Converting from MP3 to AAC

Several thousand of my songs are in the MP3 format. My question is twofold: first, is there that big a difference in sound quality between MP3 and AAC? I do not care about space restrictions, as I have plenty of room on my 80GB. Second, if I do begin to cnvert these songs to AAC, is a second copy put on my computer as well as in iTunes? If so, where can I find it, as I cannot find duplicates of the ten or so that I have already converted. Thanks in advance. Just want to know if it worth the time and effort to make the conversion.

Converting creates a second file in the format you are converting to. The original file is not changed so you end up with two copies of the song, once in each format. However it's always preferable to re-rip from the original uncompressed format rather than converting from one lossy format to another.
For reference, you'll get an extensive comparison of the various formats on these pages:
Record Store Review - Quality of AAC v MP3 Part 1
Record Store Review - Quality of AAC v MP3 Part 2

Similar Messages

Converting from MP3 to AAC not working

When I try to convert any of my songs in iTunes I get an error message saying: "An unknown error occurred (0x77686174)." This only happens when trying to convert to AAC. I have tried to convert to AIFF, and Apple Loseless Encoder and it works. I have also tried the default 128kbps and many others. Can anyone help?

When I try to convert any of my songs in iTunes I get an error message saying: "An unknown error occurred (0x77686174)."
hi killbrad!
hmmm. i've seen posts on this topic. see:
http://ipodgarage.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=494&sid=79e818827474b53cfdab3c8b619 aa0e2
i've also seen toonz say (my fault for any misreading of her post) that it's a QT error message saying something like "codec not found". so if the workarounds aren't helpful for you, we could try a careful standalone QT reinstall. see:
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=1157322#1157322
keep us posted.
love, b

Converting from WAV, or "converting but secretly not converting" from wav to AAC

I got this particular problem I just found out about. I imported a wav file into iTunes, and I assumed that means it gets converted to whatever format I set iTunes up for (in my case AAC). But when I then sync my iPod, I get the message that the file that was originally in WAV, cannot be imported because it is not in a compatible format. Yet the same song plays fine in iTunes. This does not make sense, unless iTunes does NOT convert files you import into the required file standard, but just copies them in, and iTunes happened to be able to play wav files. But then again, if iTunes is compatible with WAV files, why isn't iPod?
Now, I have to add, I have the file already on my computer, so I just drag the wav file into my iTunes. Does that mean iTunes copies the file over to the iTunes library, or does it actually convert it into the file format set up?

As for importing, I assume you refer to importing via drag-dropping files into iTunes? because according to my preferences, when I insert a CD it DOES convert to a particular file type.
Kryn, yes, that is the importing that Dave is referring to. Ripping from CD is a different process.
As far as your WAV file, iTunes and iPod can both play WAV. They are pretty reliable if it is a CD-quality WAV, but sometimes have trouble if it is a low bitrate WAV such as the kind that come out of voice recorders. If that is the problem, use a 3rd party conversion tool such as Switch to convert it to an MP3 or AAC.

Converting From Mp3 to Wav and also dividing a song.

Is it possible to convert an mp3 to .wav and then split the entire song into 10-second wavs. If there is a way, please share. Thank you. I'm using Quicktime Pro

Nathan, welcome to these discussions.
Open the .mp3 file with QT Pro.
Set the "in and out" (selection markers) to the ten seconds you wish to convert and use "Copy" from the Edit menu.
Open a new QT Player window (Control-N) and then Control-V (paste).
Choose "Export" (File menu) and then choose Sound to Wave.
Repeat for all the conversion you want to make.

Converting from ALAC to AAC: A question of quality?

I'm trying to back up my music electronically. I have all of my CD's on a rack in my entertainment center. However, I'm upgrading to a flat panel TV (YES!!!) finally, and with my old tube TV, the entertainment center is going, and being replaced by something much smaller.
Anyways, I'd like to make copies of my CDs, so I can store them away in the attic. I was told Apple Lossless is essentially the same as having the actual CD on your computer (so no loss in fidelity at all). However, I was wondering if this is true.
And if it is true, does this mean that I can rip CD's to my external HD in ALAC, and then convert them to AAC without any additional loss of quality??? (i.e. Does converting a song in ALAC format to AAC have the same quality as converting from the actual CD to AAC?)

