Apple Lossless...is it really???

Isn't music from Apple's iTunes Music Store purported to be "Apple Lossless?" Of the songs I've downloaded, all are labeled as "Protected AAC audio file," at a bit rate of 128k. Needless to say, they sound like crap when played on a hifi. Is this format lossless, and if not, is there a way to download songs in lossless format?
There's no way I'm going to continue to download songs of such low fidelity in the future.

Not down with stuff like that Russian site, which I would consider a form of piracy, but I can see how people might be tempted to use such to counter the other form of computer piracy found in stuff like Sony's rootkits. They have no moral right to run their hack-ware on their consumers' personal computers, either.
What makes corporations' intellectual property rights any more important than consumers' private property rights to our own computers? I say absolutely nothing!
In my own system, I use iTunes for the fair use of keeping the music I listen to in my computer for personal listening, and in my iPod for personal listening.
I recall making the "mistake" of inserting Alanis Morissette Unplugged into my old slot-loaded iMac, and not only did it's "copy-protection" stuff block that CD playing, but after the attempt my CD drive became unstable in it's operation until the next time I restored my system in that computer. And I had no warning at all there was anything out of the ordinary with the CD before finding out the hard way.
I don't know what kinds of rootkits may or may not exist to invade a Mac, but I do know that some of this DRM stuff crosses a line of committing vandalism against consumers who just want to listen to their music on their own systems.
Maybe it's better to hook up the analogue audio line output of a CD player to the line-in/mic jack on one's computer and use a program such as Audio Hijack Pro or some similar app to convert the analogue signal back to a digital format without this corporate malware.
One takes a minute loss of quality one time for continued peace of mind, at least until the law catches up with the corporate vandals.

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160 Gb Classic - Audio dropouts, gaps on gapless albums with apple lossless

Dear All,
Since getting my new iPod Classic 160 Gb iPod Classic, I am experiencing audio dropouts that last between one and two seconds. They aren't frequent, occurring maybe one every hour or two of audio playback. They appear to be very random. If I play back the same track after having a dropout, it plays fine and doesn't happen again in the same place. This doesn't appear to be connected to my moving or shaking the iPod around, as it will happen when I am sitting down and perfectly stationary. Also, I don't think it is related to a bad earphone connection, as I a have played the iPod with several pairs of new and/or high quality earphones. More info: Most of my files are Apple Lossless and content is primarily regular music albums. Of note, this is the second 160 Gb iPod I've had with the same problems! The first one I brought down to the Apple Store in Ginza, Tokyo and they replaced it in the blink of an eye after I explained the same as above.
Prior to the 160 Gb Classic, I have owned 1st, 3rd and 5th generation iPods (plus a 2nd gen. Nano and shuffle). The 5th gen. 60 Gb was playing the exact same audio files and never had any dropouts.
I have reset the Classic and reinstalled all my music files (with the most recent ipod software 1.0.2 and running iTunes 7.5) twice now, but the problem remains. I am now thinking of taking one of two possible routes of action. a) go back down to the Apple Store and try to get another iPod replacement (and hope and pray that it doesn't experience this problem) or, b) change all my music files to something like 192 kbps and hope (and pray!) the iPod can handle the smaller file size without the dropouts. At the moment, I am leaning towards going down to the Apple Store as it would actually be the less time consuming of the two for me.
What do you wise people out there think? Exchange iPod or downsize my audio files? Or, does anyone have another suggestion or recommendation on how to resolve this issue? Thanks for any assistance.
To add to this, I have also noticed that several of my gapless albums (DJ mix CD's like those by Global Underground), no longer play consistently "gapless". Sometimes it will pass smoothly between tracks and other times there will be a small pause/gap. No doubt, I have checked the gapless album box and selected yes, in the album get info section for all of these albums, but still problems remain. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Again, my previous iPod, 5th gen. 60 Gb had none of these problems with the same files. I am really happy with the 160 Gb capacity of my new classic but feel a bit let down with these problems I'm having.
Regards,
Peter B.

