Windows – iTunes randomly freezes on startup on Windows 7

hangituneswindows

I'm running iTunes 11.4.0.18 (the latest available version) on Windows 7 x64; for reference, I've been having this problem for months, and even on the computer I had before this one, which I replaced in December 2013; thus, this doesn't seem a version-specific or system-specific issue. The only Apple devices I've connected to iTunes are iPhones: I started with a 4, then replaced it with a 5, now I have a 5s; this doesn't seem to have affected the issue in any way.

The problem is: sometimes, iTunes freezes upon launching. It displays the main window, but it's blank or almost blank, and it doesn't answer any click. This has no resolution, waiting is useless, and the only way out of it is by killing the iTunes.exe process from the Task Manager.

What is really strange is, when this happens, there actually are two iTunes.exe processes in the Task Manager; killing one of them kills them both, and after doing this, iTunes can be launched again, and it just works.

This happens randomly and not very often (about 1-2 out of 10 times), but it has been a nuisance for a while; there doesn't seem to be any reason for it, and the fix is always the same: kill iTunes.exe (of which there are two), launch it again and it works. Of course, I've reinstalled iTunes several times, there have been several updates in the meantime, and I'm also using a completely new computer instead of the one I had when I first started experiencing the problem; the OS has also received countless updates, although it's still the same one (I just can't stand Windows 8, sorry).

Has anyone encountered this problem? How can it be solved?

Best Answer

The following iTunes version seems to work (tested in Windows 7 x64): iTunes 12.1.1.4.