Comments on: AAC Transcoding

By: Mook

Mook — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 20:33:35 +0000

I’ve tried to use iTunes both for Lossless (PC / Airtunes playback) and iPod syncing, and it’s a complete pain - I had to maintain two independent user accounts, duplicate iTunes configs and even then, the ‘AAC’ iTunes is rubbish at importing the lossless files. In the end, ditched it and converted to WMA Lossless for the PC and just use iTunes for iPod management.

If you’re ripping to ALAC, surely the overhead of keeping an AAC version of the same files is pretty small? Why couldn’t iTunes give you the option to ‘cache’ transcoded versions of files on disk (either created at rip time or on demand). This would give the best of both worlds - ALAC for use in iTunes and other streaming devices, but AAC versions on tap when transfer to an iPod is needed.

By: Andy

Andy — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 15:43:50 +0000

Strange, i’ve never seen it on by default on any of my default wma10 installations….

either way, it can still be turned off (if on) by ticking the box.

& finally, for Jeremy Higgs, I completely agree. Due to me having a large (250gb) lossless collection, I dont want the hassle of maintaining two libraries. This keeps me from moving into the ipod route. As much as I like itunes, it doesnt give me the feature to transcode on the fly. I think the amount of hits you receive are probably due to people google searching for a solution to this on itunes and finding a lack of one!

By: judoman

judoman — Wed, 11 Jan 2006 02:17:39 +0000

Actually, Mat is correct albeit ignorant; most versions of WMP add DRM by default. To see this, launch WMP (I am using v10) and navigate to Tools->Options->Rip Music. See the “Copy protect music” checkbox? If that is checked, which it usually is by default, Mat is right–you cannot move WMP-ripped files between boxes.

FWIW.
/j

By: Jeremy’s Little Corner Of The Web… » AAC Transcoding

Jeremy’s Little Corner Of The Web… » AAC Transcoding — Wed, 28 Sep 2005 06:54:00 +0000

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By: Jeremy

Jeremy — Sat, 15 Jan 2005 17:09:41 +0000

Mat has no idea what he is talking about. More likely, he’s just a liar. That assertion is patently false.

By: Jeremy Higgs

Jeremy Higgs — Mon, 25 Oct 2004 12:11:43 +0000

Hmmm… which version of WMP is that? That would be weird, considering the number of WMA files you see on sharing networks such as Kazaa and Gnutella (not that I’ve ever used them… ahem).

By: Mat

Mat — Mon, 25 Oct 2004 12:02:25 +0000

Incorrect. Anytime that you rip to WMA in WMP it automatically assigns DRM to it so that you cannot move it between machines.

By: Jeremy Higgs

Jeremy Higgs — Sun, 24 Oct 2004 13:17:06 +0000

Yep, I know that. What I was saying was… instead of putting Apple Lossless on the iPod, why not store it as Lossless on the machine you sync the iPod to, but when you sync the songs it iTunes, it automatically transcodes or “downsamples” the songs to a chosen bitrate (such as 192). That means that when you get a bigger iPod, or want to have better quality songs on your iPod, you can just change the transcoding/downsampling quality setting, instead of re-ripping all of your songs at a higher bitrate.

By: Bill

Bill — Sun, 24 Oct 2004 11:32:33 +0000

It would not be very sensible to use Apple Lossless on the iPod . . . the size of the files would cause the hard drive to spin up almost for every song. Not a good idea if you are active while using the iPod. Not to mention the significantly fewer songs that would fit. At 320 AAC I have slightly over 4000 on my 40GB and about 2GBs left.

By: Jeremy Higgs

Jeremy Higgs — Sun, 24 Oct 2004 01:53:46 +0000

Hi jbelkin,

What DRM are you referring to? As far as I know, Windows Media Player doesn’t add DRM when you rip/encode tracks into that format… It’s only when you purchase songs from music stores (which is what iTunes does as well).