songs and ringtones on itunes are greyed out and have dotted circle next to them. also saying "cannot transfer to iphone because they could not be found"

See this post on tracks that have an exclamation mark: Re: Itunes not finding (!) files, not locating other missing files;

In playlists greyed out tracks may simply be unchecked. Unchecked tracks are normally excluded from syncing to devices. In the songs view you can click any empty check box to check all items.

You could try the following all-purpose steps for dealing with erratic device or sync behaviour (including the troublesome greyed out tracks and/or dotted circles of stalled transfers). They assume that all of the content you want on the device is in your library ready for restoring. If it isn't see Recover your iTunes library from your iPod or iOS device first. I would also recommend you copy everything out of the camera roll if you haven't already.

1. Backup device.
2. Restore as a new device.
3. Restore the backup you made earlier.

Use an encrypted backup (*) if you want to preserve passwords, Wi-Fi settings, web history and health data where appropriate. I also suggest syncing with a selection of playlists (unless you're using iCloud Music Library) rather than manually adding content as, if nothing else, the process above is easier to do if you ever have to go through it again.

(*) The downside with backup encryption is that if you forget the password when you need it again, which could be years later, you may need to invoke a workaround to turn off encryption as shown in Disable iOS backup encryption, which can only help if your device is in a state that can backup to iCloud, or runs iOS 11.

For added security you might also want to make an independent backup to iCloud and/or archive your current backup before you start.

FWIW I successfully used this method some time ago when Siri became unable to call contacts or play my music.

tt2

Same issue. I have iPhone 5c and I'm on a PC. I've seen help for the gray circles on your phone, but never for the gray circles on iTunes. So frustrating.