Thank heaven! I thought I might be the only one.
My situation almost exactly mirrors your own. My first 160GB classic suffered from sudden dropouts, apparently random and almost impossible to replicate in any predictable fashion. For example, I'd start playing an album and would hear a one or two second dropout in the second track, but in attempting to replicate the situation exactly (as in, powering down the iPod, powering it back up and starting over from the first track of the album) I'd find that the fault didn't recur. Restoring and reloading made no difference at all.
So I took it in to the Apple Store and had it replaced, loaded the replacement up with music and was dismayed to discover myself facing the same problem. I too have had several iPods which were loaded off this same library, and none of them ever gave trouble in this fashion.
I think the issue might just be the size of the files in our libraries. The bulk of my files are at 320kbps, and you mentioned yours were mostly Lossless - could it be that the classic has problems dealing with large files? It's a very frustrating issue, since the audio quality of my classic is so much better to my ears than that of my previous iPod 5G.
I recommend that you take the iPod in and take them to task about it. That's certainly what I'm going to do - I really don't want to re-encode all my music, especially considering that I bought this iPod due to the burgeoning size of my library, and re-encoding would defeat the point. Plus, since it has better sound it sort of deserves to be loaded with larger files. I just hope this isn't an irremediable issue, which I'm starting to suspect it might be, since your iPods were obtained in Japan and mine in the UK. I'll continue posting as this unfolds, and I hope you'll do the same.

Apple Lossless vs. AAC 256k - and best way to change

I originally imported all my 1500 cds as Apple lossless files figuring that would give me the best audio quality for playing back through my AppleTV. But I have realized that sometimes my bandwidth is not enough (when other are downloading from their computers in the house) and the playback stutters. I also want to be able to fit more songs on my iphone.
So now I am thinking about re-encoding using AAC 256khz - I do not think I can really hear much difference.
Firstly what are your opinion on the relative quality of AAV vs. Apple Lossless files....
and secondly is it best to re-encode by ripping all my cds again (please say no) or can I just select all the lossless files in itunes and have it convert them all to AAC - and if that is the best way how do it do it....?
Many thanks for your help...

Well, I have the same question. So last night I compared the original CD vs. Apple Lossless vs. AAC 256kbit/s.
And to be honest: I cant really hear a difference between AL & AAC@256.
When I knew which version I was hearing I felt that AL is a bit more clear in the highrange. But when I closed my eyes and asked my girlfriend to randomly pic a quality, I only guessed right in 6 out of 10 trys. So I guess I cant tell the difference.
My heaphones are Audio Technica: http://www.audio-technica.com/cms/headphones/e69d047fa2f50ad9/index.html
The tested music was electronic/trance & pop/rock.
In case I later start hearing classic music or jazz, I might do this test again.
Kind regards,
Jan
Message was edited by: Jan Riggert

Confused about Apple Lossless and m4a files

I have Itunes set to import music files from CD in the "Apple Lossless Encoder" format. I notice that it makes
.m4a files. Are these in fact lossless? Are these mpeg4 files? Is mpeg4 lossless?
Thanks,
John

John,
if you get info on a file it will tell you what kind it is, in this case Apple lossless. The difference between importing a song this way and regular AAC or MP3 is size. Lossless is roughly 10MB per minute, AAC and MP3 is about 1MB per minute, so a 4 minute song lossless is about 40MB compared to 4MB.
By importing a song as lossless, you don't lose any of the song, whereas AAC and MP3 throw out the stuff you don't really need to hear and enjoy the song, thus the reason it is alot smaller in size. You can increase the bit rate that you import your songs in using AAC or MP3, making them larger, but not by much.

