Unable to connect to the CDDB server. The network cannot be reached.

I CANNOT get this to work! Argh! I get the "cannot connect to the CDDB server" error. When I follow the above instructions, I not only lose internet connectivity through Safari (Chrome and Firefox work FINE), but then I get a long beach ball in iTunes and it eventually says "HTTP connect error."

VERY frustrating. I'm on 10.94 and this began with the last iTiunes update. So aggravating. Any other ideas??

It's been a while since your post. I hope you can help me. I work at a school and I have one Win 7 machine that is incurring this issue. Do you know where this proxy stuff is in Windows so I can try that? Thanks.

I've been using iTunes on an iMac since day one and have never had this fault before.

Thanks to JWMS1985 I fixed it in a few minutes, but I'm still puzzled as to why it suddenly happened and needed fixing. I've successfully imported CDs with track names since downloading Yosemite and iTunes 12, so it can't be that.

Anyway thanks again for the solution.

Wow! 2014 and your solution still works! Does make me wonder why Apple hasn't fixed this issue themselves............

2015 and it still works - thanks!

This also works in iTunes 12.

No problems at all with Gracenote/CDDB-- until tonight, but this fixed it. 🙂

Now-- can I get iTunes 10 or even 11 back? 😐

I have a huge music library and iTunes 12 is like a bad April Fool's joke-- I thought 11 was a huge step down, but I was wrong-- 12-- ugh. Huge step backward in usability, at least for large libraries. I probably wouldn't care much if I only had 100 albums or so...

Thanks again.

JWMS1985 Thank you for your help. 🙂

To all, once you change your settings be sure to restart your computer.

Unfortunately, it worked for 2 CDs then iTunes froze. I restarted my computer and tried to add another CD to my library and it didn't work.

Now I get this message: An error occurred in the communications subsystem.

Genius! Thanks very much! I will be pointing other people in the direction of your solution!

A 1000 thanks..... this worked.🙂

I also want to thank JWMS1985 for the tip. I'm actually hardwired, but the WIFI on my IMAC 27 was active and I assume, the primary connection. All I did was turn off the WIFI and iTunes connected to the server immediately.

Thank you, sir!

after spending a frustrating time with this nonsense I did what any experienced IT professional would do. I restarted the machine and the problem went away. For the record this was version 12.1.05 on Mac OS 10.10.2.

I am guessing the problem is that at some stage tries and fails to connect to the CDDB and it gets marked as unavailable and nothing short of restarting the OS will fix it. It appears to be a very persistent bug and one that is probably very difficult to reproduce and that is why it has not got fixed.

JWMS1985 wrote:

I do not know if you have this solved but I may have a solution. I have a MacBookPro early 2011 model with iTunes 11 installed. This is what I did to get it working;

1. Close iTunes

2. Open System Preferences

3. Clicked on Network

4. Select WiFi in the white column on the left

5. Choose the Advanced button in the lower right hand side

6. Press the Proxies tab

7. Choose Auto Proxy Discovery (a tick will apear)

8. Press Ok, then Apply on the Network section and close the window.

9. Relaunch iTunes and see if it connects

Hopefully it works for you.

Like almost everyone else, I had the same symptoms and the above solution worked perfectly for me (iTunes 12.1, OS X 10.10.2 Yosemite). Thanks very much!!!

Fine work with this solution great thanks JWMS1985

I came across this problem as well. I'm running a OS X 10.10.2 and iTunes 12.1.0.50. I have a wired network and the solution for me was to simply:

1. quit out of iTunes

2. unplug the cable from the back of the iMac

3. wait a minute or two

4. plug the cable back it

5. start iTunes

6. import CD