HT201587: About download times for the iTunes Store purchases and rentals

Learn about About download times for the iTunes Store purchases and rentals
shearer3000

Q: Why is my movie download going to take 12 hours?

hi

Why are itunes downloads so slow? I just purchased a movie @3.5GB and apparently it's got 12 hours to go. ITunes downloads are constantly this slow, and I know its defintiely not my ADSL2+ broadband connection thats the issue, it's definitely the itunes store.

 

thanks for any advice

Andrew

Posted on Jun 25, 2013 3:21 AM

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Q: Why is my movie download going to take 12 hours?

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  • Helpful answers

  • by HACKINT0SH,

    HACKINT0SH HACKINT0SH Jun 25, 2013 4:12 AM in response to shearer3000
    Level 5 (5,774 points)
    iLife
    Jun 25, 2013 4:12 AM in response to shearer3000

    I know its defintiely not my ADSL2+ broadband connection thats the issue, it's definitely the itunes store.

    LOL!!!!!!!!!

     

    iTunes Store: Download times will vary

              http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1577

  • by shearer3000,

    shearer3000 shearer3000 Jun 25, 2013 4:26 AM in response to HACKINT0SH
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jun 25, 2013 4:26 AM in response to HACKINT0SH

    not helpful, sorry

  • by c.felix,

    c.felix c.felix Aug 12, 2013 12:50 PM in response to shearer3000
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 12, 2013 12:50 PM in response to shearer3000

    I have the same question, it takes 2 + hours to download HD episode of breaking bad. I think Apple doesn't want to pay for the "bandwidth" to let us down load at faster speeds. It reminds me of the day when 56K was considered fast. 

  • by Mateo603,

    Mateo603 Mateo603 Aug 12, 2013 3:46 PM in response to shearer3000
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 12, 2013 3:46 PM in response to shearer3000

    I would use a different provider like Xfinity or Amazon App. My download today was as long as 15,000 hours. It's not your modem settings, it's not your phone, it's iTunes. iTunes is horrible at delivering content. Once my 15,000 hour download completes I'm going to ask for a refund, it's always this way... The site says download times may vary but they never do. They're always unreasonable.

  • by Hammie28,

    Hammie28 Hammie28 Sep 7, 2013 7:32 AM in response to Mateo603
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 7, 2013 7:32 AM in response to Mateo603

    Seems as though apple are only concerned with taking our money and not improving the service started downloading the new Star Trek movie and its going to take 70 hours to download.Would have been better downloading from another site it only took me 2 hours to download a perfect copy 2 weeks ago.

  • by filln,

    filln filln Sep 28, 2013 3:16 PM in response to shearer3000
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 28, 2013 3:16 PM in response to shearer3000

    The best way to fix this is to not rent/purchase a DVD from Apple. Use Amazon or Netflix.

  • by professorpig,

    professorpig professorpig Sep 30, 2013 3:35 AM in response to shearer3000
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Sep 30, 2013 3:35 AM in response to shearer3000

    Hi,

    I live in Australia where we just had fibre to the home installed as a part of our national broadband network in new houses. My speed is 100 megabytes per second (1/10 of a Gig) and is getting speed test results of around 94 mbps on average.

    I would say this is about as good a speed as any domestic customer of Apple's could possibly hope for around the world and yet, only since the new iOS 7 and iphone 5s/c came out did my download times go from about 3 - 4 minutes per HD movie to around 11 - 15 hours.

    I know this was not due to my internet connection or cookies / system settings as I reinstalled and rebooted a number of times on different computers and yet still had the problem. What made this more of a joke was that I went to one of Apple's competitors (someone shall we say rhymes with moogle and starts with 'g')  and purchased the exact same movie (American Gangster) which was almost the exact same data size and downloaded it in less than 4 minutes WHILE MY iTunes download was simultaneously downloading and hovering at around 11 hours by that stage.

    The movie was still downloading the next morning (almost complete though) but my wife and i no longer wanted to watch it as our free time was over and we watched it elsewhere with less hassle.

    The moral of this story is that if Apple are to clog their servers with a mass of new user traffic (as per what has occurred with the new iphones and iOS7 releases) they must be willing to OVER cater for this otherwise customers will go elsewhere.

    P.S. i feel sorry for the person who is on ADSL2+ and is going to have to wait until they are on the aged pension before they watch their movie.

  • by helpmywife,

    helpmywife helpmywife Oct 1, 2013 11:59 AM in response to professorpig
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 1, 2013 11:59 AM in response to professorpig

    After testing my connection speed on a number of sites, troubleshooting my router, troubleshooting my modem, updating my appleTV, ensuring there is no EM interference, and reading the entries on this site, I'm afraid I am left with the same conclusion...the problem lies with the iTunes servers.  I strongly suspect this coincides with everyone and their brother trying to download the "Breaking Bad" series finale, but it does not excuse long download times at other peak hours. Investment in servers would "serve" Apple well (sorry, couldn't help myself).

  • by c.felix,

    c.felix c.felix Oct 1, 2013 3:57 PM in response to shearer3000
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 1, 2013 3:57 PM in response to shearer3000

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRQJR9l2Uig

     

    Here is proof that Itunes downloads are slow, 10 megabites downloaded in one minute for a recent episode of Breaking Bad.

  • by Twotickets1,

    Twotickets1 Twotickets1 Nov 3, 2013 5:13 PM in response to professorpig
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 3, 2013 5:13 PM in response to professorpig

    G'day Professor.  Wish I would have read this prior to buying a 4 hour Rockumentary...Thank you for the feedback as well as the alternative solutions. I am afraid to say that my steadfast loyalty to Apple is waning on a number of fronts.  This may be the first nail in the coffin for me. 

  • by Twotickets1,

    Twotickets1 Twotickets1 Nov 9, 2013 7:15 PM in response to shearer3000
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 9, 2013 7:15 PM in response to shearer3000

    Another nail in coffin....DO NOT BUY ANY MOVIES FROM ITUNES.....YOU WILL WAIT FOREVER TO DOWNLOAD. 

  • by WGQ,

    WGQ WGQ Nov 14, 2013 12:27 PM in response to shearer3000
    Level 1 (16 points)
    Mac OS X
    Nov 14, 2013 12:27 PM in response to shearer3000

    I have a verizon FiOS 100mb/s service.  Speetest indicates I'm getting a little bit more than that.  Despite this, it just took me a little bit more than 14 hours to download a 5.43GB movie.

     

    However, if I choose to stream this movie directly from iTunes to my Apple TV, no problem.  It starts within a few seconds and plays smoothly.

     

    I target iTunes downloads to a Western Digital MyBook Live NAS, and I'm suspicious that this may be the problem, at least in my case.  The NAS is connected via ethernet to my router, which my iMac is also directly connected to via ethernet.  It should be very quick, but it isn't.

     

    WD issued an update for Mavericks compatibility just before Mavericks was released, which I installed.  I'm also now running on Mavericks.

     

    Are others who are experiencing this slow download problem downloading directly to their Macs, or to external storage like me?