Nano won't recognize Apple LossLess files

So some of my music is in the Apple Lossless format and everytime I try to put those particular songs on my iPod, I get a message saying: "some of the songs from iTunes such as the file "insert name" were not copied to the iPod "insert name" because they cannot be played on this iPod". Now last time I checked Apple Lossless formats where supported by iPods, so I went and downloaded the newest iPod updater only to find that I was already up to date on my software. I would convert the songs to another format, but for some reason these few songs when converted to AAC become 2x as long and play at half speed, so I really just want to be able to put Apple LossLess files on my nano. Any one know why I can't play them on my iPod, or how to make it play them? Thanks.
-Blake

Is the podcast playlist configured to sync to your iPod from under your iPod's Podcast configuration tab? To access this tab, plug your iPod in and when it appears in iTunes, click on its name from under the Devices section in the left hand pane. This will bring you to the Summary tab.
Locate the podcast tab and click on it. Here you can configure your iPod to sync podcast playlists.
B-rock

Apple Lossless in Windows

I have iTunes working in Windows.
I have Windows Media Player automatically adding (unprotected) iTunes tracks.
I have Windows Media Player reading tags in AAC tracks (from iTunes).
I have Windows Media Player able to play AAC tracks (from iTunes).
I have Media Center also able to see and play these AAC tracks!
I have Windows Media Player able to read tags in Apple Lossless files (which use the same m4a file format and extension and tags as AAC tracks).
What I am not able to do is get Windows Media Player to play Apple Lossless files. So far I have not found a codec to do this.
This is a bit surprising since nearly every other Windows player can play Apple Lossless (e.g. WinAmp, MPlayer, etc.).
Has anyone else managed to find a solution?

It is also possible to get Windows Media Player to play Apple Lossless files as well. (In case that's what your friend really meant.)
See http://jelockwood.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/using-apple-lossless-aka-alac-in-window s.html

128 to Apple Lossless Conversion?

I imported some CDs at 128k. iTunes gives me the option of converting tracks to Apple Lossless compression. Doing this changes the file from about 4mb to about 20mb. If I imported using 128k "lossy" compression, am I really regaining the data I would have had from an Apple Lossless import? It doesn't seem logical, but it would sure save me some re-importing of CDs. Thanks mucho for any insight on this.
Steve

Converting from any compressed format to Apple Lossless will gain you nothing but an increase in file size. It's not possible to get quality back from any "lossy" codec such as AAC or MP3; that data is permanently gone. So if you want the quality of your CDs with the file size reduction of Apple Lossless, you'll have to reimport from your original CDs.

Nokia N95-8GB, won't play Apple Lossless.

Hello All,
I have a large number of tunes ripped to Apple Lossless (via iTunes). I've tried everything I can think off, but my new N95 just won't play them. There are two problems: a) the tracks end up on the device as "Artist:Unknown" and "Album:Unknown". and b), the tracks won't play on the phone (the elapsed time just sticks at -:--).
Nokia Music Manager either just hangs or copies the tracks to the phone. ANd I get the same results if I copy from my PC via "Data Transfer" on the USB.
Does anyone know how I can get these files onto the phone so that it'll play 'em? Or can anyone recommend a better format-changer so that I can downgrade them.
Cheers,
John

People in the know use analog....
But regardless, Apple Lossless is yet another compression algorithm as such it will tamper with the audio quality.
Not to get into that debate, but if you think you are getting "lossless" you are "clueless". In a good way, we are the victims of the storage problems.
To accurately depict real sound, you will need infinite amounts of bandwidth and storage.
So now that we have settled that, what we are talking about is how much is "good enough quality".
What can people REALLY perceive. I'll bet good money that if you record the same song in different codecs and bitrates you will be hard pressed to find people that can pick any codec over another at over 300 kbps. At this bitrate it's very difficult to tell MPEG4 AAC to MPEG-1 Layer 3, or eAAC+, never mind WAV or Apple Lossless.
If you don't believe me try it. encode the same song into MPEG4 AAC, MP3, eAAC+ at 300 kbps then also put the WAV and Apple lossless. Create a playlist and play them back through a good set of headphones or home stereo system at random or with someone else selecting the different versions. BTW if your pair of headphones cost you less than 200 pounds then you won't be able to tell the difference.
Since I'm already compromising by going digital then all I have to decide is how much I'm willing to compromise. If I want high Q, I have my home set-up.
640K Should be enough for everybody
El_Loco Nokia Video Blog

