UPDATE 10.23.2013: Apple released Mac OS 10.9 A.K.A. Mavericks yesterday. I do not know if iTunes 10.7 will run on the new OS. If you are still at iTunes 10.7, upgrading to Mavericks will certainly install iTunes 11. If you decide to upgrade to Mavericks I would advise doing a full bootable clone of your startup HD with something like Carbon Copy Cloner. Once your upgrade is completed you would have to downgrade to iTunes 10.7. If you’re “feeling lucky” or want to be a “Guinea pig” go for it and report back. The downgrade process should be the same. You do so at your own risk!
UPDATE 05.16.2013: Apple updated iTunes 11 to 11.0.3. With this update Album Art was added back to the Songs View. The Mini Player was also updated, as were other features and bug fixes. They also increased the speed of searches in large music libraries. Sorry to say, Cover Flow is still not back. I wrote a new blog article about 11.0.3 because I did do the upgrade & will use it now. But before I went crazy I tested that iTunes 11.0.3 can also be downgraded back to iTunes 10.7 with my How To below. If you still ned to downgrade … read my How To below. Thanks … Joe
Sometimes even I regret blindly upgrading an Apple application without doing any research. This was the case installing the iTunes 11 upgrade. Lots of pretty eye candy … but the loss of many features. Ones that many people use every day.
You may have your own reason for wanting to downgrade, but rest assured, the procedure outlined after the break, worked 100% for me. So it should work for you. The operative word here is … should.
It took much looking to piece this together. I’m posting it here just for reference. Make sure you have a backup of your data before proceeding. Then use the most recent TimeMachine backup BEFORE your iTunes 11 install.
One other thing … if you are downgrading to iTunes 10.7 because Apple removed a feature you used, or for whatever reason you downgraded … let Apple know! Go to the Apple iTunes Feedback Page and leave feedback about why you downgraded. If enough people register their reasons why, and what features they’d like back in future iTunes versions … Apple has been know to bend to the will of the people and return features. So when you’re done … come back here, click on the link, and make your voice heard. And now back to our regularly scheduled downgrade …
The following instructions are for Mac users only.
How To Downgrade iTunes 11 to iTunes 10.7:
Please make sure your computer is backed up.
Caution … proceed at your own risk.
Before starting, quit all open applications. Close all Finder windows. Disconnect any iPods, iPhones, iPads connected to your computer. It just makes life easier.
You will need your computer’s user account password.
This method might have more steps, but does not require a previous backup of your iTunes folder or use of Terminal.
Read through the instruction AT LEAST once, to familiarize yourself with what’s needed, before starting.
1) Download Pacifist here.
2) Select: General > About > Name
1) Download Pacifist here.
2) Open Pacifist_3.0.10.dmg file.
3) Drag Pacifist application to your desktop or to your Applications folder.
4) Download iTunes 10.7 Mac if you need it, here.
5) Launch Pacifist from your Applications folder.
Once open you will see the window above.
Pacifist is a shareware utility. You can use it for free, or pay $20.00. If you use it for free, you will have to wait 15 seconds before you can use it each time it’s launched.
6) Drag and drop the iTunes 10.7.dmg file onto the main Pacifist window.
When you do this you will see the window above change and say “Drop a package, archive, or disk image file here.
7) The window above should open.
8) Click on the “Not Authorized” lock icon. Enter your computer account user password.
9) Select the first line in the list, “Contents of iTunes 10.7.dmg” and click the Install arrow icon.
10) Check “Use Administrator Privileges” then click the “Install” button.
11) At this point file processing will happen, then you will get a number of dialogs popping up telling you “A file already exists” or something similar.
For each dialog, check “Don’t ask again …” and always click the “Replace” button. Do this for every dialog that pops up through the remainder of the install.
12) Quit Pacifist when the install is complete.
13) Open your iTunes Music Folder.
14) Open your iTunes Music Folder.
If you never moved your iTunes folder it’s located here:
Your HD/Your User/Music/iTunes
Or go to the Finder type: Command + Shift + G
Paste this into the the dialog (above): ~/Music/iTunes
If you moved it to another hard drive, you will know where to locate your iTunes folder.
15) One of the two images above “may” be what your iTunes Folder looks like. The most important file will be the iTunes Library or iTunes Library.itl depending on the age of your first ever iTunes install. You may have more, less, or different, “other” files and folders. Don’t worry about that. You should also have a Previous iTunes Libraries folder.
16) Open the “Previous iTunes Libraries” folder
17) Find the most recent copy of the “iTunes Library 2013-xx-xx.itl” file.
Normally it will the last file at the bottom of the list.
18) Holding down the Option key, drag a copy of the file into the iTunes folder. Or hit Command + D to duplicate that file and drag the COPY to the “root level” of the iTunes folder (as seen above).
19) Delete the “iTunes Library” or “iTunes Library.itl” file depending on your case.
20) Change the name of the “iTunes Library 2013-xx-xx.itl” to “iTunes Library” or “iTunes Library.itl”, again depending on your the original file.
21) Launch iTunes 10.7 by clicking on the iTunes icon in your dock, or however you normally launch iTunes.
If you launch iTunes and your music library is empty. Don’t freak out!
- Quit iTunes 10.7
- Go back to your ~/Music/iTunes folder. (step 11)
- Add (or delete the) .itl extension on the iTunes Library file you had previously added or removed it from.
- Launch iTunes 10.7 again. Voilà … your music should be back.
{ At some point in time Apple changed how iTunes wrote the iTunes Library file to your iTunes folder. Early versions used no file extension. But at some point Apple changed that and started using the iTunes Library.itl as the default written library file. If you installed your version of iTunes or your Mac came with iTunes installed before this change … your library file remained extensionless and that’s why you needed to remove the extension. If your iTunes version and install was after this change, your iTunes folder requires iTunes Library.itl. Okay …TMI? 😉 }
After you do the downgrade the iTunes icon in your dock may still look like the iTunes 11 icon. Not to worry. It will change to the (blue & black) iTunes 10.7 icon after the first time being launched.
That’s it. All should be right with your digital world.
You should now be able to do all the things you need, including syncing your iDevices, without the nasty iTunes -42408 error many people have been getting before this method.
Enjoy iTunes 10.7 … again!
There use to be 200+ comments covering issues other people had. Sadly they have been lost to time. The post & this version of iTunes is so old I have closed comments and will not answer questions. If you need more help … Goo-Goo-Google baby!
