iTunes stuttering playback

Question

iTunes stuttering playback

After the big OS X Leopard update, iTunes started skipping or stuttering on playback. It does it often enough that the program is basically unusable. The skipping is NOT related to internet access by my mail program (Mailsmith) or web browsers. It is NOT an mp3 file corruption problem, since the stuttering occurs in different places with each replay of the same song. The songs are those loaded from my own CD's and played flawlessly before the software update. The usual rigamarole of trashing preferences and resetting PRAM has not changed anything.

I have noticed other people with the same problem posting on different boards. I assumed that the 7.6.1 update to iTunes would address this issue. No such luck.

I am at a loss. I have an almost new MacBook which worked flawlessly until the update. I am very disappointed with Apple that 1) this issue is not addressed, and 2) that it is impossible to contact anyone knowledgeable about how to attempt to fix this. As a legacy Mac user (first 128K Mac bought on 2/24/1984 and many, many Macs since, this is a new type of helpless feeling.

Help!

MacBook Pro 17", Mac OS X (10.5.2)

Posted on Feb 29, 2008 4:43 PM

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Answer 1

berada

Level 1

15 points

Mar 1, 2008 2:30 PM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

This is a widespread issue, search the boards for "stutter" .... there must several hundred people posting on these forums with the same issue.

I have my 300GB + iTunes library on an external WD My Book Pro (a 2TB version set up as a 1TB RAID mirror) connected via FW800. I solved my stuttering playback problem by transferring my library to another external FW800 drive with two Seagate 200GB drives configured as a RAID stripe.

Thats all I've found so far.....

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Answer 2

Mar 1, 2008 5:51 PM in response to berada

I hope Apple monitors the boards and comes up with a fix soon. It is an issue caused by the recent 10.5.2 update, not the iTunes update. It would be nice to hear some announcement that they are cognizant of the problem and working on it; absent that, I'll just assume they are doing that. But it certainly is frustrating waiting for the next fix.

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Answer 3

Mar 1, 2008 7:27 PM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

A suggestion was posted on another thread (for a different issue) to try repairing permissions - one thing I had not thought of. So far, iTunes has played for about 10 minutes with no stutter, so the problem may resolve with that fix. I'll post again if that does not hold true. If anyone is having the stuttering problem, try repairing permissions. How that would cause a stutter is beyond me, but it SEEMS to be working at this point.

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Answer 4

Mar 1, 2008 7:49 PM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

My wife's iMac (Intel) started having this iTunes stuttering and stalling problem a couple of weeks ago. However, this iMac is running the latest version of OS 10.4 (Tiger). I installed the latest iTunes update today but it didn't cure the problem.

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Answer 5

berada

Level 1

15 points

Mar 1, 2008 11:30 PM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

An interesting thing is that all of the MP3's I have all playback without any problems, but ALL the files encoded with iTunes, wether they be AAC or Apple Lossless, stall during playback.

New thread here:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1422226&tstart=0

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Answer 6

Mar 2, 2008 8:52 AM in response to berada

I've never had a problem until today. I upgraded to the newest version of Itunes last night, and my problems started immediately. Stutter, stutter, stutter. The Apple QC is going down hill. Had numerous problems with the Ipod firmware update also. You think that they would test their upgrades thoroughly before releasing them.

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Answer 7

Mar 2, 2008 10:57 AM in response to Leonard Senn1

Please try the "repair permissions" solution that worked for me and please report back whether it works for you as well.

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Answer 8

Mar 2, 2008 11:50 AM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

Well, I take it all back. iTunes played fine for about 30 minutes straight, and now is stuttering again. So permissions repair is not the answer.

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Answer 9

Mar 6, 2008 8:26 AM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

I completed a report to Apple Support a few days ago. Suggest y'all do the same. Incredably disappointed with Apple's quality assurance...

My wife uses iTunes as the music jukebox at her retail establishment and now iTunes basically doesn't work. They don't want to use a CD player as they really like their playlists. iTunes on my PowerMac has only had problems recovering from sleep mode (so far).

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Answer 10

Mar 6, 2008 9:50 AM in response to Sven Erik

I would report it to Apple (I'm sure they know about it) if I knew how. The page that lists e-mail support as an option has no e-mail address or online form to fill out. Got a link?

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Answer 11

Mar 6, 2008 1:13 PM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

The iTunes feedback link is:

http://www.apple.com/feedback/itunesapp.html

My wife just told me the iTunes stuttering and stalling seems to occur only when she is using the remote speakers connected via AirTunes (AirPort Express). Hope Apple fixes this soon as it would be very difficult to coonect her remoste speckers sdirectly to her computer.

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Answer 12

Mar 10, 2008 5:34 PM in response to Sven Erik

Now I notice that CD's playing on iTunes do the same (bleeping) thing: stutter at odd intervals, never in the same place on the CD - just like the mp3 issue. Not that anyone at Apple seems to notice.

I'm thinking of reinstalling Leopard after deleting iTunes, but I don't know how to update the OS short of the 112 MB update that I think caused the problem. Also, I'm afraid I'll get the error message "your iTunes library was made for a later version."

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Answer 13

Mar 18, 2008 8:51 AM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

I have the same problem. For me it started after I downloaded the latest iTunes (7.6.1) everything in my music library has started stuttering. The music breaks up or skips at irregular times. This is an intermittent problem and when I play back exactly where it has occurred it doesn't happen again in the same place. It is affecting downloads and tracks ripped from my own CD collection. Very annoying.
Anyone got a solution?

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Answer 14

Mar 20, 2008 5:13 PM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

Seems I can use music from iTunes in an iPhoto slideshow without the stutter problem.

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Answer 15

Mar 20, 2008 9:10 PM in response to Jeffrey Hull1

I found something intriguing. I have a 1GHz TiBook with the same problem. Seems to be systemic to all of Leopard -- Quicktime, VLC, mplayer all have problems. Even the system chime gets cut off sometimes. If I leave iTunes "playing" after it stutters and plug or unplug my external line out, the music resumes playing, at least temporarily (alas, only to break again shortly thereafter).

I've tried everything at the following website except cleaning the caches (which is my next step)
http://www.macsimumnews.com/index.php/archive/macosgsound_problems_inleopard

Thoughts?

-Ben

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