iTunes stuck at 'sync' stage after iPhone 12 Pro updated to IOS 7.2

Hit control-alt-delete, find iTunes in the list of open processes, click the arrow besides iTunes to expand its contents and you'll find the crash report tool there. Right-click on it and select End Task. But, FWIW, when I do this iTunes suddenly goes to Steps 3 and 4 quickly and still doesn't load any music onto my iPhone.

Thank you for the posting. Stopping MDCrashReportTool, DOES WORK, to at least get by. I am running Sonoma 14.1.2, Music. 1.4.2.83, iPhone 14 Pro 17.2.1. I spent 6+ hours with Apple support, no joy. I submitted error logs and are supposed to get back to me by 1/24/2024. There must be literally millions of users with same problem. Complaints and logged support calls should have reached critical mass for a fix soon. Thanks again for temp fix.

This has been affecting me too for the last month and it's driving me nuts. I've tried restoring my phone from various backups and nothing makes a difference. Manually "force quitting" the MDCrashReportTool works but is a pretty shoddy workaround. If anyone is aware of a more permanent solution without losing data please let me know (!) wtf Apple!!!

I posted this way back but just in case. Before you force close it open the file location. Then force close it. Next, delete or rename the file. This will fix it permanently and everything will work better.

Someone told me it's an issue with the blue tooth connection. If I go to focus and turn off the blue tooth, it will usually start to work after a short wait. I can turn it back one when it's done. Once in a while I also have to restart my M1 mac mini in addition to turning off the blue tooth on the phone. I also have an apple watch synced to the phone which I'm told plays into this problem. I noticed this problem did not begin for me until IOS 17.2 was installed on my iPhone 12 and OS 14.2 on my M1 mini. I'm still having the problem with IOS 17.3 and OS 14.3. Common Apple! Let's squash that bug!

Closing out the "MDCrashReportTool" did the trick for me as well. I also have my Apple Watch attached to the phone. In the past, I found turning off Bluetooth before syncing worked to, but no longer the case.

I would agree there is very little incentive for Apple to fix this issue. They rather have everyone on their Apple Music subscription. Personally, I already have an extensive library of music that I paid for. I don't want to pay $11 a month (which is bound to go up over time) and just listen to the same songs I already own. Every few months, I will go purchase the few new songs I enjoy.

killing MDCrashReportTool did not work for me this month... I used the finder to eject the phone, then disconnected and reconnected the usb cable and it worked. This is a stupid bug that does not happen with my iPad using the exact same Mac and usb cable.

I previously replied and then thought this bug was fixed with an update. Then it’s not again. How flipping hard is it for me to sync my phone Apple? This is a joke. For the money we pay your software is a farce. We all bought iPods for a reason! If you want to disown the guys that bought music you’re betraying your base. Fix this ****!

djj001 wrote:

It’s broken again. Useless

Okay, one more time!

For those claiming a "solution", there has been no solution. There exists some "workarounds".

For those claiming it broke in a recent release, they are ignoring the same issue being reported many times in the past 15 years.

For those claiming it "broke again", it can't unless it was first fixed. It hasn't been fixed.

The issue, as I see it, is a software glitch that is raised when the sync process encounters a certain data condition it cannot resolve and fails to properly report to Apple. What is that condition? Only someone with access to the code can say for certain.

When the data sync has nothing to do, it works just fine.

When the data sync processes the data successfully, it works just fine.

When the data sync does not encounter data it cannot process, it works just fine.

When the data sync fails, someone will say, "it broke after a code update".

When the data sync works the next time after a failure, someone will say, "it's fixed". However, if it then fails again they say, "it's broken again".

It's a data driven issue. It's bad software (code) that cannot process some certain out of sync data or if it does process successfully, it fails to report back to Apple.

If anyone can prove otherwise, please share.

-R.

In my case, as crazy as it sounds, it seemed to be related to my Watch and its connections thru installed apps to the iPhone. If you don't have an Apple Watch, then your solution is gonna be something else.

I'm on MacOS 14.3 and iOS 17.2.1, and I have an AppleWatch that is watchOS 10.3.1. I had the same 'will not finish sync' problem, resorting to my needing to force quit the MDCrashReportTool. I'm not convinced this actually allowed for the sync to complete cleanly, perhaps only stopping it at that point, but in any case...

Through an accident, I discovered that if I unpaired the watch, the sync would work just fine. So by experimenting, I un-paired and then re-paired the watch, as a new watch, and then removed all of the non-built-in apps from the watch. And the sync works fine. I've added back in a few apps at a time, and so far, sync still works fine.

So, I'm guessing that the sync process was being broken by some wonky watch app that was not playing well with the phone and was preventing the sync from finishing. Just wish Apple's error reporting would give some indication of where the problem was coming from... um, if there was an error reporting tool... So Apple, please give us an error log or sync log or something, anything...

But in any case, the above steps solved the problem for me and has continued to work for well over a month now with several updates. Just be mindful of what apps you install on the watch...

Another possible workaround; turn your watch completely off, then sync. Only tried it once, but it worked. I'm guessing that if the watch and phone are connected in any way, you can't sync. You can't just take the watch off your wrist. The watch must be completely off for the duration of the sync.

It is still an issue. New M3 24" iMac, Ultra 2 Watch, and iPhone 15Pro. All up to date but the sync sill stalls at 2. WTF. As someone mentioned this has been around a long time, why? Killing the crash tool works but is a hassle to do every time. I am not sure about deleting it as it may be used for something else. Beyond me how they let this go on so long. Maybe this is just a place for users to vent and no action ever really takes place?