Any lossless format - Apple Lossless, FLAC, etc., - should be identical to the original in sound quality.
I have found this to be this case in listening tests on fairly high quality stereo equipment. However, the best way to answer your question is to test this yourself. Rip a cd to Apple Lossless, and, I would suggest, to 320 bit AAC, and then see if you can hear a difference between them. I'll bet that you would be hard pressed to hear a difference even at 320 bit. After ripping my cd's I now regard my cd's as my backup, and the digital copies my actual collection, since that's what I actually listen to. So in that sense you always have a perfect backup, as long as you still have the cd.
I frequently convert FLAC's to AAC with outstanding results, and would expect the same with Apple Lossless. I think the bit rate you choose to convert to will be much more significant than whether you
convert from CD or lossless. Again, try it and see if you can hear a difference. (If my memory is correct - not always the case - the lossless format will be decoded first and then will be recoded to AAC - meaning you are essentially creating the AAC files from cd's in either case. Can't find a source on this tho to point you to).
One last thing, is storing them in the attic your only alternative? I just remember storing records in the attic and, well, they just never were the same with the summer heat. Cd's are more durable but I'd still be worried (unless it was a finished attic).

Using iTunes 10: Converion from MP3 to AAC

I'm working in a named playlist of many MP3s that I would like to convert to AAC. The problem is when I
convert these files they do not return to this playlist but show up in the Library.
My question is: When converting these files, it does not give me an option to convert to the same playlist.
Is there a way that this can be done so my new files that were convert show up in the same playlist.
Are must I lookup each individual file in the library which can take several minutes of extra time.
Thanks

Open the playlist. Select the files. Convert to AAC. Now go to the main Music list and click on the 'Date Added' column to bring them all to the top of the list (if you don't have this column add it in menu View>View Options).
Now you can delete the originals from the playlist and drag all the conversions to it, or open a new playlist and drag them to that, as desired.
Do you have a good reason for converting them? Experiments carried out by the BBC suggested that while opening and recompressing a file in the same format did little damage (as the bits that needed removing had already been removed), recompressing files in a different compressed format was liable to dregrade the quality as it applied a different compression process to an already compressed file, thus removing more data than it the file had been compressed from an uncompressed format.

Cd burning. . .converting from mp3

I can burn CD's with out a problem. BUT my problem is converting my iTunes music from AAC. Every CD I've burned plays on my dvd player but not in my car. This is what I've tried thus far:
1)Preferences - Advanced - Importing - WAV encoder
2)Preferences - Advanced - Burning - Audio CD
3)Created a new playlist, burned CD, and guess what it doesn't work!! Is there something else I should be doing??
Windows XP

OK with store bought songs from iTUnes, what you have to do to convert them to MP3 is first goto edit>Preferences>advanced tab>Burn sub tab and make sure its set to "Audio CD" If not change it to that and hit OK. Now burn the songs to a blank CD.
Once they are burned to the CD, reinsert the CD. When it shows up in iTUnes you can rightclick each track, hit get info, and manually enter in Artist, Song Name< Album ect ect. If all songs are from one album and/or one artist you can rightclcik the CD name on the left, in the source list and enter the artist and album for all track, then all you have to to is rightclick the first track, enter the name of the song, then hit the next button to goto the next track and enter its name. Once all info is entered, hit the Import button in the top right corner of iTunes (Taking for granted your import settings in preferences is already set to import in MP3).
With purchased music, the only way to convert them is burn to CD, then reimport them to the PC. Once thats done you will not have to do this again to convert it to something else

Convert from WAV to AAC from one HD to Another HD

Don't know if this has been answered before but here's my situation. I have all my iTunes music folder in one Hard Drive. All the files are in WAVE format. Now, I want to copy all of the files to an External Hard Drive and in AAC format. How do I do it exactly? Do I Import, Export? O
Windows XP

You can import & convert in one step so only AAC files will be in the new library. No duplicates and nothing to delete.
Copy /Music/iTunes/iTunes media/Music folder to an external.
Connect the external to the other computer.
Open iTunes.
Set your import settings to AAC.
Hold Option, go to File > Create new version - Convert to AAC.
Select the Music folder you copied to the external.
After you are finished, you can delete the /Music/ folder on the external.
Note that this will take some time as it is converting every song file you add.
FYI: You can convert the files directly as they are sync'd to the iPod.
Select the iPod in iTunes.
Click the Summary tab.
Tick Convert higher bit rate songs to {128, 192, 256} kbps AAC.

