Technical Tips – Disable the Device Backup Feature in iTunes when Syncing
As every Apple iPhone user knows the longest part of the sync process in iTunes with iPhone or iPad is the device backup. Taking up to an hour at times and most of us can live without a backup. So to increase the performance of the iTunes and saving a lot of daily time we can choose to disable the device backup.
There are two methods to disable the device backup feature. First, We will see the manual method.
Manual Method
Apple made it very difficult to disable the automatic device backup feature manually by burying the setting deep in a configuration file. In order to make the change you will need a good XML text editor. I suggest using the free Notepad++ that you can download here.
First, make sure iTunes is closed and create a backup of the iTunes Preferences file located in C:UsersYour UsernameAppDataRoamingApple ComputeriTunes called iTunesPrefs.xml.
Open up C:UsersYour UsernameAppDataRoamingApple ComputeriTunesiTunesPrefs.xml in your text editor and go to the <key>User Preferences</key> section.
Then copy and paste the code below just after the <dict> node of the User Preferences section as shown below.
<key>DeviceBackupsDisabled</key>
<data>
dHJ1ZQ==
</data>
It will looks like
Save the file and start iTunes. The device backup should now be skipped when syncing.
Automate Method
If you are looking for a fully automated method there is a free app called iPhone Backup Switch that you can download from here.
Just run the utility and when iTunes is closed click the Disable iPhone Backup in iTunes button.
Have questions? Ask us in the comments.
Amazing – I upgraded phone and had forgotten about photos – realising I had a backup of last night I thought I was home and dry till I realised how difficult Apple like to make things.
Bought this worked a dream – easy worth £15 for all the photos of my boy I thought I’d lost!
Glad I found this fix. Waited for nearly 9 hours just to backup, that’s completely ridiculous and unacceptable, and still has an inch of bar to the finish line so I cancelled and tried the above fix. It took less than 8 minutes to update the firmware. That’s awesome!!! Thank you.
For those who would like to wait for the backup, and keep in mind this is for everytime you update the firmware, I’d say don’t even because you’ll be very disappointed, unless your intention is to really backup and not to update the firmware. If you’re updating the firmware I’d say just do the above fix and you’ll be cruising smoothly!!!
Great fix. Worked a treat. Thanks very much. I was fed up with the forced backup of my iPad everytime I wanted to do anything.
This worked like a champ. I had been trying to update my ipad OS to 4. but iTunes was forcing me to backup the device. Killing the backup using the “x” near the progress bar would simply stop the back AND the s/w update. These little 4 lines of code fixed the problem. After following the above, the upgrade immediately began… iTunes no longer forced a device backup before updating the OS to 4.2!!!!! awesome.
Thanks – that was easy! The link to the Automate Method program does not work, i just inserted the XML.
Wow, this is a lifesaver! I’ve been beating my head against the wall trying to get my iPad to update OS versions.
Great article, thank you!
Thanks so much!!!
This has helped me a lot!
Very nice! Thanks! The forced backup was killing me.
Good job.