I do not like iTunes.  Never did.  When I first got the iphone, I would avoid sync as much as possible because of the long sync times.  After while, and with iTunes8, things got better.  It would not lock up, and I would have a full sync in around 2-3 min.  I can live with that.  (I still avoid it though)

So now I read in techcrunch that we are back to long sync times again.  What is it with Apple?  Doesn’t anyone test this stuff before they release it?  Here is an except..

“… One main culprit is what should be a nice, new feature in iTunes 9 called “Automatically fill free space with songs.” It does exactly what it says, finds songs to put on your iPhone to fill it up. This is great for people like me with too large of a music library to sync it all with the iPhone, and who don’t really use playlists (the main way to sync music to the iPhone). Unfortunately, if you click this “Automatically fill free space” option, it seems that sometimes it wants to remove and replace much of the random music. If you have a 32 GB iPhone, that is going to take a while. …”

Siegler goes on saying that even with this option turned off, it still takes too long.  Around 5 min.  If its taking him 5 min, then odds are my sync will be 10.   I was holding off on iTunes9 for the same reason I hold off on every iphone/iTunes update.  Just to make sure I would not regret my decision.   Seems like that caution is appropriate in this case.