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Level 1

9 points

iPhone playback - skipping/blank spots

Hi folks, I have a horrible feeling that my iPhone (the iPod element, at least) may be suffering some form of 'terminal' issue but I'm hoping someone may be able to prove me wrong.

I've had the phone for 14 months, running fine and using the iPod on a regular basis - but in the last 2 weeks I've encountered what I can best describe as 'glitches' in the audio playback.

These glitches involve either:

(1) The sound suddenly cutting out, but the time bar continues to progress and the sound will then come back in later in the track.

or

(2) The sound 'skips' and jumps forward several times in quick succession - like someone using the FF button on a CD - this will happen a few times, then playback will be fine.

In both cases the following should be noted:

- If I skip back to the start of the track the same result happens at the same point each time
- The corresponding tracks play without a problem in iTunes on my PC, and if loaded onto my Shuffle or old Classic
- This happens both on tracks burned from my own CD collection, and on podcasts/tracks downloaded from iTunes
- If I clear my phone's audio content, then resync it with a bunch of stuff including the same track, then that track will be ok, but otehrs may experience issues.

All of this leads me to believe that there's some sort of hardware issue (best comparison I can think of is damaged blocks/sectors on a hard drive?)

Other interesting/relevant(?) notes:

- On one occasion album artwork for the track in question was also corrupted (artwork appeared to be made up of two different artwork files, 'tiled' in quarters)
- The issue began not long after I upgraded (clean install) from Win XP to Win 7 on my PC, but I suspect this is coincidence. The music library is stored on a separate drive, and was not touched during the process.
- I have carried out a full factory reset and backup restore on the phone since encountering the issue

So, does anyone have any rays of hope for me in resolving this, or am I looking at mothballing the iPod function on my phone until/unless I can replace it?

Message was edited by: flipsix3

PC, Windows 7, iPhone 3G - firmware 3.1.3 (7E18)

Posted on Apr 20, 2010 1:25 AM

82 replies

May 24, 2010 5:15 PM in response to flipsix3

I am having the same problem and I think it appeared immediately after the 3.1.3 firmware upgrade. I notice from your posts, flipsix3, that you are also at 3.1.3. Do you know if this problem showed up before or after the upgrade?

Im going to try disabling AV and/or firewall and see if that makes a difference as I've tried just about everything. I'll post my results in a day or 2.

What I've tried so far...

Restore to factory settings
Disk defrag on the PC
Different USB cable
Used front USB port
Used rear USB port
Reencoded ALL of my music to 128k AAC

May 25, 2010 5:15 PM in response to flipsix3

I am still experiencing the blank spots and skipping after trying the following:

Syncing with iTunes in WinXP SP2 compatibility mode
Disabling AV while syncing
Disabling my firewall while syncing
Stopping SuperAntiSpyware while syncing

May 26, 2010 10:24 PM in response to flipsix3

I suspect that it has do with compatibility with the latest iTunes and Windows Vista 64 bit OS. I have several PC's at home and at work. My iPhone 3G skips with iTunes most of the time with my Vista 64 OS. With my other PC's with Vista 32 and XP, no problem. Currently opening iTunes in my Vista 64 produces an error message about iTunes not installed properly, and that I am unable to import or burn music. I have uninstalled iTunes several times and reinstalled it to no avail. Nothing seems to work. Three times out of four, I find syncing music with Vista 64 and iTunes produces gaps and loud ticks. Very annoying. But these problems don't crop up with Vista 32 nor XP. My guess is that the current iTunes is not compatible with Vista 64, which doesn't surprise me at all. Just another way Apple is trying to undermine PC's.

May 26, 2010 10:32 PM in response to avspecialist

I suspect some of you are having problems with gaps and ticks with syncing with iTunes comes from compatibility between iTunes and Vista 64. My Vista 64 laptop shows an error message regarding iTunes not being installed properly and that it is unable to import music nor burn discs properly. I have tried re-installing iTunes many times but have not been able to work around this problem. I too have the same gaps and pops and ticks with music synced from iTunes on Vista 64. I now go to my other PC's running on XP or Vista 32, and no problem whatsoever. Which doesn't really surprise me at all, Apple undermining PC's? You bet. But I shall never succumb to getting an iMac. Never!

flipsix3 Author

Level 1

9 points

May 27, 2010 4:56 AM in response to avspecialist

Apologies for my lack of input/responses - been away for a few days. Anyhow, to respond to questions raised:

Antivirus: AVG free (as when I was running XP)
Firewall: Zone Alarm (as when I was running XP)

USB is connected to socket on the back of the machine, direct mainboard input (has been connected their since purchase, doesn't get disconnected much)

Firmware 3.1.3 - unfortunately I don't recall when I updated to this, but I suspect that it was around the same time as I stepped up to Win7 (I generally overhaul everything when I have any major upgrades on OS etc) which is also around the time I first experienced glitches (initially it was just blank spotting)

Since the reset (no backup) and restore the glitches have been less frequent, but are still there so I'll read through the posts added in the last few days and see what comes from trying out any of the suggestions there.

Just to confirm, by the way, that I'm running Win7 32bit (previously XP 32 bit)

Message was edited by: flipsix3

May 27, 2010 12:31 PM in response to flipsix3

For what it's worth, my iPhone 3G is having the fast-forward/skipping/silent issues as well, except I'm using Mac OSX Snow Leopard. I'm not sure it's related to the operating system on your computer, I'm guessing it's an iPhone problem.