Synching and re-encoding Apple Lossless tracks

Hi,
I'm a brand new apple customer and first time poster - bought my first ipod recently - 80gb version. Anyhow, am brand new to ipod and itunes. To kick off my relationship I ripped about 200 of my favourite CDs using apple lossless. Now, it's all wonderful and being a bit of an audiophile(i'm not really that smug!), it sounds pretty good. So, I'm surprised to find that it really chews batterly life. Three hours or so is all I can get. This brings me onto my question;
Is it possible to resize a track when synching. I ask because in the past I've used Windows Media Player with a Sony Ericsson Walkman phone and I could resize and re-encode tracks as I transfered. I've searched all that I could and there's nothing glaring at me to suggest that I can or cannot so I'm a little unsure. Perhaps I'm missing something.
Anyhow, hope someone can advise....
Thanks
VR

Is it possible to resize a track when synching.
Only with the iPod Shuffle.
And you are correct in resizing the songs will most likely cure the problem.
The iPod has a buffer of ~32MB, which is about 8 songs in AAC 128 kbps. With Apple lossles, it's about 1 song.
If a song is longer than the buffer, the HD will spin continuously until it will all fit into the buffer. Or spin when it needs to load more data. In your case, it will likely spin up for every song.

Apple Lossless streaming on Apple TV

When streaming Apple Lossless files on on Apple TV, what is the maximum bitrate? I realize Apple TV can stream AAC and MP3 files at 320 kbps, but what about Apple Lossless file that can often provide up to 1,000 kbps? Does Apple TV support such high bitrates? (I know the sampling is always 16 bit / 48 kHz).

Hello. For some reason, your reply to my May 2 post, has disappeared, though I still have it in email. I've reposted in below.
First, let me thank you for taking the time to answer my questions. I'm confident that you've zeroed in on a solution. The clarity of your response is greatly appreciated.
Your points about compressed/lossy formats make sense. This explains the lower bitrates for those formats.
You also asked about the original source of my alac (Apple Lossless) files. As you may have guessed, the original files are typical itunes downloads, which I understand are usually MP3s at 256 kbps.
I had assumed that running them through the itunes converter would transform them into proper (16/44.1) lossless files with the associated bitrates ranging around 1,000 kbps -- with a much richer sound.
At first glance, it would appear that I was wrong. Merely upsampling the music has created larger files but without the added clarity, depth and soundstage. That's how I read your previous post. Again, correct me if I am wrong about this.
However, there is a twist.
As I mentioned, when I play these alac files through Apple TV -- through homesharing on my computer -- they sound no better than the 256k files. However, when I play the same files through the foobar2000 media streaming software, they sound much better and show the proper bitrates at around 1,000 kbps.
On this last question, my ears may be playing tricks on me, but I don't think so. I'm playing the files through a good system: an audiolab 8200CDQ pre-amp and 8200p power amp.
So, this has me stumped.
One last question: what is the point of having a program that upconverts MP3/AAC files to lossless if there is no improvement in sound quality. Why would you have a bigger file that sounds just as bad as the small one?
Regards
Here is your May 3 post, which has disappeared from the websit.
May 3
No problem. Sorry for the long reply.
I see what you mean about my equation. All 16/48 stereo signals would equate to 1536kbps. If you changed the sample rate to 44.1 (what CDs use) or something else, then the bitrate would change.
Now thats for uncompressed formats like WAV, AIFF, and PCM. And in the case of Airplay, the stream getting sent to the AppleTV is always uncompressed, no matter the the original format (aac, mp3, apple lossless, etc).
AAC files (and mp3, wma) are known as compressed formats: some fancy math equations are used to reduce the file size w/o your brain noticing the missing bits, so that initial stream (1536 kbps for instance) gets reduced to 320 kbps or lower in order to fit more songs on your device. the way this happens is really crazy but if you want to learn about it theres a magazine that did a good article. WARNING, its really technical!: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/apr12/articles/lost-in-translation.htm
you seem to be able to hear the difference between compressed and uncompressed formats. many people do but many dont. It all depends on your hearing, sound equipment, etc. I was wondering if the reason your not hearing a difference btwn apple lossless and aac might be because of where the lossleess files came from. did you rip them from CD's or convert them from another format? If they didn't come from CD's, WAV, or AIFF files, you probably won't hear a difference, because you can't "upconvert" from something like AAC to Apple Lossless and get higher sound quality. If they came from CDs, then maybe the AAC versions are just really good quality to begin with and so you are having a hard time telling. That article has some examples of the same music in different formats, so you can test your ears and see if you notice a difference.
bE

When will Apple Lossless Music be Available from the iTunes Store?

