iTunes Woes
May 30, 2007 Posted by Al Castle

trackback Categories: Castle, OSX, Puter Stuff, gnash-teeth

Ugh. Just a week or so ago I had spent some serious quality time getting my music collection in order on iTunes. The other night my laptop battery was drained and I had forgotten to keep it plugged in while syncing with my new AppleTV, and the iTunes Library binary file was corrupted and useless the next morning. After much online hunting for tips or tools to save all my work I realized I would just have to start over, none of the music was deleted just all of my saved preferences, ratings and such.

Then I decided to download a new movie to watch on the flat screen via my AppleTV, well the movie completed its download but refused to play. iTunes only lets you download a movie once, so I was out $9.99 plus taxes. Both Quicktime and iTunes would freeze when attempting to play that one movie. Several days later and as many emails back and forth between me and Apple support - nothing was resolved via their canned replies. Here’s what they sent me, along with my initial trouble ticket, you’ll notice that my ticket includes the operating system and version I’m using…

Dear Al,

I understand your system “freezes up” when trying to watch “[porn]” in iTunes or Quicktime. I apologize for any inconvenience this issue may have caused you, and will be happy to assist you in this matter.

Fortunately, this issue can usually be corrected by simply reinstalling QuickTime.

If you’re using iTunes for Mac, just download and reinstall QuickTime:
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/standalone.html

I apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced. If reinstalling QuickTime doesn’t help, please respond to this email, and I’ll have the issue investigated for you.

Thank you for using ITunes, and enjoy your movie!

Sincerely,

Leigh
iTunes Store Customer Support
http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/ww

Customer First Name : Al
Customer Last Name : Castle
email : [barph]
Web Order # : [barph]
Support Subject : iTunes Store
Sub Issue : Other Question
Comments : iTunes Account Name: [barph]
Platform : iTunes/7.1.1 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.4.9)
Item Name : [porn]

Comments:
Attempting to play the movie in iTunes or Quicktime causes the application to freeze up. Unable to watch the movie.

Ah the old windows trick, re(install|boot) as needed. Well to humor them I went ahead and reinstalled Quicktime, which of course resolved nothing. By now I’m on day four having not been able to watch my movie and so I simply pay for it again this one plays just fine. Allegedly iTunes will be processing a refund which may take several business days.

A few months prior a similar situation happened where I purchased the entire first season of Desperate Housewives, only one of the 10 plus episodes didn’t download properly. That time support turn around was much faster, additionally they waived the fee for the entire season. I didn’t ask for it, I just wanted my episode. After each support encounter they also email me a canned “How was my driving” type survey questionnaire. I answer as honestly as possible. You know me.