iTunes for Windows not Syncing with iPhone

[WarmPuddle]

--- Edit - I think I fixed it, update at the end of post ---

Here's the problem:
iTunes will not automatically launch when iPhone is connected.
iTunes will not reliably sync when iPhone is connected.
iTunes will not reliably see iPhone when it is connected.
iTunes will frequently stop syncing and iPhone will disappear from iTunes after syncing has begun.
iTunes will not reliably sync automatically over Wi-Fi despite this option being on.

Here are the steps I've taken:
Restarted the computer.
Restarted the iPhone.
Verified that Windows is recognizing a USB device is connected.
Removed all other USB devices, tried different USB cables, tried different USB ports, tried both the old USB2 cable and the USB-C cable.
Verified iTunesHelper is running.
Wiped and restored iPhone.
Wiped iPhone and did not restore.
Uninstalled iTunes using the normal uninstaller.
Uninstalled iTunes using Revo Uninstaller (to remove left over remnants the standard uninstaller leaves behind).
Followed the steps listed on Apple's "If your computer doesn't recognize your iPhone, iPad, or iPod" support page.
I've uninstalled and re-installed the drivers for the iPhone, either manually using "usbaapl64.inf" as per the support page or using the Apple Mobile Device Support from the iTunes.exe installer.

Multiple calls over several hours on the phone with Apple Support.

This has impacted a previous phone (iPhone 7 Plus) and my current iPhone (iPhone 12 Pro Max). The problem has existed for me across many versions of iOS to varying degrees. It used to be easier to work around, now I'm often unable to successfully sync at all. It was first noticed after iTunes removed the manual sync option on iOS which is how I would typically sync before. It has existed as a problem for me since that iOS update.
iTunes is up to date and is kept up to date with the current available version. I use the Windows 64bit installer directly from iTunes. I have tried the Windows 10 App Store version to see if it made a difference, it did not. I am currently using the stand-alone installer. Like with iOS this has been a problem with each version of iTunes since I first noticed the problem. Updating or reverting iTunes has not had much noticeable impact.
I've tried connecting to a laptop short of actually syncing the different library there, and it seems to function normally. By that I mean iTunes sees the device consistently and prompts me to sync it. This (and that it's happened on two different iPhones) leads me to believe it's a problem with the installation on my PC.

Some things I've noticed that might be part of the problem:
My Apple Mobile Device USB driver listings fall under "Universal Serial Bus devices" and Apple's support page implies they should be found under "Universal Serial Bus controllers".
The iPhone seems to be found by Windows and shows up as a device with "Internal Storage" in File Explorer.
The iPhone will always charge when connected to the PC. It seems like Windows can find the iPhone, but I'm suspicious it might be routing it as the wrong type of device.
After uninstalling iTunes and/or the iPhone drivers Windows will often install a driver update. The update is listed under "Driver Updates" and "Apple, Inc. - USBDevice - 486.0.0.0". It seems suspicious to me that I would need this as it installs after installing the latest version of iTunes and/or Apple Mobile Device Support.

I can occasionally (now very rarely) complete a sync successfully by doing the following. Restarting the PC and the iPhone. Launching iTunes. Connecting the iPhone. At this point it will either sync normally or start to sync and then disappear. If the sync fails and the device disappears the iPhone will not be found in iTunes again unless I repeat the series of restarts. If the sync completes successfully, and I try to sync the device again the sync will fail and the device will disappear again until I repeat the series of restarts. A complete uninstall/re-install of iTunes seems to allow me one successful sync/connection before the problem returns.

Any help would greatly appreciated. I've tried everything I can think of, and I'm pulling my hair out. The only thing I can think to try next is a complete re-install of Windows, but I'd like to avoid that if at all possible. I'd just like to know what's gone wrong.