I have recently rediscovered the wonders of uncompressed music. I bought my first CD player in 1984. The best vinyl records were better then than the best CDs, and still are, but the average CD was a lot better than the average vinyl. The CD average has probably gotten better since then. At some point, I imported the CDs I listened to into my Mac, initially as 128K AAC, and later as 256K AAC, and thought I was still getting good quality. A couple of months ago, I bought an external USB DAC (NuForce Icon µDAC) and some better-than-the-usual-computer-speakers powered monitors (M-Audio AV40). And I reimported my CDs in Apple Lossless format. Oh! Sweet new music!
The difference between 256K AAC and Apple Lossless is subtle, but through good equipment it's still very noticeable. I have lots of music I bought from the iTunes Store over the years, in 128K and 256K AAC. Some of those I've replaced with CD rips, but I don't have all those CDs. I sure would like to be able to upgrade to Apple Lossless through the iTunes Store. I'd be happy to pay the HDTracks.com prices of $12/album or $1.49/track for the privilege, but it isn't available. The best Apple will sell me is 256K AAC. So now I'm getting all my new music from HDTracks.com, who have wonderful recordings, but a small selection, or as CDs from Amazon.
Apple, when are you going to step up to the plate for the audiophiles in your market and sell us Apple Lossless (or FLAC) music? I realize that we aren't nearly as big a market as the teeny-bopper iPod users out there, but we ARE a market, and I for one would happily return to the iTunes Store if I could buy full-resolution music there.

Wonderful question, would be nice if Apple was not so hush-hush about new developments, but alas, that is what they must do to stay on top of the game. I cannot wait for the day when I will open iTunes and see the phrase, "All Downloads now in Full CD Quality Apple Lossless!" Woohoo, what a momentus occasion that will be. Fortunately, we can hope that they will allow upgrades to Apple Lossless just like they did for iTunes Plus (and why wouldn't they, it's a money maker).
I too have only been purchasing cds mostly from amazon to rip in Lossless, and just came across an album of interest to me that is unfortunately only available through iTunes and Amazon. The hard copies of Steve Jablonsky's Transformers Score are only found in highly marked-up quantities on amazon and ebay, so i am left to bite the bullet and purchase the adequate 256kbps AAC version from the iTunes store. At least I don't have to buy Amazon's MP3 coded versions(typed with a smirk).
With the capacity of most iPods ranging between 8 and 160 GBs, I think it is safe to assume that storage space is not really an issue anymore. Let us cross our fingers for Apple Lossless soon(or use those fingers to raise typed awareness).

Apple Lossless vs. AIFF for iPad, etc.

I hope this question is more suitable for this iTunes section (instead of the iPad).
I'm importing songs and recordings from audio CDs (what people call "ripping") that I legally own. I want to carry them around digitally (what people call "archiving") instead of hauling around the physical discs.
And yet I want to retain as much original data as possible. I have several objectives:
1. I want the freedom to not bother touching my physical CDs (by archiving or storing them away).
2. I want the ability to maybe burn CDs if the originals cannot be located.
3. I want to use my iPad to store some of them (in addition to keeping them in dedicated audio/visual hard drive) as well as play them back at the highest fidelity that may involve future technology like iPad to stereo equipment.
So I have two questions:
1. In the iPad, how to read the file size for each item copied over from iTunes?
2. Which is better for my objectives -- Apple Lossless or AIFF?

