WMA lossles to Apple Lossless

I have the same problem and the wish like this guy:
"I’ve also been migrating of my music library from WMV Lossless to AAC Lossless.
I initially tried to drag a big folder full of nested album folders containing WMV Lossless media from a networked drive (SMB) over to iTunes on the Mac, but it did… absolutely nothing. So now, my $700 Dell is cranking away at 95% CPU on both cores, converting a list of more than 5,000 songs, many of which are long, classical tracks. It is maintaining a conversion rate of 11.8x, which Victor says is pretty fast.
At 3am this morning, iTunes had converted more than 3,000 songs in 26 hours when Windows forced a reboot due to software updates. ARGH! So I had to dig around to find the 2,000 songs hadn’t been converted yet and drag them over again. Needless to say, I have disabled Automatic Updates.
Keeping both lossless and compressed versions of music is not easy. I was telling Victor last night that I wished iTunes supported “stacking” of music not unlike what Aperture does with photos. My main music library should be able to track compressed versions alongside lossless versions, or at the very least, have an option to auto-compress when sharing music or transferring music to portable devices (like what iTunes does when you attach a Shuffle). What I want to do is to have access to my lossless media at home and my compressed music on the road."
http://echeng.com/journal/2006/09/13/converting-wma-lossless-to-apple-aac-lossle ss/
is there any hope to have this features ???
I need something like this too
Thank you

Thanks Bottlerboi - a useful distinction between lossless compression for space saving, and lossy compression. I am partly interested in this because of my general interest in hi-fi, and Naim Audio in particular. Naim are just launching a new product which is essentially a CD player with 2 hard drives (albeit one is a back up of the other). The Naim HDX is said to store approximately 600 albums on 400Gb hard drives while making bit-for-bit copies, which I assume from what you have said, to be in WAV format (clearly even Apple Lossless would be many more albums than this). A great piece of kit until they tell you it costs £4,500 sterling...

Similar Messages

  • How do I convert WMA lossless to apple lossless

    I've recently switched from Windows and I have over 400 cd's ripped in WMA lossless format. Is there a program (free or reasonably priced commercial) that will run on the mac and batch convert these files without loosing tags or album art?  I used goldwave on my last PC to convert to MP3 however it didn't support apple lossless.
                                                                                                                                                                                             Thanks

    I have had this same exact problem for about 4 years now.  I keep checking online every few months but never have any luck.  What gives?  Is there nobody out there that can program an application to transcode efficiently while maintaining metadata including album art?
    I bought and owned over 1,000 cd's by 2003 when I decided to rip them all with WMP (Windows Media Player 9) on a PC into WMA Lossless without DRM (Digital Rights Management).  I used the slow but detailed error correction so it took a long time to complete this project.  Many of the CD's were from different countries (as I had been living in different countries) so some had different songs and album art than the US Versions.  As a response I had to continually over-ride the built in suggestions for metadata from WMP and had to manually type in song titles and search for album art online, then copy and paste it into the folder the files were in.  WMP would then import that file into the WMA metadata. It took a lot of evenings but it was worth it and I had the best music collection I knew of while traveling for another 5 years.   I was ahead of the curve as far as digital music went.
    In 2008 I switched to a MacBook Pro and haven't had easy access to my music collection sense.  In 2011, I ripped another batch of about 150 new CD's I've bought into Apple Lossless but now have to keep 3x music collection folders.  1) WMA Lossless, 2) VBR MP3 (converted for itunes without art), and 3) Apple Lossless.   I have thought about switching back to a PC but I do like my mac so I'm stuck with no options.
    There are very few applications that can transcode WMA Lossless to Apple Lossless, less that can do so without bloating the file size to almost double, and none that keep the size similar to WMA Lossless while maintaining the album art already saved in my music collection's folder hierarchy.  (To clarify itunes on mac doesn't, Flip4Mac doesn't help, Auditri does not, VLC does not, Song bird does not, Pro Audio Converter does not, easyWMA does not.  I've even installed VMware (virtual machine to run Windows on my mac) to try dbpoweramp and no luck.)  And with all these trials I've also noticed it takes just as long to transcode on my Intel i5 MBP as it did on my AMD Athalon XP PC in 2003.
    I'm very confused so any help would be greatly appreciated.

  • Converting files to Apple Lossless without keeping originals

    Can someone let me know if it is possible to convert files to Apple Lossless without actually keeping the original file. I converted all my files and now my whole library is duplicated! Also need to kneo the quickest way to erase all my duplicated files.

