iTunes stuck on "Reading photos from Pictures"

Let it run over night and see what happens. I have much fewer photos than you have, and my iPhone synced overnight. Once I had a good sync, subsequent syncs were fast!

I cannot be sure it's a bug in iOS 11.3.1 or iTunes 12.7.4.80 under Windows 10. I posted earlier that I waited almost 7 hours to Sync 5000 photos from my PC to my iPhone 6s. Having read your post about the iPod Photo Cache folder, I checked the time and date signature of the folders and files. All the 50 or so sub-folders (F00 to F50) were created almost at the very end of the 7 hour sync operation.

These folders did not exist before the sync operation started. Each folder contains around 95 to 103 thumbnail files (I cannot find any reason why some folders have a particular number between 95 and 103 - there seems to be no particular pattern). Under the iPod Photo Cache folder there's a huge file (3.9 MB) called Photo Database which appears to have taken 22 minutes to create and write out to my HDU (all the thumbnail files and folders were created at 23:26 and the database file at 23.48).

The total size of the iPod Photo Cache folder and contents is about the same as the 5000 photos I synched. This seems to be a huge overhead to create just to work out which of the 5000 photos need to be copied either to the iPhone or to the PC to sync the two copies.

I hope this helps others in this thread to understand more about what seems to be going on.

I'll try other sync operations later this week with and without the iPod Photo Cache folder. I'll come back with any results that might help.

Cheers

Ian

Just 7 posts above your post rickyuruvilla explains (May 19th 10:36 PM) how to use filehippo.com to get version 12.7.3. I don't know what the last digits of the version number are. I used this method to replace my iTunes 12.7.4.80 that could Sync my 5000 photos to my iPhone under iOS 11.3.1 but it was taking 5 hours to accomplish.

I have not yet done another sync to compare timings. I will post back here after my next sync.

Cheers

Ian

Hello ... I'm really sorry .. I didn't notice my typing error!

The website is "idownloadblog.com"

The full address is http://www.idownloadblog.com/2011/09/21/downgrade-itunes-fix-itunes-library-itl -cannot-be-read/

I've just looked at this site and followed the link to a YouTube video and watched it again... ignore the many adverts!

It did work for me .. Please don't give up!

Regards, Michael. ... Let me know how you get on!

Thanks to everyone who has posted some solution or idea here; I think ALL of us appreciate the efforts of the "few" - it is obvious Apple is not willing to make the effort, so we have to reply on others here. I have some updates to share on this issue and believe it is worth the time for everyone to read. APPLE...it is WORTH your time to read as well, it MAY actually help!

I struggles with this sync for the last several months and finally was able to do a drastic check on it. While this issue was a big factor for me, the bottom line was I had both an older iPhone and an older laptop...I WAS due to update them, and I did! So after getting a new iPhone X, AND a new Lenovo X1 Carbon laptop, I was looking forward to getting back to normal! I knew better than to set up either piece of equipment via a backup of the older one; so both the iPhone and the laptop got fresh new install/setups done on them. So here are the specs:

NEW iPhone X 256 (setup as "new phone")

NEW Apple cable

NEW laptop

NEW install of WIN 10, iTunes

ALL updates done and current.

I did a couple of test syncs without photos. They were done instantly,as I expected. I added in my playlist; it was slower, but I expected that as it first time copied all my music over; second pass was again, instant. Now to add in photos. I did it with only ONE folder to be synced (120 photos)...it worked, fast too! Added in a couple of other folders and the same thing, it was going great. I was happy, and thought I had it solved, at least for me, so I clicked all the photo folders I wanted synced and let it go. It was naturally slower as again, 1st time copy of all those pictures, but again, it WORKED. Well, it worked once anyway. Subsequent syncs have ALL failed....stuck forever on "reading photos..."

I am afraid all that advice about hard resets on the phone, uninstall and reinstall software, new cables, dif ports, etc, etc, etc.....just does not work. All new equipment with NO other software or apps installed, repeated the problem over and over. For the record, LOVE the new iPhone, works amazing, but as my iPhone 6 was NOT the problem here, i cannot help but being "taken"...again!

