Can't Sync or Shut Down

[sangej01]

My ipad 2 spontaneously has stopped talking to my MacBook Air. Despite multiple rebooting of both devices, and replacement of USB cable, when i plug in ipad, it launches iTunes, but then i get the spinning beachball. Once this occurs, i can also no longer successfully power down the ipad ... the spinning widget spins and spins ...forces me to do a reboot of the ipad to recover. I am stumped and appreciate any help.

 

[Tim SPRACKLEN]

My ipad 2 spontaneously has stopped talking to my MacBook Air. Despite multiple rebooting of both devices, and replacement of USB cable, when i plug in ipad, it launches iTunes, but then i get the spinning beachball. Once this occurs, i can also no longer successfully power down the ipad ... the spinning widget spins and spins ...forces me to do a reboot of the ipad to recover. I am stumped and appreciate any help.

A couple of questions. I'm assuming that this iPad has previously synch'd with this particular MacBook - I think you more or less say that for sure, but just wanted to be absolutely certain.

When the iPad is showing the spinning beachball what is happening at the MacBook end? Is that locked up as well? Does iTunes indicate that it is connected to the iPad? Does it think it's carrying out a sync operation which is taking quite a time and that's why you're seeing the spinning beachball?

Tim

 

[sangej01]

Yes, I have been syncing and backing up to this particular Macbook Air every few nights since this particular iPad 2 was received.

I boot the iPad; i boot the Mac. They both boot fine. When i plug in the USB cable, iTunes runs itself .... but does NOT go into apparent sync mode ... get the spinning beach ball on the Mac. The iPad screen does NOT indicate that a sync is in progress ... nothing APPARENTLY happens on the iPad 2. I have let the two of them sit there in this state for about 20 min with no apparent resolution. However, the only way i can get out of this situation is to Force-Quit iTunes or unplug the USB cable ... at which the iPad2 is placed in a state where IT CANNOT power down ... i just get the spinning widget on the screen ... i have let it run for about 10 minutes (it usually takes less than 30 seconds) ... at which point, my only remedy is to RESET the ipad2.

So ... there is SOME communciation going on over the USB cable ... iTunes is triggered to run ... but that is all ... the sync just won't start anymore.

Hope this info is useful, and thanks for chiming in.

 

[twerppoet]

Out of curiosity, what happens if you start iTunes and then plug in the iPad?

BTW, there is a new version of iTunes( 10.2.2 ) that is supposed to fix some syncing bugs. You could try updating iTunes and see if it helps.

 

[sangej01]

If I start iTunes, then plug in the iPad, i get the beachball on the Mac, and no change to the ipad screen, i.e., no indication that syncing is being initiated. I just upgraded to iTunes 10.2.2 ... same behavior. Thanks for your post.

 

[twerppoet]

It sounds like your iTunes installation might be broken, or the iPad. While I have the upmost confidence the forum will eventually solve the problem you might give Apple Support a try if you are in a hurry.

But a couple of other thoughts as well.

When you say you reset the iPad, you mean that you hold down both the power and home buttons until you get the Apple logo?

You might try a complete deinstallation of iTunes, and reinstall. Unfortunately I believe this is a bit more complicated on Windows than on a Mac, so I can't tell you how to do it. I saw a brief description once, and I got the impression that there was more than one thing that had to be deinstalled.

 

[sangej01]

Yes, when I say 'reset ipad' i mean hold both the power and the home button together until the Apple logo appears.

I hesitate to uninstall iTunes from my Mac (not that I even know how to do it yet) because my backup of the iPad is there .... would hate to lose it. Yes, I know i have, theoretically, a copy of everything in two places ... the iPad itself and my host Mac iTunes ... but i don't know which device is currently to blame and hence I don't really know which copy of my apps/data is expendable and which one is not!

I do have another Mac in the house ... a MacBook Pro .... i COULD plug my iPad into another mac, but i am nervous about losing the relationship between the iPad and my host Macbook Air (as dysfunctional as it is!). Any guidance here would be appreciated, of course.

