iPhone 3G Stopped Syncing with iTunes "unable to load provider data"

The other day, my iPhone 3G and iTunes (9.1) decided to stop communicating.

Since Apple refuses to release a Linux version of iTunes, I keep it synced with my Windows 7 x86_64 system. The other day iTunes started popping up a message

"unable to load provider data from sync services"

There are a number of suggested remedies for this error, from removing / reinstalling iTunes, downgrading versions, deleting the SyncServices directory, disabling startup items etc...

Here's what worked for me, renaming C:\windows\SysWOW64\sqlite3.dll

Now, for the debugging process that finally produced the pointer to sqlite3.dll:

First, I searched the web for the error displayed by iTunes. This is either a generic error that covers a range of failures, or it's horribly worded. The search didn't help in my case, although other users reported success using the suggestions.

Next, I dug around until I found the iTunes log files. Perhaps there's a way to view them within iTunes, but I located them under C:\Users\MyId\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\Logs

Look for the log with the most recent time stamp and open in your favorite text editor (Geany or Notepad++ are good choices).

I spent time debugging the errors listed at the bottom of the log file to no avail. Those messages were similar to these:

[4368 @ Mon Apr 26 20:05:48 2010] [ASL ASL] windir=C:\Windows
[4368 @ Mon Apr 26 20:05:48 2010] [(unknown facility) iTunes.exe] _receive_message: Could not securely receive message size: SSL_ERROR_ZERO_RETURN
[4368 @ Mon Apr 26 20:05:48 2010] [(unknown facility) iTunes.exe] AMDeviceStopSession: Could not stop session with device: kAMDInvalidResponseError
[4368 @ Mon Apr 26 20:05:48 2010] [(unknown facility) iTunes.exe] _send_message: Could not securely send message size 282: SSL_ERROR_SYSCALL errno (File exists)

[4368 @ Mon Apr 26 20:06:00 2010] [(unknown facility) iTunes.exe] receive_message: Could not receive secure message: -1
[4368 @ Mon Apr 26 20:06:00 2010] [(unknown facility) iTunes.exe] _read_thread: Could not receive message

Then I started reading back in the log file until I found this line:

[728 @ Mon Apr 26 20:05:48 2010] [_ISDVLog AppleMobileDeviceHelper.exe] SyncServer is unavailable: timed out trying to connect

This got me digging around in Windows Services applet (services.msc) looking for a service that controls Apple Mobile Device Helper. The service was started, I stopped it, restarted iTunes and plugged in the phone. A new message appeared almost immediately indicating that the iPhone can't sync without the Mobile Device service. I started it, resynced and was back to the original error.

The files for this service are located under C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Apple\Mobile Device Support

I navigated to that directory and found an executable named AppleSyncPref.exe

Hmm, perhaps my sync prefs got corrupted? I double click that executable and get a message box with the following error:

"The procedure entry point sqlite3_file_control could not be located in  the dynamic link library SQLite3.dll"

Interesting! A search for this error revealed this page on Apple Support message board. In particular, user 'johnporcaro' posted this short helpful comment:

On my HP Pavilion, Windows 7, deleted sqlite3.dll c:\Windows\SysWOW64. WORKED!

Rather than delete the dll, I renamed it to ~sqlite3.dll, restarted iTunes and sync worked right away.

Hope this helps other frustrated iPhone synch'rs!