--- Edit ---

I was bothered by the USB drivers showing up under the different heading of USB devices instead of USB controllers in Device Manger. There were two Apple USB listings under devices, so I manually attempted to "update" the driver from the Windows 10 automatically updated version of 486.0.0.0 from Oct 2020 with the driver found in Apple Mobile Devices. One of the listing refused and one of the listings let me update the driver. It immediately moved the listing to USB controllers. The driver is now listed as being version 6.0.9999.69 from 2017. The second listing is gone. I've restarted the PC and I can sync my iPhone with iTunes as many times as I want. I've restarted the PC a few times, synced multiple times in a row, restarted iTunes, used iTunes to force a sync over Wi-Fi... anything I can think of. All of the syncing is working and appears to be reliable so far. It's only been an hour, but I've never had any sort of change or success before. The only thing that isn't working the way it sounds like it should is iTunes isn't automatically opening when I connect my iPhone to the PC. I don't really mind. Looks like I fixed it. I figured I'd leave this here if anyone else is struggling with this. It figures I would stumble across the answer not during the months of struggling with this issue and running troubleshooting it but instead around an hour after posting for help.

 

[WarmPuddle]

And the problem has come back.

I still have two drivers installed under "Universal Serial Bus devices" for Apple Mobile USB Composite Device & Apple Mobile USB Device. Driver version 486.0.0.0. The iPhone is showing up under "Portable Devices" when plugged in as "MTP USB Device" version 10.0.19041.746. I believe when it was working this showed up as "Apple iPhone" but I've been unable to get it to function normally for the last two weeks so I could be wrong.

I'm out of ideas. Anytime I seem to be able to re-install myself into the iPhone syncing it will inevitably break again. I managed to save the diagnostics from iTunes if that is useful. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[jetsam]

And the problem has come back.

I still have two drivers installed under "Universal Serial Bus devices" for Apple Mobile USB Composite Device & Apple Mobile USB Device. Driver version 486.0.0.0. The iPhone is showing up under "Portable Devices" when plugged in as "MTP USB Device" version 10.0.19041.746. I believe when it was working this showed up as "Apple iPhone" but I've been unable to get it to function normally for the last two weeks so I could be wrong.

I'm out of ideas. Anytime I seem to be able to re-install myself into the iPhone syncing it will inevitably break again. I managed to save the diagnostics from iTunes if that is useful. Any help would be appreciated.

I have a 12 Pro with Windows 10 20H2 19042.844. You are correct in thinking "Apple iPhone" should be showing up under "Portable Devices."

Two, probably useless, thoughts:

Are you using iTunes from the Microsoft Store or loaded directly from Apple? I've had nothing but problems with iTunes and iCloud for Windows loaded from the Microsoft store. For both products, I've gone back to downloading direct from Apple.

If you are using iTunes direct from Apple - have you uninstalled all components as described here before re-installing?

I really wish I could be of more help. Since iPhone sync seems to be working on my PC, if it would be helpful for me to check anything in the Device Manager or elsewhere on my system, please let me know.

Edit: I Googled "MTP USB" and that seems to indicate an Android portable device. Are you also syncing an Android phone with your PC? If so, perhaps there is some sort of conflict between the Android device and iPhone?

 

[WarmPuddle]

I have a 12 Pro with Windows 10 20H2 19042.844. You are correct in thinking "Apple iPhone" should be showing up under "Portable Devices."

Two, probably useless, thoughts:

Are you using iTunes from the Microsoft Store or loaded directly from Apple? I've had nothing but problems with iTunes and iCloud for Windows loaded from the Microsoft store. For both products, I've gone back to downloading direct from Apple.

If you are using iTunes direct from Apple - have you uninstalled all components as described here before re-installing?

I really wish I could be of more help. Since iPhone sync seems to be working on my PC, if it would be helpful for me to check anything in the Device Manager or elsewhere on my system, please let me know.

Edit: I Googled "MTP USB" and that seems to indicate an Android portable device. Are you also syncing an Android phone with your PC? If so, perhaps there is some sort of conflict between the Android device and iPhone?

Thanks for the thoughts. It's been very frustrating as my wife's laptop works perfectly with our iPhones, so I can see how it's supposed to work. It seems so easy.

I'm running iTunes from Apple, though I did try the Microsoft Store version at one point to see if it helped. It didn't, so I went back to the Apple download. It's the 64bit version if that matters.