Converting MP3 to AAC in iTunes 8.0.1

I heard about how Walmart is offering MP3 tracks for 94 cents through their MP3 downloading site that is now compatible with Mac OS X, Safari, iPod, and iTunes. The MP3 sites has no restrictions for backups, playlists, computers, etc.
So I'm wondering, how do you convert an MP3 file into AAC file?
Sincerely,
Stu "the1macnerd" Carpenter
P.S. MP3 is okay (MPEG-3 Audio layer 1) but AAC (MPEG-4) is a lot better and sounds better in both 128 kbps and 256 kbps, even though 256 kbps takes up twice the space with no DRM, iTunes Plus. However, buying from iTunes Store is a lot better cause Walmart only has 3 million tracks available compared to iTunes' 8.5 million tracks. The iTunes Store is also worth it for people who don't want to buy the edited versions of music because iTunes Store sells both versions, and Walmart is more selective in that they don't sell certain artists based on religious or moral objections, such as Marilyn Manson and other artists.

You won't get any benefit converting from MP3 to AAC, both are lossy compression formats and you could even end up with a file of lesser quality by converting from one lossy format to another. Converting to AAC won't add any more information to the MP3 file than is already there. However to convert any type of audio file in iTunes 8 you first have to change your import settings in iTunes>Preferences>General, choose the Import Settings button. Once you have chosen your setting (AAC for instance) highlight the track you want to convert and go to Advanced>Create AAC version.

Fuzzy output when I convert mp3 to aac (to make audiobook)

That's pretty much it.
I have imported CDs of audio books that I want to put on my iphone.
I am converting the mp3s to AAC - then changing the extension from mp4a to mp4b so that it is filed in the audio book section.
But during the conversion the quality of the track goes from clear to fuzzy. (like white noise in the background)
How do I get round this?

but unfortunately I cant file them in the audiobooks section like that.
Why not? That's exactly what changing the *Media Kind:* does. Puts them under Audiobooks.

Converting mp3 into AAC

Has anybody ever converted an mp3 into AAC and had the AAC file be larger than the mp3? All of the music on my iPod (close to 3000 songs) is AAC, and when I have an mp3 file I've been converting them, but I did that with a podcast, only 2 discover the size increased from 24 to 65 MB!!!
Does this make any sense?!
Also, am I doing myself a lot of harm, quality-wise, by making this conversion?

Converting 320kbps files into 128kbps will reduce the size by around 60%, but at the same time reducing audio quality. How much so can only be determined by you after several sid-by-side tests. You may or may not be able to hear the difference with your ears and equipment (iPod/headphones).
Converting the 45kbps podcasts to 128kbps will effectively triple the file size of each podcast, while adding absolutely no audio quality. Again, sampling a sample will lower quality.
Down-converting the 320 MP3s may not be as great a audio loss since they are starting off at a high quality bit rate. If they were 128s or 190s, you would notice a significant difference.
Just let your ears be your guide.

How to convert to MP3 or ACC?

I made a small song on garageband. now it is saved as .band
but want it to be an mp3 or acc. how can i do this? i already tried taking it to itunes and when i try to convert it there, nothing happens. i also tried looking at it with quicktime but it wont let me convert.
how can i do this?

I would never suggest lossy re-encoding of already lossy encoded audio, this will kill it literally. There should be only one lossy encoding done at the final stage. So the best way for GB is to "Share to iTunes" and then convert to MP3 or AAC within iTunes or drag it to Finder and use any other free/commercial software you like.

