one on volume A, all labels and collections are lost again.

Is there a way to move movies from A to B and keep all collections, labels and other data?

2

Very simple.

  1. ADD the new location to the list of top-level folders for that library section.
  2. _it will scan the empty
  3. Settings - Server - Library –
    – Turn off Automatic
    – Turn off EMPTY TRASH
    – SAVE
  4. Now move the movie(s) to that new location
  5. Scan Files to update the pathname(s) for the movie(s)
  6. Check Get Info to confirm it has the updated location
  7. Observe the collection is still intact.
  8. Re-enable Automatic & Empty Trash
  9. SAVE
  10. One final Scan Files.
1 Like
3

I recommend a different approach, which avoids disabling any server settings.

  1. copy the movie(s) to the new location. Do NOT delete the files from the old location yet.
  2. ADD this location to the list of top-level folders for that library section.
  3. verify that the copied files have been added to the existing posters as versions/duplicates.
    (This should happen automatically if the library has already been converted to use the modern metadata agent. Only if this conversion was not performed to completion you may get separate posters for the copied items, which means the existing posters were still being matched with legacy agents. You need to avoid this situation. Confirm the existing posters are all matched with the modern agent. If the modern agent has been selected in the library properties, performing “Refresh Metadata” on the items in question should ensure conversion.)
  4. Now delete the files on the old location
  5. Scan Files again
  6. Empty library trash, if not set to be emptied automatically
2 Likes
4

Thank you OttoKerner,

I`ve tried this, with some minor differences though, unsuccessfully…

Step 1 done

Your step 2: the location is already added to the library, so I can`t re-add it. It already contains a number of movies and TV shows.

Step 3 checked. Everything is normal, with correct poster, labels and collections.

Step 4 delete of old location files done

After step 5. collections and labels removed, poster reverted to something other than what I`ve selected.

Step 6 not done as procedure already seem to fail…

I have tested with the suggestion by ChuckPa on one movie, and that seem to be successful. I`ll test with a couple more and confirm the result.

5

Thank you ChuckPa,

Your solution seem to work nicely :slightly_smiling_face:

6

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