I'm excited about the second thought. Somehow in Googling for hours I hadn't seen such a detailed list for completely uninstalling iTunes, and I'm going to go through it right now. There are a few steps I definitely didn't do before.

It's funny you mention the MTP USB being related to Android. I was just thinking about that this morning. I did have an Android before switching over to iPhone 3 years ago. I used iTunes with a program called iSyncr to sync to the Android phone. Everything related to Android has been uninstalled as far as I can tell. At the moment I'm thinking it's Windows automatically replacing/updating one of the drivers in the background. I'm having trouble figuring out which one because changing one will usually affect the others and the different listings often seem to share drivers.

Off to try the removal instructions.

--- Edit ---

After following the removal instructions it's working, but that's normal. Lately it takes a day or two before it starts acting up. For what it's worth the iPhone is showing up as "Apple iPhone" again instead of MTP USB. The disappointing thing is the extra steps weren't necessary. It was the stuff about deleting folders that were left behind "in some rare cases". I guess they weren't kidding around as uninstalling iTunes wiped them all out, so I didn't actually do anything differently. I'll keep trying every few days and post back if/when it all breaks again.

One thing I noticed that might mean something is that it said to uninstall Apple Application Support (32-bit, 64-bit or both). Apple Application Support wasn't installed at all. After re-installing it still isn't installed. I found a support post on Apple's forums that mentions it was possibly removed in October 2020.

 

[jetsam]

I have both Apple Application Support 32 bit and 64 bit installed with installation dates of 12/14/20, which was when iTunes was last updated.

Bonjour, Apple Software Update and Apple Mobile Device Support were also installed on 12/14/20.

 

[WarmPuddle]

I have both Apple Application Support 32 bit and 64 bit installed with installation dates of 12/14/20, which was when iTunes was last updated.

Bonjour, Apple Software Update and Apple Mobile Device Support were also installed on 12/14/20.

Weird. It's iTunes 12.11.0.26? I double-checked on my wife's computer which is working correctly, and she doesn't have Apple Application Support installed either. I looked inside the iTunes installer I downloaded today and I don't see it in there. All that's inside is AppleMobileDeviceSupport64.msi, AppleSoftwareUpdate.msi, Bonjour64.msi, iTunes64.msi & SetupAmin.exe. I'm not sure if it's related, but that seems odd. Maybe I can track down an older version of iTunes to pull out Application Support in case things go south. This is the thread I found mentioning it had been removed.

So far I've thrown a couple of reboots at my computer, and I'm still syncing normally. Device manager still shows Apple iPhone. I noticed in the link you posted it said "Don't uninstall these components in a different order, or only uninstall some of them.". I'm crossing my fingers I just uninstalled everything in the wrong order before.

Oh, one other weird symptom, it always or almost always asks me to "Trust" my computer on my iPhone. I'm pretty sure it only asked once with my wife's phone.

 

[jetsam]

Weird. It's iTunes 12.11.0.26? I double-checked on my wife's computer which is working correctly, and she doesn't have Apple Application Support installed either. I looked inside the iTunes installer I downloaded today and I don't see it in there. All that's inside is AppleMobileDeviceSupport64.msi, AppleSoftwareUpdate.msi, Bonjour64.msi, iTunes64.msi & SetupAmin.exe. I'm not sure if it's related, but that seems odd. Maybe I can track down an older version of iTunes to pull out Application Support in case things go south. This is the thread I found mentioning it had been removed.

So far I've thrown a couple of reboots at my computer, and I'm still syncing normally. Device manager still shows Apple iPhone. I noticed in the link you posted it said "Don't uninstall these components in a different order, or only uninstall some of them.". I'm crossing my fingers I just uninstalled everything in the wrong order before.

Oh, one other weird symptom, it always or almost always asks me to "Trust" my computer on my iPhone. I'm pretty sure it only asked once with my wife's phone.

Yes, I have the same version of iTunes.

In the thread you cited, someone speculated that they still have Apple Application support because they use iCloud for Windows. I, too, use iCloud for Windows.

Edit: I downloaded iCloudSetup.exe from Apple. Inside the installer is both versions of Apple Application Support. That's why I have it and you don't.

