iPhone 15 Plus stuck in “Preparing To Sync"

Thank you. This problem haunted me, even crashing my Mac. Disconnecting the cable did the trick.

A reminder to stop saying "this solution worked". These are NOT solutions, these are workarounds. The real solution will be when it actually gets fixed, because quitting system processes and repeatedly unplugging and replugging cables are not solutions.

Thanks karstene69. Your workaround worked for me. HOWEVER, I needed to disable Sync Over Wifi first otherwise unplugging the USB cable didn't cancel the sync.

I am so glad I didn't update to 14.3.1 since someone said it broke the fix. If you are on 14.3, the initial sync time takes about 5 minutes before making any progress. Subsequent syncs (in the same session) often take seconds after the initial sync. Apple is still aware of the problem as evidenced by the question at the bottom of this feedback form: Feedback - iPhone - Apple

MaxClayton wrote:

C'mon Apple: my 2023 MacBook M2 pro and new iPhone 14 "just oughta work"! Fix MDCrashReportTool ASAP!

This is a user forum, Apple don’t read or respond to comments on here .

Try:

Feedback - iPhone - Apple

iOS 17.2 broke iTunes sync. On Windows PC, it hangs at "Preparing To Sync". The culprit MDCrashReportTool (32 bit). MDCrashReportTool (32 bit) does not appear in Task Manager/iTunes UNTIL iTunes arrives at the Preparing To Sync step. And subsequent Sync requires repeating ending the process MDCrashReportTool (32 bit) each time until the Apple Programmer which broke it fixes it. 😠😠 credit appletrav on YouTube (@NoMathHere123) has the workaround for Windows PC here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HczFwxWHj2c

xCowboy, no idea how the heck you sussed that out, but thank you. Worked on my Windows box, too. It had been hung forever this evening as I patiently waited for it to get its act together, but after I zapped that process in Task Manager, iTunes had moved on to the next step before I even clicked back over to it. Thank you so much!

It is an embarrassment that this hasn't been fixed. And it happens whether wired or wireless. This issue and the one where Sidecar freezes constantly when used wireless with an iPad. Apple should be ashamed of how buggy their device interaction is and how long things continue with never being addressed. Buy a new computer, latest OS, but still the same old bugs... smh

Hello Norman18

You're brilliant! Thank you very much for making this at least a fixable nightmare. How long has the "MDCrashReportTool" been a nightmare, years and years.

I wasted an hour or two waiting for it to resolve, but once I quit the "MDCrashReportTool", boom it finished right up.

Anyways, Thank you very much for your help, I'm sure Apple would have suggested we are to delete everything reinstall the iOS and MacOS fresh, etc. In other words destroy your enire setup, and it likely still wouldn't have worked. You, you put the truth and have probably made a lot of people pretty happy solving this problem.

FYI: While I haven't tried it yet, I found an article called "How to disable and enable the Crash Reporter on MacOS

" at http://www.mnott.de/how-to-disable-and-enable-the-crash-reporter-on-macos/ that may solve not having to deal with it every sync. I'm not sure what MacOS it's written for, I hope 10.14.6 and all others that need it. Apple as usual isn't any help, I'm really glad you were have been a great help.

Thanks again,

Dan

[Edited by Moderator]

cdmilton wrote:

Amazing! That seems to have fixed it. Thank you!!!

I think it’s worth remembering that aborting troublesome processes (ie Force Quit) doesn’t actually fix anything.

It simply terminates the problem.

It may be the only recourse, we don’t have a lot of choices when faced with a stalled process.

But, there could be unknown consequences.

The real “fix” is Apple’s responsibility.

I could not agree more. Aborting a process can leave the parent process incomplete.

In addition to the comments in this thread, readers may find additional information in this thread:

Since installing the latest iPhone and Ma… - Apple Community

Ron_NJ wrote:

I am squarely on the fence as to whether renaming the tool is a wise choice. Sure, the Sync or Backup will run successfully. However, no error will be reported in a popup when the process completes. Also, what other processes use this reporting tool that will no longer do so?

Yes, I’m sitting there too, on the fence. Windows users may have a different problem. Some malware disguises itself as the crash reporter tool.

Renaming or otherwise disabling the tool permanently means Apple will no longer receive crash reports for mobile devices. Perversely if the tool has a bug which prevents it from reporting crashes then Apple are not receiving any reports of any MD (mobile device) problems - so all is well !!

fispeterKloten wrote:

It works fine with my iPad

Yes. My sync settings for iPhone and iPad are the same. iPad sync works, iPhone doesn’t. So is this a problem with the IPhone ? Is MDcrashreporttool waiting for a response from the phone? (Which never comes) Is it a UUID problem? Who knows?

Update: It appears that it may have to do with the Apple Watch. I turned off my wifi, bluetooth, and cellular (Not Airplane Mode) and it synced fine. (I do skip the backup) It took about 10-15 seconds and all of the steps completed.

Second Update: Never mind. This seems to be very very unpredictable.

Marc Marshall wrote:

Northern-Survivor wrote:

Apple must know about this issue and it’s disconcerting that they don’t seem able to solve the problem(s).

I mean, iOS 17.2 has been out for all of 6 days, so it's not exactly unusual or shocking that Apple hasn't released a patch for it yet, even if they found out about it on day 1--that kind of thing takes at least some time and regression testing before you push an update to tens (if not hundreds) of millions of devices. And while this bug is very annoying for people who do a wired sync of their phones (if it does indeed affect all of them, which it may not--there may be some additional necessary trigger), that's a pretty uncommon thing these days, so it's impacting a relatively small fraction of the user base.

This problem has occurred before iOS17.2. I first encountered it when I had an IPhone 5S and iTunes on a Mac Mini. But then the car had an Aux input and I still had an IPod Classic.

Now the car has CarPlay and no Aux socket so the only alternatives I can think of to syncing music to the Phone are 1. Manually managing music…. Or 2. Streaming (such as Apple Music) . Maybe you know others.

Regarding this instance of the problem, In my ramblings I did say I’m not an expert and could be wrong (for the reasons you gave) but this problem, or very similar problems, have occurred before over many years. I’m not a fan of Force Quit. For me it’s a last resort, not a quick fix.

In my experience this problem happens whether the phone is connected by USB or WiFi, so I don’t think it only affects “people who do a wired sync”. And we have no way of knowing how many users are affected, and have been affected over the years.