iTunes Freezes when connecting iPhone (AppleMobileDeviceHelper/SyncServer to blame?)

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iTunes Freezes when connecting iPhone (AppleMobileDeviceHelper/SyncServer to blame?)

I'm having several issues with iTunes and connecting my phone. iTunes becomes unresponive for about 30 mins when either connecting my iPhone (via cable or seeing it over WiFi when WiFi-sync is enabled), pressing sync, or sometimes other tasks which relate to the device. While frozen, iTunes continues playing the current track until the end, then it won't start the next one until it becomes responsive again.

I think I've tracked down the error; I noticed that iTunes has a child process called "AppleMobileDeviceHelper", terminating this causes iTunes to resume (although it won't sync the device anymore until it restarts). Upon further investigation, I looked at which files AppleMobileDeviceHelper was using, and found the "syncservices.log" log in ~/Library/Logs/Sync/. Looking at the log, it was clear something wrong was going on since the following lines were being added to it every few seconds:

2012-01-25 22:51:21:640|SyncServer|40031|0x10b016e50|Logging|Info| Logging initialized, engine version 673.3 : log level 3

2012-01-25 22:51:21:645|SyncServer|40031|0x10b016e50|SQLite|Error| Detected out-of-space situation: 0 (Undefined error: 0). 786713006080 bytes free in Robert.

2012-01-25 22:51:22:339|AppleMobileDeviceHelper|36432|0x35de40|Mingler|Error| failed to connect to the server: NSInvalidReceivePortException connection went invalid while waiting for a reply because a mach port died

2012-01-25 22:51:22:876|AppleMobileDeviceHelper|36662|0x388730|Mingler|Error| failed to connect to the server: NSInvalidReceivePortException connection went invalid while waiting for a reply because a mach port died

I couldn't find a process called "SyncServer", I'm guessing it failed to start due to being unable to start SQLite, which is why ApplyMobileDeviceHelper is presumably unable to connect to it, just after. The SQLite error complains of apparently not having enough space, although as you can see I have over 780GB free, and there's plenty of free space on my iPhone, too.

Does anyone have any idea why these errors might be happening? I've seen people report similar issues (and that iTunes normally resolves itself after a while), although it's not fixed it for me (as I have to do that everytime), and I've found nothing searching for the errors in that log.

Late 2008 15" MacBook Pro 2.8 Ghz, 10.7.2, iTunes 10.5.3, iPhone 4 running 5.0.1

Any help would be appreciated, thanks!

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.2), Late 2008 15" 2.8 GHz

Posted on Jan 25, 2012 3:02 PM

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Answer 1

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Aquis Author

Level 1

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Jan 26, 2012 4:35 AM in response to Aquis

After some extensive digging around, I've been able to fix this problem by trashing the "SyncServices" folder in ~/Library/Application Support.

I tried running SyncDiagnostics.app, which I found in the same directory as SyncServer.app (which I found through spotlight). That froze, so I killed it, and then I found a support document pointing me to a perl script to run (on step 10). That also failed, but it revealed the SyncServices folder and its location, so after closing applications which appeared to be failing because of SyncServer (the perl script, SyncDiagnostics.app, Mail, iTunes), I trashed the folder and restarted. And then it all worked!

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Answer 2

Jan 27, 2012 1:15 AM in response to Aquis

Thank you so much!!! I spent 2 hours with apple support and they couldn't help me. After trying your solution, all is well. Thank you, thank you , Thank you 🙂

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Answer 3

Aug 6, 2012 7:04 PM in response to Aquis

Perfect! Thanks

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Answer 4

Zac.

Level 4

1,375 points

Oct 23, 2012 7:54 AM in response to Aquis

Thanks, this has been bugging me for a month or so now....and resetting SyncServices as recommended by Apple did not work.

This did.

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Answer 5

Jan 4, 2013 6:15 PM in response to Zac.

Unfortunately, this didn't solve my problem. I trashed SynServices in Application Support, restarted, and then connected my phone to iTunes.

The Spinning Beach Ball of Death has been going for 2 minutes now, and it looks like I'll have to force quit.

Any other ideas? This is really frustrating.

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Answer 6

nbison

Level 1

4 points

Jan 30, 2013 11:19 AM in response to s_w_i_t_t_e_r_s

Hi Switters,

Did you manage to resolve your issue? I am having the same problem and by trashing the SyncServices folder has not helped 😟

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Answer 7

Mar 14, 2013 4:37 PM in response to Aquis

Thanks mate! It solved my problem too!

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Answer 8

Sep 25, 2013 4:57 PM in response to Aquis

I have been battling this issue for ages, and seeing how many other poor people have this issue with little to no help from apple. I will post what worked for me. I tried everything, I mean everything and my itunes would still freeze when my iphone was connected.

go to podcasts on your device, and delete every single episode you have. This instantly fixed my problem and I hope it helps people in the future.

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Answer 9

Sep 29, 2013 9:25 AM in response to Aquis

This worked for me too. We've had this problem for over a year, and it finally did the trick!

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Answer 10

neverfi

Level 1

0 points

Jan 29, 2014 6:18 AM in response to Aquis

After tracing system calls on SyncServer, I narrowed down the error to the admin.syncdb database for SyncServer. My solution was to rename the database file. SyncServer then recreated that database on its own and seems to have solved the problem reported with 'Detected out-of-space situation' error messages.

Specifically, in this directory:

~/Library/Application Support/SyncServices/Local

I renamed the renamed the admin db via terminal with:

$ mv admin.syncdb admin.syncdb.org

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Answer 11

Jun 1, 2014 5:24 AM in response to Aquis

Fixed it for me also! Thanks for this post.

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Answer 12

Jun 22, 2014 1:57 PM in response to Aquis

This totally fixed my problem as well!

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Answer 13

Jul 2, 2014 12:52 AM in response to Aquis

This problem was the bain of my existence for two days...

It's probably worth noting for less tech savvy people like me that the location from which you delete/rename the file can be found using this process: why can't i find my application support folder

.. I tried moving the entire folder to trash - iTunes no longer froze however got a little stuck on step 6 of the synching process

I then replaced the old SyncServices (and followed prompts to revert back to this folder) and renamed the 'local' within it as neverfi suggested - that worked.

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Answer 14

Jul 6, 2014 4:42 PM in response to Aquis

Thank you. I had the same issue, and your solution worked.🙂

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