Is there an audible loss of quality when converting from WMA to MP3/AAC?

Just wondering when I convert my WMA files to MP3 or AAC using EasyWMA, iTunes for WIndows, Switch or whatever, will there be an audible loss of quality in the conversion?
Thanks.

There is always an audio quality degradetion while converting a compressed file from one codec to another. It may not be significant for everybody tough.
To avoid this degradation, you should compress your file from the original instead of passing from one codec to another.

Why won't my playlists convert from aac to mp3

Hi,
Never had to use the forum before as I've always previosuly been able to figure most stuff out that I needed to do, but I recently converted my whole music library from AAC format to MP3 (so that I can burn an MP3 disc to play in my car) with no problem using the "Advanced" tab and "Convert to MP3 format" tab.
(I've also changed my settings now so that all downloads are set to MP3 as well to stop this happening ever again!.)
However, I then tried to do the same for my playlists, but it just doesn't work for those using the "Convert to MP3 format" facility - even though it doers actually give the impression of doing so. i.e. It appears to be converting the songs and I even get a confimation tone when it's suppossedly finished converting the playlist, but the playlist still shows it's "Kind" as AAC, and hasn't converted it at all!
The only way that I can find to do it is to delete the playlist (after printing out a copy of the playlist) and then manually re-creating the whole playlist again by dragging each song individually from the library! Which I obviously don't really want to do as I've got a lot of playlists and that would be very laborious and would quite frankly be a ridiclous thing to have to do again (especially after doing it already for the library).
Am I missing something here, expecting too much or just being thick?? Any one have a solution for this please?

Thank you, absolutely brilliant, I knew there had to be an easier way to do this!!! And also thank you so much for the really quick response too!
It took me less than a minute to do this for the first playlist and I'll now easily be able to do the same for all the other playlists - saving me potentially hours if I'd had to do it using the other way.
In case anyone is unaware, there is one further little tip once you have converted the playlist from AAC to MP3 and sorted by "Date Added". Press and hold Shift, then highlight (the first song) and scroll to the last song (which will then highlight all the songs that you've just converted) and then simply drag them to a new playlist - voila, job done!

HT1349 I have a large Windows iTunes library (18k+ songs, 650+ movies, 2.4K TV shows) and since upgrading to iTunes 11 files are disappearing from my library. Some music files re-appear in the cloud which means I have to re-download and re-convert to MP3.

iTunes 11 is rapidly becoming a disaster for me. I have a dedicated Windows 7 machine running iTunes to service 3 Apple TV's, 2iPhones, 2iPods, and an iPad. Itunes 11 is very sluggish with my large library and has now started 'losing' files to the cloud. This means that music I purchased in 2005 is being removed from my library and subsequently seems to become available as a ne cloud download. This may well be because I convert all ACC files to MP3 and delete the ACC (my ears are too old to care about the reduction in quality). Either way, it's detrsoying my playlists and means I have to re-download files.
Does anyone know how to stop this? I have no interest in the cloud (my library is too big and contains hundreds of ripped CD's and Vinyl records that can't be matched).
Thanks

Because back in the early days very few devices supported AAC so converting to MP3 allowed me to use iTunes and other devices (like a $1000 dollar MP3 player with a 3.5" hard disk drive that pre-dated iPods ) as well as my gen 1 and 2 iPods. I can't hear the difference (I'm old...) so the files being smaller is still an advantage (even though I have 64Gb iPods and iPhones these days. Anyway, the major issue is iTunes deleting the MP3's and messing up my playlists because the file it downloads just goes in the library - not the original playlists. The secondary issue is how do I know it's truly replacing all the files it deletes. It's just scary and I don't like it.
BTW, I'm not anti-cloud and in fact use iCloud extensively with my iPhones/Apple TV's for photo sharing/backups but iCloud is useless for media sharing. I have just over 2tb of media data shared on my iTunes server (and remotely accessible on my iPhone/iPad using WebDav to my home server).
...and none of my media is pirated. I have crates of vinyl, CD's,DVD's, and Blu-Rays along with thousands of iTunes store receipts!

Converting from MP3 to AAC

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