ZDNet's Ed Bott has discovered that the jukebox software installs crash-prone drivers without informing users (let alone asking them). Bott says iTunes 8 installs not only QuickTime, but also Apple Mobile Device Support, MobileMe, and two driver updates. One of those drivers-a USB controller update-reportedly identifies itself in many users' blue-screen error messages. The other-GEARAspiWDM.sys-has "a long and colorful history of causing Windows crashes," according to Bott.

This driver [GEARAspiWDM.sys] is typically used with third-party programs that write to CD and DVD drives. The old iTunes versions of this driver is dated January 29, 2008. The new one is from April 17, 2008. . . . I remember dealing with it back in Windows 2000 days. And sure enough, a search for GEARAspiWDM.sys BSOD turns up thousands of hits. I've also found anecdotal reports of this driver causing iTunes to crash, including this one from the Gear Software forum last May.

Update: Apple's posted the solution for Vista users getting smacked in the face by a BSoD when they connect an iPod to iTunes 8: Uninstall iTunes and Mobile Device Support, restart, and then re-download. Wha? It looks like a crappy driver is to blame, so they've silently replaced it with an older version from iTunes 7.7 that won't kill your system. Try it, let us know if it works.