Songs stutter/jump in new iTunes

I'm having the same problem - it only started yesterday after I updated iTunes from 12.1.0.26 to 12.1.0.71. Only iTunes is affected (Windows Media Player etc. are fine).

I have an Acer Aspire E 17 (ES1-711-P3LV) laptop, which I only bought a few weeks ago. It runs Windows 8.1.

The choppy/stuttering effect only happens when I'm browsing online, particularly an application such as Facebook with takes up a lot of bandwidth.

I played around with the sampling speed/bit rate settings both on my laptop and in iTunes, but it had no effect. I also tried uninstalling iTunes then installing the 'older video card' version, but the problem was still there.

Any help much appreciated!

Cheers,

Gus.in.Edinburgh

I tried to install the iTunes 64bit version for older video cards but that didn't solve the problem for me. I have now installed the older version of iTunes 12 to be able to listen to music, hopefully there'll be a fix pretty soon! :-)

Where do I find a previous iTunes version without this issue (but not the one for older videocards)? Thanks.

I downloaded it from the Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:7nYtkD0WVZoJ:support.apple. com/kb/DL1615+&cd=1&hl=nl&ct=clnk&gl=be

I tried going back to version 12.0.1.26 (from the link above) but it's still doing exactly the same thing! :-(

Any other ideas?...

Cheers,

Gus.in.Edinburgh

Ok I think I fixed it!

1. I downloaded iTunes version 12.0.1.26 using Froy74's link above.

2. In Preferences/Playback, I changed Play Audio Using from "Windows Audio Session" to "Direct Sound". This option does not seem to be available in the latest version.

No more choppy sound when browsing the internet!

Hope this helps anyone else who was unable to fix it using the previous suggestions :-)

Cheers,

Gus.in.Edinburgh

Thanks for this tip! I had installed the iTunes 12.1 version for "older video cards" and the issue was still there UNTIL I went into preferences and changed the audio playback to Direct Sound instead of Windows Audio Session and then restarted iTunes. No more crackling or stutter! I am on Windows 8.1 64-bit and I was only having issues when browsing in Google Chrome.

I noticed that too, but haven't had any issues. Have you encountered any?

While I appreciate this 'quick fix', I hope the actual 64-bit version gets fixed soon.

The "trick" with audio setting worked for me as well! Hope Apple brings us a decent 64bit release soon.

I think this lack of the Direct Sound option in the new iTunes must be the problem.

Compare with QuickTime, which got updated for me in the same batch as iTunes - this DOES offer direct sound as well as Windows Audio Session.

Count me as another person having this problem.

And the solution suggested here appears to have fixed it.

You would think that Apple would have investigated basic functionality before they released this update.

Looks like that version fixed it. It appears that my "ancient" GTX 980 couldn't handle a 64 bit version...

Same issue here using a GTX-660Ti video card. Tried playing with the playback setting but haven't installed the "old" video card version yet...my next step of course.