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Level 6

11,155 points

"Ghost" Songs Create Sync Error in iTunes

CDMA iPhone 4 w/ iOS 5.01 (since the day it was released)
Auto-sync to select playlists (either over wi-fi or USB)
Windows7, iTunes 10.5, only one iTunes account for this library
Backing up to iCloud (as of yesterday) but not using iTunes Match

Recent purchases I've made directly to my iPhone have been creating "ghost" entries on my iPhone -- they're not visible on the iPhone until connected to iTunes and I open the iPhone contents (see screen shot below). Each one of these ghost entries are grayed out and have what looks like a sync wheel next to them which doesn't move. Each time I sync to iTunes the iPhone displays an error message saying that "9 items failed to sync, see iTunes" (no error number). These 9 items are the tracks of the album "Canyon" which are the ones that appear as ghost entries, although the number of errored songs sometimes includes two other iPhone purchases.

This started after purchasing this album and tried to transfer it to my library later that night. I did not get an error message, but my library showed these same grayed out ghost entries, which are not playable. I tried to re-sync and they still didn't transfer, nor did they go after selecting "Transfer Purchases" from the iTunes menu. On iCloud they showed up as already downloaded to my computer and my iPhone. So I manually deleted the entries in my library, and from my iPhone by swiping each song left to right. I re-downloaded the album from iCloud to my computer. Great, no ghosts. I sync'd the songs to my iPhone, but now I have two entries for each song (as in the shot below) and I get this error message from iTunes on each sync. On the iPhone itself there is only one copy of each song, I only see the ghost entries while connected to iTunes.

This isn't a show-stopper, but annoying since two other purchases are occasionally showing up as ghost entries. So far I have done the following with no success:

Reset, Restored from Backup, Restored then installed backup
Changed sync settings to not sync music at all, then sync'd to remove all music, then reversed the process to put it back on
Went into Settings/ General/ Usage/ Music/ and swiped across "All Music" and selected Delete

The only thing I have not done, which I'm trying to avoid, is doing a restore as new iPhone ... I don't want to re-do all my settings, especially if the ghosts only come back.

Any suggestions?

iPod touch, Windows 7, "Cogito, ergo iPod." (I Think, Therefore iPod)

Posted on Jan 13, 2012 1:51 PM

42 replies

dpx

Level 2

390 points

Feb 24, 2014 8:30 AM in response to rockmyplimsoul

I have just successfully deleted my greyed out songs.

If you turn on 'Manually manage music and videos' in the Summary page then right click the songs; you are then given the option to delete them.

This sorted them out for me.

rockmyplimsoul Author

Level 6

11,155 points

Feb 24, 2014 10:19 AM in response to dpx

Although that is not related to my issue (from 2 years ago on iOS 5) I did have a similar problem when first installing iOS 7.

After the iOS 7 installation I had to do as you said above, changed to manual sync and manually deleted. But to really get the ghost entries to stay away I had to take it a few steps further: In manual mode I had to delete all songs, perform a backup once everything was deleted, restored to the backup, then changed back to auto-sync to my specific playlists. Only then were these rogue songs permanently deleted.

dpx

Level 2

390 points

Feb 24, 2014 11:15 AM in response to rockmyplimsoul

My grey songs came back as soon as I auto-synced. The songs in question were from the 12 days of christmas app, they were deleted and hidden but still were stuck in my phone, greyed out. They were more of an annoyance than anything. I found other threads about this and I followed the advice from this one...

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5369825?start=0&tstart=0

...and now they have gone forever, hopefully.

Feb 28, 2014 4:50 AM in response to leeg330

Worked for me (just the Purchase dir).

Thanks leeg330

michaelc

Level 2

169 points

Mar 8, 2014 12:40 PM in response to leeg330

leeg330's suggestion worked! Holy moly, this has bugged me for over a year. THANK YOU!!!!

Mar 16, 2014 10:25 PM in response to leeg330

Leeg30 - thank you! i think this issue is finally done with!

landm4

Level 1

0 points

May 21, 2014 1:13 AM in response to rockmyplimsoul

I had this problem syncing music or movies to ipad2. Had ghost circles of whatever I tried to sync. Problem fixed by unchecking all songs, movies, books on itunes on imac, applying to ensure all cleared from ipad (check lloking under 'on my ipad'), then was able to sync as normal.

Jul 26, 2014 8:43 AM in response to rockmyplimsoul

This solved my problem,

At the beginning I've Sync problem and there is 5 ghost song, after i done this step, Everything went back without Restoring my iPhone

🙂

And to delete the music that not shown in itunes (not sync) go to Settings->General->Usage->Music and clear from that menu

Thanks Rock!!!!!

Jan 30, 2015 11:58 PM in response to indrasuryatama

This conversation is really old but I hope people are still around. I had this problem and I used the same solution. It worked temporarily, but every time I sync new phantom songs appear. The weird thing is these songs are different every time. Has anyone had this problem?

Feb 23, 2015 11:51 PM in response to Noah000000

Had the same issue, so frustrating. Finally got it; try these steps:

From your phone:

Settings > Music - toggle "Show All Music" to off.

Open music app - identify all songs that are on your device.

Settings > Music - toggle "Show All Music" to on.

From the music app, download songs from iCloud identified in step 2

Settings > General > Usage > Manage Storage > Music > Edit > All Songs > Delete

(Optional) Settings > Cellular - In "Use cellular data for" locate Music App and toggle off.

Settings > Music - toggle "Show All Music" to off.

Sync with iTunes

At which point I had about three quarters of them gone. If there are more remaining:

Download and install iExplorer http://www.macroplant.com/iexplorer/

Plug in device first, then open iExplorer

Delete the iPhone\Media\iTunes_Control folder (you may want to copy this, just in case)

Restart the iPhone / iPad

Start iTunes. Not restore iPhone from back up, select New iPhone (don't worry, you will not lost apps or data on your iPhone doing this)

Sync with iTunes

Jun 18, 2015 11:28 AM in response to travisfromfraser

I had a slightly similar issue with the ghost songs.

I went through my music library on my iPhone while connected to iTunes on my computer in order to delete music from my iPhone. I share music with my family, and a lot of songs that I don't personally enjoy manage their way into my library. After discovering I had hundreds of songs that I simply disn't listen to, I began to delete them, seeing it as a way to create more storage space. After deleting many of them, I discovered that all of the ones I had removed were still there in my library, but grey. They could not be opened up, and were simply there and in the way.

In order to delete these "Ghost Songs" I went into my Settings, then Music, then turned off the "Show All Music" button. Worked like a charm.

Jul 18, 2015 9:41 PM in response to rockmyplimsoul

Haha, I know its been what, 3 year since youve posted this?

Thank you so much. I backed up my stuff on my phone, restored my phone to factory settings and then put all my data back on.

Not only did the copys delete, but I got back multiple songs that I lost due to iTunes problems.

Thanks!!

"Ghost" Songs Create Sync Error in iTunes