ITunesService.exe - I'm annoyed

luke_church · October 16, 2005

I'm angry now.

It's not often that I get angry...

So I've just been talking to a bunch of cool people about Mac security, it's interesting, and I'm learning a fair bit.

For example, I was impressed to hear that Mac don't have default 'network open' installed services running by default on a Mac. Kudos Apple.

:

: I'm happy, I like to see people getting technology right, no matter who they are...

But then... Can someone please explain to me...

Why do I have IPodService.exe on my machine?

-> I don't have an Ipod.
-> I don't want ITunes to index my music.
-> ITunes is set not to share my music.
-> I have not used ITunes since I last rebooted...

OK, so I'll roll with it, Apple decided that I have to put up with running some pointless service for which I have no need.... Irritiating, but they wouldn't be the first.

Then... My machine seems to be running a little slow... Hey you know what?

IPodService.exe Page Faults: 10,786,287....

(In context, the only thing that has page faulted more is NAV, but it does happen to have read 364GB since last reboot, media player which I've been using pretty much continuously during the day since last reboot has only 4 million times and has played back over a 1.2Gb of data)

Can someone explain to me, why a service I don't need, that has read only 156Kb from the disk and used 14 seconds of CPU time has page faulted 10 million times?????????

OK, so it's not good software... Once again... It did this when it first came out, I uninstalled it then, I was about to do it again now... When I noticed something. When I sent a kill signal to the process, it didn't die... Interesting...

Oh yes, I'm only allowed to kill processes in my own address space.

AND IT'S RUNNING AS SYSTEM. For those of you who aren't familiar with Windows architecture, SYSTEM is God. It is the highest level of permission on a Windows machine. A compromise to a system account means kissing your machine goodbye.... I run as a much lower level of permission on my machine. Other things that run as system include the Logon management system, the hardware comms core (which talks to the wires), and the system debugging engine (which can edit the insides of the memory at will).... Similar in purpose to a music player aren't they?

So, a service that I don't need or want, is running as the most priviledged account on the system, and is network facing.

OK, so maybe it's been code reviewed to death and is trustworthy enough... Say, maybe it's as tough as LSASS?

Err yeah... You would have thought that they might be able to stop it page faulting 10 million times whilst doing nothing if that was the case.

Apple understand security??? Maybe on Macs, they've just taken a nose dive in my opinion of their software.

Software List.Unsafe.Add(ITunes).

Sorry, I don't usually rant like this....

Back to work now, with Windows Media Player.

Luke

DavidTO · October 16, 2005

I can't answer all your questions. But it makes sense to me that if you have iTunes you'd have iPod services. You may not have an iPod, but iTunes needs to be prepared at any moment for it's users to succumb to temptation and get one. Makes sense to me that it would stand at the ready for that.

Other than that, I can't defend Apple in an MS world. I can barely defend them intelligently in their own world!

Richard · October 17, 2005

I'm afraid I must agree with you. Apple's software on Windows behaves badly. Apple is also getting aggressive about bundling stuff you may not want along with stuff you do. I needed to upgrade Quicktime recently and found that there was no way to install it without installing iTunes as well. Interestingly, I already had iTunes installed, but somehow that didn't matter.

I use iTunes once in a great while to manage my wife's iPod. I had also noticed the iTunesHelper consuming system resources all the time, so I used Mike Lin's Startup Control Panel (available at www.mlin.net) to prevent it from automatically starting at boot time. It does not have to be in the background for you to start iTunes. I can also recommend Startup Monitor, available from the same site. This is a nifty little utility that warns you whenever a program is trying to install something will run automatically at startup. Good for preventing scumware.

Nikolai · October 17, 2005

I would chime in ...
..about itunes-4-wintel, ipod+PC, etc., but since I'm a registered wintel-shauvinist-pig (hi, David!

Time to get together for another

, don't you think? It's been awhile :-) it would do more harm than good, so I better hold my peace

Winamp rulez!

David_S85 · October 17, 2005

Luke, if I'm understanding correctly (be aware that it is 12:52am when I write this and I'm not understanding much), the ITunesService.exe was pre-installed on your WIN XP machine? If so, what brand?

devbobo · October 17, 2005

Hey Luke,

I understand your frustration, not that I am using iTunes, but I can't understand a recent trend in programs being implemented as services when they really don't need to be.

David

Nikolai · October 17, 2005

David, it's easy

devbobo wrote:

Hey Luke,

I understand your frustration, not that I am using iTunes, but I can't understand a recent trend in programs being implemented as services when they really don't need to be.

David

The count on the well known fact that most of the home users would not know what the service is, or my not have proper privileges, so they will not be able to remove/modify the behaviour. Sorta spammish, I don't like it, too:-)

Cheers!

StevenV · October 17, 2005

devbobo wrote:

but I can't understand a recent trend in programs being implemented as services when they really don't need to be.

just to be fair, the iPod helper is a good place for a service to be used, though perhaps not one running as System. It needs to be there all the time so that when you plug your iPod in it can be ready to launch iTunes (if needed) and get the connection made.

That said, it isn't the best-written Windows service from what I've seen, and many people are annoyed with it. There should be a way, at a minimum, for iTunes-but-not-iPod users to shut it off.

Then again there should be a way to kill AIM permanently too

asd · October 17, 2005

rsinmadrid wrote:

I needed to upgrade Quicktime recently and found that there was no way to install it without installing iTunes as well. Interestingly, I already had iTunes installed, but somehow that didn't matter.

The standalone installer is still there, but the link is hard to find. It's the first bullet item in the list above the ipod ad at the lower right of the normal download page.

..they had me fooled on this for awhile too. :thwak

rainforest1155 · October 18, 2005

I've none of the bloated players like Real or Quicktime..
Just the 'Windows Media Player' which Microsoft forced on me, but I never use them and accidently my video files were associated with it yesterday resulting in a major crash of the WMP - I couldn't kill it and even shutdown didn't bring it down - had to turn power off!

Back to topic: here you can get the Quicktime and Real codecs incl. browser plugins without the rest of the software. There's Media Player Classic delivered with it, which is just one exe-file and plays all the formats like Real and Quicktime.
Check it out and have a cleaner system!

Sebastian

ITunesService.exe - I'm annoyed

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