Photo sync issues after 10.8.2, iOS 6, iPhoto 9.4 upgrades

A STRONG warning

You should NEVER make any changes to the content or structure of the iPhoto library using any program other than iPhoto

If you use this or any other program to change the names of files within the iPhoto library you will no longer be able to access those photos via iPhoto

At this stage the thread has gotten so convoluted that I have no idea what problem the poster is trying to solve but if you use the suggestion be VERY sure you have a good backup available as you may well need it

LN

LarryHN wrote:

At this stage the thread has gotten so convoluted that I have no idea what problem the poster is trying to solve but if you use the suggestion be VERY sure you have a good backup available as you may well need it

LN

Since Apple hasn't bothered to fix it, I'll happily remind everyone what the original problem is/was:

"After doing all the upgrades noted above, I was unable to sync my photos to either my iPhone or iPad. The sync would stop with an unknown error 1140 message. I tried all kinds of things, including deleting the iPod Photo Cache folder, restoring the iPad software and setting it up as a new device, and rebuilding the iPhoto library. If I unchecked the sync photos option in iTunes the sync would run to completion (but of course not sync any photos!). There were two other oddities in all this. First, when I would check the iTunes box to sync photos, the option to select specific events was greyed out. Also, even though there appeared to be no photos on the iPhone or iPad, the little disk usage bar in iTunes would show a couple GB of space allotted to photos. Clearly something was hosed."

LarryHN wrote:

A STRONG warning

You should NEVER make any changes to the content or structure of the iPhoto library using any program other than iPhoto

If you use this or any other program to change the names of files within the iPhoto library you will no longer be able to access those photos via iPhoto

Kind of ridiculous that people have resorted to such hackish and risky attempts to work around the utter inability to sync photos which was clearly broken (for how many, and which users, I have no idea) with an iPhoto update... but without a fix or peep from Apple, that's what people resort to. Apple, fix this ASAP, ya clowns!

Thanks LarryHN,

Thanks for your sugesstion and warning.

I have the same problems, but also, iTunes loads only some of the phtos in an album.

I would have 40 in the album in iPhoto, it would bring in only 18.

I've had problems with iPhoto since the update to 9.4.x, and I've posted several times here to describe them. Things are better in 9.4.2, but like JRCorv, not all my album photos are shown/synced through iTunes, and the order of the pictures is cluttered. I sent another feedback (my 4th) to Apple again last week, hoping that they will update iPhoto again soon and fix all the problems once and for all... I hope people experiencing sync-problems with iTunes will keep sending feedback to Apple. Maybe we'll finally get their attention...

Ive been having the same issues now since the original stated updates.

I have tried several reinstalls of iTunes & iPhoto, created several new iPhoto & iTunes libaries and copied the masters folder from the original to the new one, deleted any and every plist to do with iPhoto and iTunes i can find!

I even tried changing every track in a slideshow manually to get rid of the & - no joy with any.

I am now running iTunes 11.0.1 & iPhoto 9.4.2 on OS X 10.8.2.

I had pretty much given up having any photos on my iOS devices that havent been taken on them recently,

until today....

Im not sure why i tried this, but it seems to have given me a possible answer, although not a real solution.

I created a new iPhoto libary, located the Masters folder in the original libary and dragged the first folder '1999' to the new libary, this copied about 50 pictures.

Plugged in my ipad, clicked photos and it showed 50 photos to snyc.

I then dragged the next folder '2003' this copied around 400 pictures across, and when i restarted itunes, it showed 450 images.

I have roughly 13,000 pictures in my original libary. Each time i dragged a folder across, i restarted itunes and checked the total amount - where it has said '0' for months, it displays a number.

9403 was the number displayed at previous import in iPhoto & iTunes.

12,313 was the next number shown as total pictures in iPhoto, yet iTunes still shows 9403!!

Not sure whats happened, but it happened after the 9,404th photo was imported!

So i have an iPhoto library that is 3/4 visible in iTunes! Although none of my albums are there, so its still a pain to sync.

I have done through and deleted and readded pretty much each individual file/folder from the package contents, comparing it to the 2nd library that shows the 9,403, but can't find a common factor.

As i said, not a solution, but possibly someone wiser than me can offer a suggestion?

I fixed my problems by using a free, third-party app called iPhoto Library Manager. It has a rebuild function that operates differently from the iPhoto database rebuilder. The app basically looks at your iPhoto database and, using whatever information is there, goes through and makes an entirely new copy of your iPhoto database. It doesn't replace the old one, just makes a new one. Then if you like the new one you can delete the old database.

I had events that were showing in iPhoto as one event, but which were splitting into dozens of individual events when trying to sync through iTunes. Many of these ghost events had no photos in them or just 1 photo in each. When I looked into the folder structure in the iPhoto database I also found lots of empty folders. So obviously something somewhere was corrupted between what was actually in the database, and what was displayed to mein iPhoto.

I rebuilt the database with the app and it cleared out all the empty folders and made the database match what was displayed in iPhoto. That meant I actually ended up with dozens of events in iPhoto that were supposed to be a single event, but this was Ok because now iPhoto actually matched what was in the folder structure. After that I simply collapsed those events into single events in iPhoto like you normally would do to combine events, and now it all looks fine and syncs through iTunes correctly.