 

[WarmPuddle]

Yes, I have the same version of iTunes.

In the thread you cited, someone speculated that they still have Apple Application support because they use iCloud for Windows. I, too, use iCloud for Windows.

Edit: I downloaded iCloudSetup.exe from Apple. Inside the installer is both versions of Apple Application Support. That's why I have it and you don't.

Well, that explains it. I'm not using iCloud. I was hoping that might've been something that could help.

The sync issues came back. Seemed to be running fine for the past 2 days and then BOOM! When the phone's plugged in it seems like Windows can see the iPhone correctly, but iTunes doesn't. I'm even getting the prompt to "Trust" the computer every single time. When I run the iTunes diagnostics it says there isn't an "iPod, iPhone or iPad found".

I've been keeping an eye on the drivers to see if Windows is/was updating them in the background and near as I can tell nothing has changed. Driver versions are the same (Apple iPhone 10.0.19041.746, Apple Mobile Device USB Composite Device 486.0.0.0 & Apple Mobile Device USB Device 486.0.0.0). I did notice in Device Manager that the Apple iPhone "Properties" says "Manufacturer: (Standard MTP Device)". The other driver entries say "Apple, Inc.". Seems like this one should too, right?

If I manually try to update the Apple iPhone driver with usbaapl64.inf as recommended on some of the support sites I get a message saying "The folder you specified doesn't contain a compatible software driver for your device. If the folder contains a driver, make sure it's designed to work with Windows for x64-based systems."

At this point I have no clue what is changing or what to try next. The only option I can think of is to reinstall Windows.

 

[jetsam]

I did notice in Device Manager that the Apple iPhone "Properties" says "Manufacturer: (Standard MTP Device)". The other driver entries say "Apple, Inc.". Seems like this one should too, right?

Yes, it should say "Apple Inc." Mine does.

If I manually try to update the Apple iPhone driver with usbaapl64.inf as recommended on some of the support sites I get a message saying "The folder you specified doesn't contain a compatible software driver for your device. If the folder contains a driver, make sure it's designed to work with Windows for x64-based systems."

At this point I have no clue what is changing or what to try next. The only option I can think of is to reinstall Windows.

You're using the usbaapl64.inf found at "%ProgramFiles%\Common Files\Apple\Mobile Device Support\Drivers", right? When I installed that driver, I got "installed successfully".

With the Manufacturer field changing on your system to "Standard MTP device" I think you still have some Android code hanging around. If it were me, I'd search through "Program Files" , "Program Files (X86)", "ProgramData", the various Common Directories, etc. for any remaining files. You might also want to search the Registry for anything pertaining to Android, and delete that. It might actually be easier to re-install Windows, though personally I would really hate to do that.

Plan B - workaround instead of fix.

What exactly are you trying to accomplish?

There are several third party programs that do most of what iTunes does, if not more. One of these may do the job for you. I am partial to iMazing, though there are several competitors that people like, too.

 

[WarmPuddle]

Yes, it should say "Apple Inc." Mine does.

You're using the usbaapl64.inf found at "%ProgramFiles%\Common Files\Apple\Mobile Device Support\Drivers", right? When I installed that driver, I got "installed successfully".

Yes, that's where I'm getting the driver from. Typically, I'm only able to use this driver to update 1 of the 3 iPhone drivers. Would you mind telling me what the driver version is of the Apple iPhone driver?

With the Manufacturer field changing on your system to "Standard MTP device" I think you still have some Android code hanging around. If it were me, I'd search through "Program Files" , "Program Files (X86)", "ProgramData", the various Common Directories, etc. for any remaining files. You might also want to search the Registry for anything pertaining to Android, and delete that. It might actually be easier to re-install Windows, though personally I would really hate to do that.

