Is anyone else's iTunes 11 really slow?

YES! iTunes 11 is unbelievably slow compared to any earlier versions I can recall. A simply metadata edit takes 35 seconds to save, on my 2012 iMac with 8 gigs.

In fact, virtually ANY operation takes a minimum of 30 seconds before I see a response. It is virtualy unusable. I'm hoping that Apple will very quickly find and fix the regression bug, before I'm compelled to look for another player application.

Same here. My itunes 11 seems to chug. I have a large music collection but didn't have this problem with the previous itunes. I could navigate around the db much faster in itunes 10. Now there is definitely a delay when I do anything in it. It takes 20-30 seconds just to close the program.

I have found just the opposite... as much as I dislike much of what has been lost feature-wise in 11, it loads and runs significantly faster for me. In previous versions, the UI was horribly laggy when editing my almost 40,000 song database... that lag is virtually non-existent for me in 11. However, the welcomed speed-up does not come close to offsetting the loss of basic and essential usability features featues such as duplicate finder and the list view artwork window.

For me, the only slow feature in 11 was the new and absolutely horrid search system... but once I realized it could easily be returned to old-style behavior that became a non-issue.

FYI... running on a notebook with Win7 64-bit, i5 processor, 8GB RAM and 1TB HDD.

I was just going to post and ask about this.

It is very slow to update metadata and to import new new content.

Also, new content doesn't always show up straight away - I have to go to another area and then back for it to appear.

I had this problem a few years ago with iTunes, but in has been fine for a long time.

I just installed this on my MBP (i5) and it is a lot slower than the previous version.

My recommendation: do not upgrade to iTunes 11.0. Wait for the next minor or major version.

I am sick of itunes ... I am sick of being ripped off (I am in Australia) on the price of music ... and now I am sick of itunes becsue they no onger have a playback system that works ... I am an itunes user because I like to listen to music ... much of which is about 5000 dollars that I have purchased FROM APPLE AT HUGELY INFLATED PRICES ... I am thinking that there isd a breach of contract here ... where they promise a system to play back the music that I purchase FROM THEM ... and then don't deliver on the playback system promise ... don't get me started on the fees that I pay for iCloud that6 just causes more problems FOR ME NOT APPLE ... it reminds me of the old management tgheory ... 'Get thwem by the B*lls and their hearts minds (and in this case their wallets) will follow).

Me too. Upon upgrading to iTunes 11 importing new songs into iTunes is incredibly slow. The songs that I import are from 3 sources:

A) downloaded from Amazon -- Downloads are massively held up by the process of "syncing" them to iTunes

b) downloaded from emusic -- The same (so its not Amazon or emusic download managers whcih cause the problem.

c) ripped from CD- the same

Checking and un-checking the "keep organized" box does not remedy. Neither does removing movies and podcasts from the library.

Googling this problem reveals that it began surfacing for some in iTunes 10, as iTunes was in the process of evolving into the system-hogging bloatware that it is today. I was ready to put up with the interface changes (which for me make the program less usable) but the inability to import due to VERY slow operation make this program unusable. I am now installing and testing Media Monkey. If anyone has another suggestion for an alternative please let me know.

Dean

Turn off Search Entire Library. That will restore the speed.

Click on the down arrow to the right of the magnifying glss in the Search box. Untick the Search Entire Library and the performance will improve and search will work like it used to.

Thanks for the tip, Steve, but changing the search in the way you suggest, including in conjunction with the "Check / Uncheck" solution does no good.

Dean

Slooooooooooow! And slower than any previous version. They seem to get slower with each iteration. Often the only thing to do is force quit. That sends a report to apple. Will they notice? No they will not. I wish there were an integrated alternative. Ive tried all the tricks and work arounds. Itunes dominates and apparently uses that as an excuse for abuse. Every new trick and money grab seems to make it slower. Itunes match is still matching songs weeks after I got it to convert my old DRMs. Turning it off just causes more interuptions to its already hapless brain. I suppose I will have to archive music I don't listen to that often. Any ideas on how to do that?

This is exactly what I am experiencing. Late 2011 MBP-13 running Lion (10.7.5), iTunes 11.01. Managing about 114GB in music. iTunes 10 had no issues with metadata updates. Now updating metadata (e.g. track #) takes between 20 and 30 seconds each and drives CPU to 100%.

For what it's work, I've restarted the MBP, disabled Genius, logged out of store, disable system wide search, disabled home sharing and started in safe mode testing the performance after each action. All changes had zero effect on this issue. iTunes Match was never enabled.

To be clear, outside of changing the side bar view setting, I made no other config changes between iTunes 10 and 11. I cannot confirm if this issue was occurring in 11.0 but I do see it in 11.01.

Any other recommendations out there?

Update: slow metadata update issue has been observed only in Genres view. Making the identical change in Song, Artist or Album view works normally. Weird bug...

Actually, I have experienced slowness in all areas.

I turned off Automatically Download Album Art and I saw an immediate increase in speed for all operations, not just importing. Apparently iTunes tries to download art for each song separately when importing. I made deliting and updating faster also.

You may want to try this.

Been having a problem w download speeds since I got 11.0, and even when I moved back to 10.7 somehow the problem remains. Now takes hours to dl a 30-min show and minutes to dl a single song. Before it was a fraction of that. Wish I'd left well enough alone!

Oh my lord.... Itunes is soooo slloowww...

Booting up takes Fo...ev.... ver!!!!

Performance *****....terrible program....