May 27, 2010 8:47 PM in response to flipsix3

Decided to move all of my music to my work laptop running Windows XP Pro. Imported my iTunes library from my Vista 32 box into iTunes running on my laptop. Deleted all of the music from my iPhone and then did a resync to put it all back using iTunes on the laptop. I've only listened to about 30 minutes of music so far but have had absolutely no problems with blank spots or skips. So...is it the USB drivers on Vista? Is it something else having to do with Vista 32? Or perhaps is it iTunes? I am running 9.1.1.12 on Vista and 9.1.0.79 on the laptop with no intention of upgrading anytime soon.

May 28, 2010 11:25 AM in response to jmorganti

I am having the exact same issue. I am on the latest O/S (3.1.3) and iTunes (91.1.12). Work friends who are on the same release, be it Win7 (me) or Mac O/S are having similar issues. This points to either iTunes or the iPhone O/S. Not that I can "prove" it, but I didn't have these problems prior to the latest iTunes/OS updates. Is anyone getting "sync" errors between iTunes and the iPhone and occasional "timeouts"? I started getting them at the same time that I started getting these playback issues. I have done all of the recommendations. Reset my iPhone. Completely rebuilt it using both the Win7 and Mac iTunes platforms. This tells me it's likely the iPhone OS. Thoughts?

May 28, 2010 1:11 PM in response to flipsix3

I have been listening to the music on my iPhone at work today. Over 6 hours of continuous music with 0 blank spots or skips. If it were the iPhone OS, then moving everything to XP Pro wouldnt have made a difference for me. Anyone know of a way to move to an older version of iTunes? I'd like to move my installation of iTunes on my Vista 32bit system to the same level I have on XP Pro (9.1.0.79) to see if I get the same results.

May 28, 2010 1:32 PM in response to jmorganti

Found a way (google knows all)...
http://www.gadgetsdna.com/how-to-downgrade-itunes-9-1-to-9-0-3-easily/1737/

Have not tried it yet, but will over the weekend. I will post my results with the downgrade as well as how the iPod function works on my iPhone after using the older version of iTunes.

May 30, 2010 7:05 AM in response to jmorganti

Following the link in my previous post I was able to downgrade iTunes on my Vista box to 9.0.3.15. The only thing I didnt do was wipe out my iTunes folder. When I started iTunes after the downgrade, I received a message stating it couldnt load my library because it had been created by a newer version of iTunes. The link I provided does warn this may occur so be warned you may have to recreate your music library from scratch. However, I found some older versions of my library in a folder under iTunes called Previous iTunes Libraries. I copied one of these to my iTunes folder and restarted iTunes. This loaded successfully. I then wiped all of the music off my iPhone and did a resync.

The iPhone was plugged into the FRONT USB port on the system and the system had
ZoneAlarm firewall, CA Antivirus and SuperAntiSpyware active during the resync. I listened to about 2 hours of music so far with 0 blank spots or skipping. I couldnt go 3 songs without hitting this problem before so things are looking good. It appears it was the latest iTunes upgrade that was causing my problems.

I've unchecked the Automatically check for upgrades under the iTunes preferences as I will not be changing the level of iTunes until I am sure the upgrade will not be causing me any problems.

I hope this helps some of you get past the problems you are seeing with blank spots and skipping on your iPhones.

flipsix3 Author

Level 1

9 points

May 30, 2010 7:24 AM in response to jmorganti

Good stuff, I tried but did see a lot of work I'd need to do to recompile my ratings/playlists etc.

Back on current version at the moment, but if you go for a few more days without problems than I may take the plunge.

Interesting question now is (if it is iTunes), what is causing this to happen for a handful of people, but not the majority?

Jun 1, 2010 7:01 AM in response to flipsix3

I was considering the iTunes roll back and then decided to try the following. So far, I have had good results -- no syncing problems and no play back skipping or blanks. My theory (or grasp at a straw) was that since 9.1 "rebuilt" the library, perhaps that was an issue. So, I deleted all items from my iTunes library (without deleting them from disk), sync'd to my iPhone, which removed everything from there, had iTunes rebuild its library by pointing at the iTunes music folders, and then resync'd back to my iPhone. So far, so good. I've listened to a few hours of music with no problems.

Prior to deleting entries from iTunes, I did export all of my playlists, including the Purchased list. After iTunes rebuilt the libraries, I imported my playlists (you have to copy the imported Purchased playlist over to the iTunes intelligent one) and was back in business. The downside was that if you have any ratings, etc.s, those probably get lost. You also lose any configuration data for your Apps. I'm not sure that you have to remove the Apps, but I did as I was having syncing problems with some of them.

flipsix3 Author

Level 1

9 points

Jun 6, 2010 7:59 AM in response to Mike Donscheski

Going to give that a try Mike, thanks.

Whilst I do, interesting note: my partner has the exact same setup for her iPhone (same firmware, same iTunes version, same Win7 version) running on her laptop - and no sign of any playback issues.

Man this is weird!

Jun 7, 2010 1:34 AM in response to flipsix3

I am not convinced it is a hardware problem.
I have a 16gs version 3.1.3 (7e18) (not Jailbroken) 5 months old.
In the last 14 days or so I downloaded a few more podcasts.
Now when I play them they are running too fast possibly about 110% speed. Everyone sounds like they are on helium. The podcasts are from bbc and new york times, two different, quality suppliers. My other music appears to be fine.
I suspect a bit of bad code in the latest software update.

iPhone playback - skipping/blank spots