So... I did some checking and I did find something. There was a Samsung folder still on my PC with one folder inside called USB Drivers which contained two files an uninstaller and dgderapi.dll. I ran the uninstaller and then manually deleted the folder. I'm not finding anything else when I'm looking manually and nothing comes up when I search. I think I only had three things installed for my Android, a Samsung driver pack, Samsung backup/restore software and iSyncr. As far as I can tell all of that is gone. I did a simple search for Samsung in the registry and I found quite a few references. Most were related to a Samsung flash drive I have, but quite a few were for my old S7. One specifically mentioned Samsung S7 & MTP USB driver. I deleted anything I could determine was linked to the S7. I figure if it breaks anything, it only means I'll have to re-install which I'm slowly leaning towards anyway. It's promising and was a great suggestion. If nothing else comes out of it my PC is a little tidier, and it sure felt productive!

Plan B - workaround instead of fix.

What exactly are you trying to accomplish?

Basically I just want to sync my music with my iPhone. Playcounts, ratings, new music etc. I had an iPod back in the day, so I've had an iTunes library for ... decades? I used iSyncr so even my Android kept everything going. One of the reasons I switched to iPhone was specifically for the simplicity of iTunes. It's kind of just the principle of it! But I've looked at some options when I started having trouble. I was considering using MediaMonkey which I used in the past. It might work. iMazing seems pretty great, and I had no idea it existed. It's certainly an option and seems to do what I want. I'd probably re-install before I'd settle. Something would bug me to know that this little issue is still there, just living inside my PC.

Right now everything is working again. Yesterday, after Windows said it couldn't update the Apple iPhone/MTP driver, I had Windows automatically search for a driver, it found the best driver "MTP USB" was already installed and didn't seem to do anything, BUT at the same time iTunes was running in the background, and it immediately started syncing again. 🤷‍♂️ I don't even know why it's working at all. Now that I've cleared those things out I'm going to do a quick uninstall/re-install like the link you posted before said and hope for the best!

--- Edit ---

After uninstalling/re-installing it still showed up under Portable Devices as Apple iPhone Standard MTP Device. I uninstalled that from Device Manager, added new hardware it replaced it with a generic MTP USB Device. I uninstalled that and used the iTunes installer to "repair" the iTunes installation. Loaded up iTunes to sync, and it's now listed as Apple iPhone from Apple Inc! I think that's progress. Now to see if it lasts.

 

[jetsam]

Yes, that's where I'm getting the driver from. Typically, I'm only able to use this driver to update 1 of the 3 iPhone drivers. Would you mind telling me what the driver version is of the Apple iPhone driver?

10.0.19041.746, same as you.


A thought - have you checked the Task Scheduler? There might be tasks there doing mischief on a scheduled basis - like restoring "MTP USB device." I just looked at the Task Scheduler on my PC, and there were several uninstalled programs that still have entries.

Under the "Events" tab in "Apple iPhone Properties" in the Device Manager - are there any unexpected entries? I have two entries for "Driver service added," and one for "Device install requested" - all from 9:27:24 AM 1/20/21, a timestamp which has no special significance to me.

 

[WarmPuddle]

A thought - have you checked the Task Scheduler? There might be tasks there doing mischief on a scheduled basis - like restoring "MTP USB device." I just looked at the Task Scheduler on my PC, and there were several uninstalled programs that still have entries.

Under the "Events" tab in "Apple iPhone Properties" in the Device Manager - are there any unexpected entries? I have two entries for "Driver service added," and one for "Device install requested" - all from 9:27:24 AM 1/20/21, a timestamp which has no special significance to me.

I checked through Task Scheduler to be safe, but it's pretty clean in there. Nothing seemed to be obviously related. I found one entry for an unrelated old program and a few standard Windows entries that might be triggering driver update checks.

The Events tab is interesting. It's part of the reason why I attacked the Apple iPhone Standard MTP Device entry. Yesterday I was looking through there and noticed that there were around 20 entries dating back to January. Most of the entries were at the beginning, middle & end of February which seem to line up with the times I had trouble syncing and were probably related to uninstalling/re-installing iTunes. What struck me as odd is that there weren't any new entries in March, even though I had just done a thorough uninstall/re-install. When I look now I'm still on the correct Apple iPhone/Apple Inc driver and the event history just shows three entries, Device install requested on 3/4/2021 6:17:19 PM, Driver service added (WUDFWpdMtp) on 3/4/2021 6:17:20 PM, Driver service added (WinUsb) on 3/4/2021 6:17:20 PM.

