Home Sharing/Apple Remote Suddenly Stops

Question

I have been having this problem for as long as Home Sharing and the Apple Remote for iPhone has been available. I am throwing out to see if someone can help. Here's the background.
1. One day Home Sharing (iTunes 10.0.1 but also in iTunes 9.x) works, and then a few days later, it will not work. A few days later, it works again.
2. When Home Sharing stops, I get the messages about Firewall settings, but I have made no changes to any settings. I am using 10.6.4. I have tried turning off the Firewall and restarting the computer, but that did not work. I currently have the Firewall on and it is set to allow incoming connections to iTunes.
3. When Home Sharing stops, Apple Remote on my iPhone also no longer connects to iTunes.
4. 2 iPhones can still connect to my other computer running Tiger. It is always the Snow Leopard computer that has the connection issue.
5. My IPv4 addresses did not change on any device.
6. I have IPv6 turned to Off.
7. All my devices are running on the same WiFi network. No other connections are effected, and the iPhones connect to the Tiger computer with no problem.
8. I have tried uninstalling iTunes, and removed all iTunes related files as outlined on the Apple support page. After a fresh install, Home Sharing still did not work.
9. I have tried uninstalling the Apple Remote App on my iPhone, but it did not work.
10. When Home Sharing Stops, no iPhones can be paired to iTunes to be able to use Remote.
11. I have tried renaming my iTunes library.
12. Restarting the computer does not change anything.
13. I have not changed any network settings.
13. Mysteriously, for no apparent reason, Home Sharing and the Remote will start working again at some point.
So there is some sort of connection issue happening that is beyond me. It is only in iTunes on my 10.6.4 computer. Only iTunes is affected. Time Capsule is backing up. All other connections to the internet work fine. Sync is never interrupted.
I believe someone out there has the answer! Genius, help me!
Thanks in advance for reading and any help that can be offered.

Answer 1

Peter Thomson wrote:
1. One day Home Sharing (iTunes 10.0.1 but also in iTunes 9.x) works, and then a few days later, it will not work. A few days later, it works again.
3. When Home Sharing stops, Apple Remote on my iPhone also no longer connects to iTunes.
13. Mysteriously, for no apparent reason, Home Sharing and the Remote will start working again at some point.
I'm having this issue as well and it's extremely frustrating. Everything worked fine before I got my Apple TV a few days ago and turned on home sharing as part of the setup. Ever since then I've had these bizarre intermittent issues where my remote app can't see my iTunes library. It will work fine, then stop working, then 10 minutes later it will randomly start working again. I can't determine any kind of pattern as to what's happening, but it definitely has something to do with either my Apple TV or home sharing because my previous setup worked flawlessly for months before I started using ATV and home sharing.
I would love to see an acknowledgment of this problem by Apple and an indication that a fix is on the way. The frustration comes from not knowing what on earth is going on and if there is anything I can do to fix it.