To sum up, what was in my iPhoto database didn't match what the index files were tracking in iPhoto. Rebuilding it the iPhoto way didn't fix it. Thus, when iTunes tried to sync my photos to my devices it couldn't do it because it obviously takes its directions from the meta-data/index files in iPhoto (which were corrupted somehow), and couldn't find the referenced photos in the iPhoto database. Rebuilding the iPhoto databse with this 3rd party app brought the database and the index files into alignment, after which I could re-arrange/combine events as normal.

Thanks for posting this Fred. I have used the iPhoto Library Manager to rebuild my library many years ago. I had forgotten that it does a good job. I thought I was all done with this problem since the recent updates fixed my Library for a while. Then a few days ago I noteced the fragmented events on my iPhont and iPad, as you describe. Then today I updated an old event with new photos and after syncing my portable devices, the event is now totally gone! Scrolling through 15,000 photos to the bottom of my loose photos shows that the new pics are indeed on my iPhne/iPad. Just the event is gone.

I have so many photos and events that I am always wary of rebuilding an entire library. Manually merging the resulting fragmented events on my Mac will be tedius. Yet at this point it may be the only solution now that my library seems to be corrupted. I still don't understand why my events work perfectly on my mac though, if the libray is corrupted.

Hi All,

MacMini 10.8.2 iPhoto 9.4.2, iTunes 11

When uploading to either iPhone or ipad. Not all the photos come in as requested.

All iPhoto libraries are grayed out (no choice avaiable)

Checked iPhoto Library Manager, No "&" in library.

Thought upgrading to iPhoto 11 would aleviate the problem.

I know many people have this problem.

Any help would be accepted.

1 - I don’t remember having the same problem on the previous Macmini.

It mainly happened when I purchased my new Macmini 2012, with the new OS Mountain Lion v10.8 and new iPhoto 11 v9.4.2

Using Setup assistant to move everything over from older Macmini running Snow Leopard v10.6.8 older iPhoto was v 8.6.

2 - When uploading to either iPhone or ipad. Not all the photos come in as requested.

In iTunes, when asked to request other libraries.

All iPhoto libraries are grayed out (no choice avaiable)

Checked iPhoto Library Manager, No "&" in library.

Thought upgrading to iPhoto 11 would aleviate the problem.

I know many people have this problem.

3 - When in iPhoto, everything works OK. When uploading from iTunes NG.

Count me in on this problem too... Not sure how long it has been in place, but found it today when I created a new Album in iPhoto with a few photos and deleted one with 3 photos. Despite various restarts of apps iTunes still shows the non-existent album but does not show the new album. Every day a new frustration using Mac OS Apple apps.

Imran

I haven't had the problem resurface for months after I deleted all my photos from the iPhone and re-synced.

In any event, there may be an entire new engine running the new iOS7 photo app. Have you seen how amazing it looks now? You can zoom out thumnails so small that entire years are visable every few inches as you scroll. This will make my visual searches for photos take a few seconds rather than forever since I like my entire 10,000+ photo library kept on my iPhone. Hopefully they fixed this bug we have all experienced with the new OS and new photo app which is coming soon. (or coming in the fall more likely)

Has anyone figured out the best way to fix this???

I have updated my Macbook Pro from 10.5.8 to 10.6.8 and now my iPhone 4 will not sync with iPhoto. I have thousands of images that I need to get off that are on the camera roll (my main concern). My iPhone will sync with iTunes and sync images from iPhoto to my iPhone through iTunes but when I open iPhoto my iPhone doesn't appear on the side. 😟

Currently downloading upgrades from the "Software Updates" so hopefully that will help, however, I'm extremely hesitant to upgrade my iPhone because I don't want anymore compatibility issues, unless this will be resolved by upgrading then I'm all for it.

Currently Using:

Mac OS X 10.6.8

iPhone 4 (iOS 6.0.1)

iTunes '10 (10.6.23)

iPhoto '09 (8.1.2)

I got here because I have problem syncing my iphone 4 to my MBP.

Every piece of software I have is 100% uptodate as of Jan 10, 2014.

My problem is:

After I added a photo to an iPhoto albumn in my MBP, and when I tried to sync my iPhone 4 with my MBP, it will not update the same albumn in my iPhone 4.

For example: if I have 10 pictures in my iPhoto albumn, I added 1 to make it 11 pictures, syncing to iPhone will continue to show only 10 pictures in my iPhone 4.

I've done WiFi sync, in-line sync from iTunes, disable sync photo from iPhoto, enable sync photo from iPhoto... nothing.

Reporting a problem to Apple received no reply, no knowledgement.

But, if I hook my iPhone 4 to the MBP with the cord, restart my MBP, go for a coffee, when I return, the photo album in my iPhone 4 is actually updated, now showing all the 11 photos. Who did what? How come?

May be I watched too many movies on my Apple TV, but I am beginning to think there is a mole in Apple whose job is to screw up Apple. I hope they find him/her/them fast and put Apple together again.