From here I'm going to see how long everything stays good. This is the closest I've come to a clean functional installation as I've probably ever had. I'm hopeful it will stick especially after removing those registry entries and drivers. Just in case (knock on wood) it's smooth sailing from here on out I wanted to say thank you. You've been really helpful, and I appreciate you taking the time to problem-solve this with me.

 

[jetsam]

From here I'm going to see how long everything stays good. This is the closest I've come to a clean functional installation as I've probably ever had. I'm hopeful it will stick especially after removing those registry entries and drivers. Just in case (knock on wood) it's smooth sailing from here on out I wanted to say thank you. You've been really helpful, and I appreciate you taking the time to problem-solve this with me.

I'm glad it seems to be working, and hope it stays that way. I'm pleased I was able to be of some help.

 

[rainrumor]

I checked through Task Scheduler to be safe, but it's pretty clean in there. Nothing seemed to be obviously related. I found one entry for an unrelated old program and a few standard Windows entries that might be triggering driver update checks.

The Events tab is interesting. It's part of the reason why I attacked the Apple iPhone Standard MTP Device entry. Yesterday I was looking through there and noticed that there were around 20 entries dating back to January. Most of the entries were at the beginning, middle & end of February which seem to line up with the times I had trouble syncing and were probably related to uninstalling/re-installing iTunes. What struck me as odd is that there weren't any new entries in March, even though I had just done a thorough uninstall/re-install. When I look now I'm still on the correct Apple iPhone/Apple Inc driver and the event history just shows three entries, Device install requested on 3/4/2021 6:17:19 PM, Driver service added (WUDFWpdMtp) on 3/4/2021 6:17:20 PM, Driver service added (WinUsb) on 3/4/2021 6:17:20 PM.

From here I'm going to see how long everything stays good. This is the closest I've come to a clean functional installation as I've probably ever had. I'm hopeful it will stick especially after removing those registry entries and drivers. Just in case (knock on wood) it's smooth sailing from here on out I wanted to say thank you. You've been really helpful, and I appreciate you taking the time to problem-solve this with me.

Can you kindly let me know what kind of computer you have (make, model, how old?) I have the exact same phone and the exact same problem but don't want to go to lengths of installing operating system etc changing registry etc. if it is a problem common to this iphone 12 pro max......or if it is a problem common to a specific computer that maybe comes loaded with something that conflicts with new iphone 12..
I have tried all of the other steps outlined by apple and many reboots, driver checks, etc etc.
In fact my phone behaves in a similar manner to what you described when connected. Now Photos cannot download pics/videos because "something went wrong" in addition to the itunes problem
Computer manufacturer says it's Apple's device at fault. Apple says its' my computer. My computer still talks to my ipad pro and my old iphone 8

 

[WarmPuddle]

Can you kindly let me know what kind of computer you have (make, model, how old?)

Sure. The bad news is that it is a custom-built PC that's around 4-5 years old. I'm running an AMD Ryzen 7 1800X processor with a ASRock X370 Killer SLI motherboard (AM4). Nothing came pre-installed on it except for Windows 10.

After my last post my problems came back, and I've since re-installed Windows 10 (I formatted the drive and did a clean install). The re-installation seemed to fix the problems. Everything worked as it should immediately, correct drivers installed, no repeated "trust this device" prompts, no changing drivers or sudden !'s in Device manager, Windows asks what I want to do with the device, iTunes immediately detects it even over Wi-Fi, and it syncs every single time without any problem. I've been running now without issue since then (3 weeks and counting). It was a pain to reinstall everything and took a couple of days, but in the end it was less work than I'd spent troubleshooting everything else. YMMV but it seems to have been the best way to get around the iTunes problems in my case.

 

[rainrumor]

Sure. The bad news is that it is a custom-built PC that's around 4-5 years old. I'm running an AMD Ryzen 7 1800X processor with a ASRock X370 Killer SLI motherboard (AM4). Nothing came pre-installed on it except for Windows 10.