 

[Anton]

I have the same problem except I'm syncing with a windows pc and the beachball keeps running on the Ipad.This happened once before but it broke through eventually.I started having problems after last Ipad update.I suppose I should have rolled it back but I didn't.I can't turn it off and it doesn't seem to be communicating.Changed USB cord.Still nothing.Downloaded latest ITunes still nothing.Damn.

 

[Anton]

There it goes,I got it to reset by holding home button and off on button together and it worked.I don't know whether I should roll it back to the previous software version or what.That would be 4.2.1 I think.Also it wouldn't install the driver when I tried to hook into ITunes.

 

[col.bris]

I would use the latest version all that happened is the iPad was lost in translation by resetting it cleared the memory so all worked. I usually do a reset on my iPad before syncing any way. But to be honest that is maybe once a month.

The other thing on a Mac to consider is permissions. It is good idea to launch disk utilities from the utility folder and repair permissions. This often fixes issues with connections like USB and FireWire plus fixes other areas that may cause hiccups. In general Snow leopard Mac os is bullet proof it is more often when problems occur it is an app issue and not hardware. On a final note I set up for my clients a second user account called admin. The purpose of this is a self test by switching user accounts is that sometimes problems go away thus showing the cause is in fact something that the user has installed. I sync 4 iPhones, 2 iPads, and An Apple TV older version with a 3 year old MacBook using 3 iTunes accounts and frankly I have never had any issues.

 

[twerppoet]

Yes, when I say 'reset ipad' i mean hold both the power and the home button together until the Apple logo appears.

I hesitate to uninstall iTunes from my Mac (not that I even know how to do it yet) because my backup of the iPad is there .... would hate to lose it. Yes, I know i have, theoretically, a copy of everything in two places ... the iPad itself and my host Mac iTunes ... but i don't know which device is currently to blame and hence I don't really know which copy of my apps/data is expendable and which one is not!

I do have another Mac in the house ... a MacBook Pro .... i COULD plug my iPad into another mac, but i am nervous about losing the relationship between the iPad and my host Macbook Air (as dysfunctional as it is!). Any guidance here would be appreciated, of course.

On a Mac you deinstall iTunes by dragging it into the trash. You reinstall it by downloading the newest version from Apple's site. Your library is unaffected by this.

However, if your library is corrupt replacing iTunes won't help. Besides, the update probably already replaced iTunes. It usually does.

You are safe enough plugging the iPad into the MBP to see what happens, as long as you don't say yes when it asks you to erase the iPad. At least you'd be able to see if the iPad locks up again. That would help determine whether it's the computer or iPad.

If it is the computer, we can walk you through moving your iTunes library to the new machine if that seems like a good idea. Or, if you've got an Apple store near you could make an appointment and hand the whole mess to them.

Gota agree with col.bris about repairing permissions. It's saved me some headaches in the past.

 

[twerppoet]

Belatedly, two other things occur to me. They probably should have been the first.

If you have not done so, to into iTunes (before you connect the iPad) go to preferences, Devices, and turn off automatic syncing. It would be good to know if things go crazy just because you plug the iPad in, or when iTunes decides you need to sync.

Second, if it the first stops the lockups on plug in, maybe be it is the backup file.

Another person recently reported problems with frozen syncs, and it was cleared by deleting the backup file. You can do this in the same place that you turned off auto-syncing.

Hope that helps.

 

[sangej01]

Repaired Permissions, to no avail. Plugged iPad into another MacBook Air, with similar results .... Does this necesarilly imply hardware damage somehow to ipad port?

 

[twerppoet]

The port, or something else on the iPad seems likely.

 

[sangej01]

Resolution! Apple Support had me plug the ipad in to the Mac while holding the Home button down; this put the iPad into Recovery mode ... was able to restore (and, incidentally update iPad software to latest release) to factory settings, then restore from backup. Took a few hours, but iPad is back to normal. Thank you to all for you comments. Deeply appreciated.