Apple's tips for solving iTunes freezes

Apple has posted a new Knowledge Base document outlining some potential fixes for unresponsiveness in iTunes 7.6. The general gist is that problematic media may be to blame.

We've noted the pitfalls of problematic movies and audio files in the iTunes on a number of occasions, particularly with regard to an issue in which the application rashes/quits while library is updating.

The first step is to try browsing through your iTunes music library (~/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music) for items with long names, remove them. Failing that, navigate to the ~/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music folder and move all the folders therein to another location (a new folder on the Desktop) for example. Now launch iTunes and make sure that the crash does not occur. Next, move the individual music folders folders back into ~/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music in groups (i.e. a few folders at a time). You should eventually experience the freeze, unresponsiveness or crash again, and you can then pinpoint the problematic music/podcast files and remove them permanently.

Apple suggests creating an alternate iTunes library to test for problematic items.

The company also, somewhat surprisingly, recommends that users "create a separate iTunes library for downloading and watching rented movies and only use your original iTunes library for music, ringtones, TV shows, and other content."

Apple also says that having large MPEG or MPG files in your library can cause unresponsiveness.

Resources

Knowledge Base document

creating an alternate iTun...

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