Also, I think a large part of the reason this is not getting as much press and attention is the fact that so many users do not even bother syncing to a PC, especially the largest user base in the younger generations. My 21 year old daughter has all Apple gear (iPhone, iPad, MacBook), they all use the same Apple ID; I have shown her, and some of her friends, how to have all devices synced, etc. Ya, they don't care! As crazy as that sounds, they just don't care. They take a zillion pics a month and do not care if they lost them all, and 99% of the time, they never look at that picture again after they take it - aka "SnapChat". Music? Again, who cares. They have 10 GB data plans, a 50 MB Internet feed everywhere they go so.....lose their entire phone data? Their answer is "I will just download it again". And they are partly right. They can re-consume anything digital, any time they want....

Hope this helps someone! It was a clean lab test for sure, Apple, you have to do the same. I am sure a few photos will most likely not repeat this problem, make sure you try with 3000+ photos (large file size photos, not a bunch of compressed low quality photos!

I spoke WAY TOO soon! MAJOR update here to my previous post (saying how the new updates worked so well....WRONG).

I was happy to see the new updates and immediately tried it out. First run through went as everyone else has posted, no problems. I decided to try adding in the remainder of the photos I wanted on my phone (3500 more)...BIG problems after that. (specifics...I replaced my iPhone 6 last week as I thought it may have been the problem; so I am working on a 'days old' iPhone X with a clean start install on it.). The new photos "appeared" to have come over, iTunes even created my albums Photos (others have reported it was not doing so for them with this update). After iTunes finished "copying items", I checked to verify all was good and saw only EMPTY new folder names...no photos. Successive attempts have all failed but have revealed a HUGE issue everyone should be aware of in case it happens to them. While my photos did NOT show up on my phone, they are there somewhere. It has eaten up ALL of my storage on the phone, even though iTunes reports I still have 28+ GB free!! I first noticed the problem when I checked the iPhone folder in Explorer...it showed I had less than 2 GB free. It is a brand new phone, so this shocked me. I looked at iTunes again, and it still showed 28 GB free. I checked Settings on the phone in Storage, sure enough, LESS THAN 2 GB free!

1) So iTunes cannot see the correct storage now.

2) Photos HAVE come over to my phone but are not accessible anywhere (time to dish out MORE $$ for a rd party app to see whats going on).

3) Album names were created by iTunes using my naming in Explorer, but did NOT sync those pictures.

4) Multiple tries failed. Renamed some folders to see if that helped, nothing...new folder names did NOT show up in albums even though I was able to select them in iTunes.

It is a BIG mess! I am going to try deleting iPod cache and see what happens. Failing that, I will have to do a complete reset (on a NEW phone!). Wow, how does Apple manage to mess up something that worked for years? I hope they have checks and balance in place; someone needs to be accountable. Surely Apple is NOT! I would love to be able to invoice Apple for all my time - especially after shelling out $1300+ for a new iPhone! I feel SO ripped off.

I will report back what I find.

Anyone else have anything similar? Work arounds?

Yes, this issue has been resolved satisfactorily. Syncing photos and other media works fine without a hitch. I posted 3 replies on Jun 22 and 23 how this could be corrected. The last resort is to do a restore on your iPhone from the most recent back up in iTunes. It takes time but it cleans the internal system of your iPhone that may have interfered with the iTune sync.

Call Apple support service in your region. They could help directing your problem to the appropriate department. They could access your computer and walk you through possible solutions. That is how I fixed my device to sync on iTunes.

Run iTunes as admin, fixes sync issue.

Hey! I deleted the IPC folder too and it worked, but then it was just SUPERRR slowww. I'm talking 15-20 minutes for the "Reading Photo Library" process 🙄

Wait for the next build or roll back to 12.7.3.46.

tt2

Try to move all your photos to C drive's My Photo folder, might fix the promble. cant believe Apple is still paying the iTunes Team.

See this iTunes installers link for downgrade instructions and links to alternate builds of iTunes directly from Apple's servers.

tt2

I also just installed the updat 11.4 and yes all working fine all photos in albums.

Thank you everyone for your help

I am having the same exact issue, tried to delete the folder "iPod Photo Cache" and re-sync the photos, but it keeps on hanging at same stage, didn't resolve the issue. Need apple to give us the solution for this issue.