Q: upgraded to itunes 11.4 and now it crashes on every sync

Thanks!   Followed your steps and I am back in business.

iPhone 5s

ios 8

not working for me... Service is running...

iTunes would crash on me every time I attempted to synchronize my iPhone 6. After getting all the apps installed it would only synchronize music I had purchased from Apple. Only when I moved my entire music library to the iTunes folder would it copy the music to my iPhone.

Very Frustrating....

Well, I spoke too soon in that after thinking I had solved the issue I continued getting iTunes crashes and my music collection was on the phone only in name. If you clicked on a song it would play the next tune that was actually on the phone.

When I watched the point where iTunes would crash it always seemed to be on Apps. Here is how I resolved this and no longer have any crashes and all my music is now on my phone - and I don't believe location of music has anything to do with any of this.  I can only validate this for the iPhone 6, but can see how the same issue would occur with any other iPhone during the upgrade to iOS 8.

There was a mismatch of versions of the Apps between my iPhone and iTunes. The Apps in iTunes all needed updating, while my phone had already been updated via wifi. I went into iTunes without the phone being attached and manually updated all the Apps. Once that was done I plugged in the phone and synchronized. I didn't have any crashes and all the music was transferred to the phone. I have synchronized several times just for testing and never have crashes.

I'm now happy once again.

Hope this helps someone.

Following on from rjay22 does this then mean that you need to update apps on your device AND itunes separately before trying to sync otherwise it will crash? I'm sure before this latest version the most up to date version would update the other. Surely that was a better bloody system!

Yes, I would agree that would be the definition of synchronization. Seems pretty simple.

My guess is if you set up your new phone (assuming the iPhone 6) by restoring a backup from iTunes rather than iCloud, you would probably be just fine. My issue is I restored from iCloud, then all the Apps updated via wifi and then I synchronized since I had more storage and wanted more content on the phone. That's when I ran into Apps on iTunes being out of date.

I don't understand why they changed how this works. Apple are frustratingly **** at talking to those who actually keep them in business. I don't have a problem moving away from Apple and problems like this just push me further away. Another instance of "it just DOESN'T work".

Having this same problem, NAS is not involved, Bonjour is running. User has a new iPhone 6, restores from Backup of her 5S, iTunes.exe crashes when she reaches the App Sync part. Windows 7, x64.

Same issues:

Win 7, 64-bit

Synology NAS

Iphone 6 plus

Every time I connect the iPhone 6 plus and do a sync, it crashes when the apps begin to sync. Rolling back to itunes 11.3.x won't work since it is an iphone 6 plus. Safe mode did nothing.

Turned off/unistalled icloud. Turned off the check purchase in the cloud.Turned off wifi sync.

Manually rebuilt the apps and music via the cloud.

What's next?

After repeatedly hitting my head against the brickwall that is iTunes 11.4 (11.4.0.18 to be specific in my case) and iOS 8 (8.0.2), I am beginning to form an overall picture of the nature (but not the cause) of this increasingly frustrating problem.

Essentially, whenever there is any difference between the apps in your iTunes and your devices (iPhone, iPad, etc), whether it be in the form of you updating the apps in your iTunes but not your devices and vice versa, or in the form of you deleting, adding, or re-arranging the apps in your devices, the syncing process between iTunes and your devices will hang will it gets to the stage of syncing the apps. You may see this problem manifested in the inability to update the apps in your devices, which you had already updated in iTunes, or the system trying but failing to re-install apps that you have deleted on your devices, which the syncing process should have reflected in your iTunes if it did not hang.

In one of my earlier posts on this subject, I thought that a workaround for this problem would be to update your apps on your devices first, and then independently on your iTunes, before connecting them and syncing. However, this patch only worked if you did not add, deleted, or re-arranged any apps on your devices, and after you have done so, independent updates are not sufficient to prevent the syncing process from hanging.

Now, I have stumbled upon a more effective workaround, but there's a catch. I found that if you deleted all your apps (including the underlying files) in your iTunes, the syncing process works. Moreover, deleting the apps on my iTunes did not affect the apps already present on my devices. However, the price you pay in taking this workaround is that you have to manually manage your apps on each device. Also, if and when Apple manages to solve this problem, you will have to undergo the tedious task of rebuilding your app library on iTunes, so that you can once again sync apps between your iTunes and all devices. As I need my music, videos, and books synced, this is a price I am willing to pay.

On top of this app syncing problem, Apple has failed to address the problem over loss of control over the "Other" storage component, and even though it pains me, I am now looking into whether there is a better eco-system than iTunes and iCloud, especially one which I have more control over storage and syncing processes.

I am just plain sick of this crap, now even with both the devices up to date with regard apps it still crashes. Apple need to pull that thumb out of their arse and fix this. Or the very least the stuck up ***** should do is issue a statement telling us what they are going to do, but just letting us sit and seethe is criminal. I will think long and hard about any future Apple purchases. Their attitude stinks.

Followed up Apple Engineer working on this issue for me and he wants me to try a few more thing on my iTunes, which is a bit difficult seeing I am holidaying now.

i Have asked for details of what they want me to try so I can review them, but so far no response.

however, the mere fact that they want me to try some more tweak son my existing iTunes installation, tells me that they are no closer of fixing this issue and are refusing to admit that it is a serious code defect.

i Think that this is going to take a while

I had this same problem.  However, I noticed iTunes was using the UNC name to reach the iTunes Lbrary on the NAS.  I then closed and restarted iTunes holding down the Shift Key (which allows you to select a new library location), and then selected the iTunes library using a mapped drive letter and that appears to have resolved my issue.

By the way, the workaround I was using prior to this, which someone else may have mentioned, was to make sure the apps were up-to-date on both iTunes and the iDevice.  Any new apps would also need to be on both as well.  You can tell if they are out of sync because the apps on the iDevice (in IOS8 anyway) will appear grayed/blacked out. While this solution isn't ideal, at least you can still sync your photos, music, calendar and email without any errors.

I am running iTunes 11.4.0.18 on Windows 8.1 with an iPhone 4s on IOS 8.0.2 and an iPad 3 on IOS 7.1.2.

Thank you!!!!!!!  This was an easy fix to something I have been working on for days.  It worked perfectly and took only seconds.

I didn't do anything to move my library or update apps or anything else.  Just used a drive letter to point to my existing itunes library that is stored on my server not on my c:\