Installing 4.0: It has taken 1 hr to backup and not done yet?

10.6.4; iTunes 9.2; 3GS 16GB; brand new MacBook Pro 2.66 GHz

It's sitting at about 90% for me on backup and is not changing. Other people are saying it takes a few hours but it will eventually finish so I guess I'll just wait it out.

To disable the automatic backup option in iTunes (4.0 has taken 10 minutes to download and install) then go to http://microseconds.com/?page_id=395 and download the app.

Similar here. My iPhone 3G backup is currently sitting with an empty and unmoving bar and has been doing so for maybe 40 mins now.

I tried the update on the iMac I sync it with and the bar got slightly further but as 2 hours hadn't seen any progress I thought I'd try it on my MacBook Pro in case it was the computer.

Strangely enough, my newer model iPod updated on my MacBook pro in minutes, backup and all. One of my friends who has a 3GS and not just a 3G had a backup time of minutes as well.

Maybe I shouldn't have bothered.

sigh

As suspected, once I hit the 271 MB mark the progress bar started moving. I noticed the earlier backup (which had a "1" appended to the folder name which otherwise was the same as the current backup) is now gone.

So the question is: did everyone on this thread do a manual backup before upgrading?

George Coghill wrote:
As suspected, once I hit the 271 MB mark the progress bar started moving. I noticed the earlier backup (which had a "1" appended to the folder name which otherwise was the same as the current backup) is now gone.

So the question is: did everyone on this thread do a manual backup before upgrading?

yup- and i just noticed that mine is now at 322.4 of the 324.1 that i had backed up just before doing the upgrade, so hopefully this means it'll pick up soon. been about 2.5 hrs since i restarted this process... i guess Apple knew about this because they warned the upgrade could take an hour or more!!

I am now at 120 minutes. Yes I did a manual backup before starting the upgrade. I had been advised to do that. Not sure why it should be a bad thing.

I can finally report completion. 2 hrs 45 min. At the end it was weird. Wasn't sure if finished or not. Showed my iPhone on left but appeared to happening. Then would get beach ball from time to time. iPhone showed no service. I thought holy **. But eventually everything restarted again saw the iTunes screen about the sync (with tabs). Was able to disconnect. Restarted phone, had service. Can make folders. Yeah! All this work and I'm getting the new one on Thur.

update - yup, it hit the same number as my previous backup and then suddenly disappeared from the Backups folder, and now iTunes is chugging along with the meter hitting the 50% mark in just a couple minutes since. seems to be working now... what a waste of a couple hours!!!

No failures reported yet but I am still going to wait before the leap of faith

i started the ios4 download about 10:15pm pacific time. it's 3:00pm pacific time now and the status bar still hasn't moved from the 'a' letter in 'Backing up' dialog window.

3g 16gb w/ 3gb free space.

under activity monitor, inspecting the itunes process, i see system calls and message numbers accumulating. i also see the mobilesync backup folder is slowly updating.

i have backed up twice a day the past week. there should be a way to bypass this backup. it's absurdly slow.

i'm keeping track of the status bar progress by placing the finder window in front as sort of a marker and see it only moved one pixel in two hours.

i've wasted an entire day because i need my phone when i go out. this is a major fail on apple's part.

i was backing it up for almost three hours and then it went away and i tried it again now its starting all over what a day im having

I beat you all its taken almost 3 1/2 hrs and its still not done. This is the most irritating thing I have ever encountered with my phone. And I only have about 4 gb of data on !! Shameful!

HAHAH the capacity says 6.90 ***!!!!! THats new!

Same problem here. I got to about 90% backup and it just stopped. Put my cursor arrow at the far right edge of the meter bar and checked it an hour later. The meter bar was in the exact same place, no progress at all.
I am an impatient soul so I just unplugged my **** phone. (I synced it before the backup started.)
After unplugging and plugging back in I selected "No" I don't want to backup the phone. Update started and finished just fine and I have experienced no problems.

Do I suggest this method?? Sure, at your own risk. YMMV for sure.

At 2.5 hours and still only at the "k" in the "Backing up iPhone" status bar!

I am truly disappointed with Apple. Before there were the OS 3.1 update problems which were terrible and where after the update one had to turnoff 3G to get a reliable connection to the AT&T network. Now with this iOS4 upgrade this is just another terrible experience.

I really wish Apple would be as attentive to the upgrade process experience as they are to the end product experience and specs. After back-to-back upgrade experiences like this, I can't recommend Apple to anyone else. It is just way too painful to recommend to anyone but a bleeding edge geek who would be willing to deal with this type of frustration-- especially time after time.

Message was edited by: NeilB1