No future compatibility problems with Apple Lossless?
Yes. If Apple goes out of business tomorrow then your music is all in a proprietary codec. Presumably if that happens your computer will last long enough to convert it to some non-proprietary format such as FLAC (but don't do that yet because iTunes doesn't support FLAC).
Also, am I wrong in assuming that my iPad can store and playback CD-quality audio through high end hi-fi stereo equipment?
I can't really answer this one. I can see articles about streaming from a Mac to an iPad, but not about using an iPad as the source.
iOS: Setting up Home Sharing on your device - http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4557 - "With Home Sharing in iOS 4.3 or later, you can stream your entire iTunes library over your home Wi-Fi network from your Mac or PC right to your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch."

Will Apple Ever Offer Music @ ITMS in Apple Lossless or Other Such Format?

It's galling to me when I look at the stacks of full-quality albums and CDs I've purchased over the years and then consider the apparent "way of the future" which is lower-quality music purchased on the ITMS and other (more lame) music stores.
I am 99.9% sure that the reason is the record companies who fear any loss of control and who are hard at work writing new viruses to infect our PCs and Macs with if we dare buy music the "old fashioned" way via CD. Sure, there are ways around those DRM schemes to control our computers, but it just seems that once again, the consumer is the slave to the corporation's desire to control everything at the expense of the consumer's rights.
The day of the audiophile is fast dying I think. Music on ITMS should be sold (as an option) in Apple Lossless format or some other lossless format so music lovers can then convert them into whatever format and size that best suits their needs as music lovers and not the shadowy corporate thugs who fear every customer and every digit they don't have complete control over.
I think Apple has done a spectacular job getting us this far and I hope Steve Jobs and Apple will continue to push the dinosaurs over at the Fascist Recording States who control most of the artists and most of the music.
One promising sign is artists who are banding together to sell their music directly to us, their fans. I look forward to a day when artists will control their own fates and their own music and we will be able to download our music at full quality. Yes, there will be piracy, just as there always has been, but we should err on the side of freedom and not control. A way for artists to be compensated can be figured out and in the long run and, I am sure, they would be MUCH better compensated than they are now in the corporate stables where hugely popular stars often retire penniless because of the egregious contracts imposed on them by their consciousless corporate masters.
How do you think the future of digital music will unfold?
JoeL
PowerMac 1.25 DP, .8 TB (in 4) HDs, 1.75GB RAM, Superdrive Mac OS X (10.4.2)

I'm not really looking for a reliable answer as such, just offering my thoughts on the subject and wishing out loud . . . user2user.
And if anyone has anything interesting to say on the subject, I'd love to hear their thoughts as well. I think Apple should offer lossless recordings, don't you?
. . . but I think I understand why they don't at this point.
I know that such conversations do break out here from time-to-time.
JoeL

Are apple lossless files playable in windows itunes?

I'm asking for a friend who uses iTunes in Windows.

It is also possible to get Windows Media Player to play Apple Lossless files as well. (In case that's what your friend really meant.)
See http://jelockwood.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/using-apple-lossless-aka-alac-in-window s.html

Ipod Touch: Does it have problems playing Apple Lossless files?

Hi All
This might sound like a strange question to some of you but considering the hassles I am having with the 120gb classic it isn't.
To make a long story short my 120gb classic cannot play Apple Lossless files properly. Essentially they crash the ipod because the files are too large. I have done some research and on many forums people are experiencing the same problem.
I do find it quite offensive that Apple do not have the courage to admit this is a problem but there is nothing I can do about it.
So my solution is to get rid of my 120gb classic and move to a Sony or Cowon player (still doing research to make sure they can handle lossless (not apple) files).
However i really do love everything else about the ipod so I would love to find a way to keep it.
I figure maybe the new ipod touch's might not have this problem because they are solid state and if that is the case then I can stump up for one of those and keep with the ipod brand.
Does anyone know if the Touch's can deal with these large files? Apparently the problem with the old 120gb classics was the small 64mg cache. Hopefull the Ipod touch doesn't have this issue.
Anyway any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
Eddie

If I went with an Ipod touch it would be a newer so I guess it would have the newest OS on it.
I'll wait awhile longer and do some more research before I take the plunge because I do not want to get ripped off like I did with the 120gb Classic.
Thanks for the reply though. At least it is leading into the right direction!
Eddie

Apple Lossless...is it really???

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