After my last post my problems came back, and I've since re-installed Windows 10 (I formatted the drive and did a clean install). The re-installation seemed to fix the problems. Everything worked as it should immediately, correct drivers installed, no repeated "trust this device" prompts, no changing drivers or sudden !'s in Device manager, Windows asks what I want to do with the device, iTunes immediately detects it even over Wi-Fi, and it syncs every single time without any problem. I've been running now without issue since then (3 weeks and counting). It was a pain to reinstall everything and took a couple of days, but in the end it was less work than I'd spent troubleshooting everything else. YMMV but it seems to have been the best way to get around the iTunes problems in my case.

Thanks!
-May I ask what your USB controllers and USB devices look like now in device manager? I have apple mobile device usb composite device, and apple mobile device usb device showing under USB devices.
-Did you have any software installed that uses a driver to connect your phone to the computer via bluetooth for mirroring, notifications etc?
I don't want to reinstall win on a new rig still under warranty in case it voids..

 

[WarmPuddle]

-May I ask what your USB controllers and USB devices look like now in device manager? I have apple mobile device usb composite device, and apple mobile device usb device showing under USB devices.

Universal Serial Bus devices - Apple Mobile Device USB Composite Device & Apple Mobile Device USB Device
&
Portable Devices - Apple iPhone

-Did you have any software installed that uses a driver to connect your phone to the computer via bluetooth for mirroring, notifications etc?

Prior to re-installing? Quite a few. I couldn't even begin to tell you a full list at this point, but yes I installed (and in most cases quickly uninstalled) a few different programs over the years for things like screen mirroring and syncing music and photos. I had several programs to back up and restore data, programs designed to find deleted data and some programs to back up and restore texts. They were all installed for Android though, I don't recall anything being installed after having an iPhone. My most frequently used program was iSyncr to sync an Android device with iTunes.

After re-installing? iTunes, iCloud, the useless "Your Phone" app and a program to sync pictures over Wi-Fi. That's it I think.

Hope that helps.

 

[Specimen-7]

Please forgive bump, but it's pretty hard to find solid recent threads/lines via Google.

I'm having near identical problems today with a brand new iPhone 13 mini purchased two days ago.

Fresh full reformat of both PC and phone.
Windows 10 Latest installs updates drivers, bios update, chipset etc etc
Tomahawk Max
3900x


Mine only seems to work, if I don't run the automatic windows update, that will install Appleinc, USBDEVICES ( a few kilobytes). After running this update, I will get the total of 3 device manager listings:

1. Portable device (either as Apple iPhone or MTP, depending on where I am within troubleshooting and replicating bug, and also depending on whether I hit Trust PC or not on phone(?))

Universal Serial Bus devices
2. Apple Mobile Device USB Composite Device
3. Apple Mobile Device USB Device

If I run the update, and thus device manager now looks like this^, I cannot get iTunes to detect the phone. So I then proceed to (keeping phone plugged in):-

Steps to sort of fix:

Right click uninstall MTP/Apple iPhone,
Right click uninstall Apple Mobile Device USB Composite Device, tick the box to delete software, wait 30 seconds, click yes to restart (LEAVE PHONE PLUGGED IN).

PC boots up, and I simply click iTunes and it all just works, however it can be really really unstable, often will freeze or lock up iTunes, and in which case I must pull the cord out, and then plug it back in. But nevertheless, it will show up in iTunes, and it will successfully sync about 50 percent of the time.

I'm ten hours into troubleshooting, Apple support has been mostly useless, and I have been the one teaching them, trying to ask for compensation for time wasted and/or will return the phone to the shop. The issue with support is it's so hard to get a proper link from them to provide basic email/text response and updates to the troubleshooting, and things like providing screenshots is impossible. They kinda just ended up closing most my links/case ID, the CSR just did a runner on me.

It sucks because eventually this update will just push through, when I have to do an actual windows update/windows defender definition update, it'll just come through with that update, and thus I have to go back through 'steps'. This looks like a reasonably common issue with Windows 10 users, is it to do with Ryzen, any Intel users with same problems?

I can only get a sort of fix to the issue, but it's very unstable and will always require me to re-delete device manager entries on any given windows update (you can't even uninstall this specific update).