    Just a note: you don't say what format the tracks were that you converted, but unless they were AIFF or lossless WAV, there was no point in converting them to Apple Lossless. Once you have a "lossy" format such as AAC or MP3, data is thrown away and there's no way to get the lost data/quality back. So if it was MP3, AAC, WMA or compressed WAV tracks, converting them to Lossless gets you nothing but larger file sizes.
    You might already know this, but just wanted to mention it.
    Regards.

  • 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;
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    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

  • FLAC to Apple Lossless

    Any way to do this? I got a rather huge FLAC library from my PC which I want to convert to Apple Lossless so I can listen to them on my Mac.

    After reading this post I decided to try XLD (X Lossless Decoder - website) and did the following steps:
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    I unpacked it
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    under File - Open I chose the FLAC files I wanted to convert
    done
    It took me less then a minute to do so and worked on Lion. iTunes accepted the files.

  • Can't Import Songs To iTunes Using Apple Lossless Encoder

    I have about 4,000 songs in FLAC format (which is a lossless format) on my external hard drive. I want to import them into iTunes using the Apple Lossless Encoder. I called Apple support and asked them how to do this, and they told me to go under "Preferences" in iTunes and chose to import using Apple Lossless Encoder.
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    iTunes cannot read nor import FLAC files - not without third-party plugins, anyway, and I don't know of any that will allow iTunes to convert a FLAC file to another format - so I'm a bit confused as to the procedure you're following. If all you're doing is using the Add to Library command and choosing the FLAC files, it's quite possible that iTunes is misinterpreting the format and adding what is in reality an invalid link with erroneous format information.
    If you have some sort of third-party plugin for FLAC for iTunes, please post that information and perhaps someone here can determine whether iTunes can do a conversion successfully.

  • How do I Download from Itunes store using the Apple Lossless format?

    I use my music on a home sterio and import locally from CD's to Windows using the Apple Lossless format only, to achieve the Highest quality sound. However, When I buy from Itunes store I can only get AAC format, which is low quality. How can I get Itunes to give me only Apple Lossless format?
    Your help will b e appreciated.
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    Phil

    I do agree with what i have been said. I am a musician, i think AAC is definitely medium-low quality. I bought this year lots of AAC 256 for Itunes. I have been surprised. SO many times i need to go to the equalizer to counter-balance the weakness of this file format.
    I advise you to do the following. Import a CD using Apple LossLess and then import a CD using AAC 256. You will see a HUGE difference.
    Now i start to buy CD again in order to get the music Quality. Then i import my CDs to Itunes using Apple LossLess (920Kbps). You will ear that on Snares and Rides. Bass will sound more natural. Bass, Medium, Sharp will more balance with each other. You will hear instruments with more clarity especially when there are a lot of instruments. Because of that, you will not need to raise up the volume.
    But more than anything... you will gain VOLUME in your files.
    In general over the internet all the online music stores including Itune doesn't provide HD quality. AAC 256 is not enough. A track bought over Itune Store should weight 30 megabytes, not 5. And then you would decide to compress it or not.

  • How do i convert my exsisting itunes library to apple lossless?

    Also whrn i do this will i have duplicate files(original/lossless)? If so what is the best way for me to delete them form my macbook? Thanks

    Not to pile on here, but the only point of Apple Lossless is to have a slightly compressed version of the an original CD (AIFF). I have converted my full CD collection (too many disks to even count) to Apple Lossless. The sound quality is indistinguishable from the original CD. Because the files are rather large for use on an iPhone or smaller iPod, I then convert them to 256 AAC (for my iPhone) or 160 MP3 to burn MP3 disks for my cars. I keep the Lossless files as the original content.
    However, lately, I'm just purchasing 256 AAC iTunes Plus files. I'm losing quality, but it's just not worth the time to purchase CD's and convert them any more.
    There is absolutely no reason to convert 256 AAC files to Lossless. In fact, I'm sure it might degrade the sound quality in that a lot of information just isn't in the 256 AAC file. However, don't quote me on this.

  • Converting "Apple Lossless" back to "AAC" - More than 1 track at a time...

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    For backup see this user tip.
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  • Apple Lossless Tags won't Save

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  • IPod Nano 4G Skips During Playback with Apple Lossless Songs

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    Hi,
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  • I'm getting a 9041 error when trying to convert files to AAC -- any ideas on how to fix it?  the files files in iTunes show up as Apple Lossless but i can't put them on my iPod

    i'm getting a 9041 error when trying to convert files to AAC -- any ideas on how to fix it?  the files files in iTunes show up as Apple Lossless but i can't put them on my iPod

    "I have been able to convert to AAC by first converting to AIFF  and then to AAC. This is a pan though."
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  • 160 Gb Classic - Audio dropouts, gaps on gapless albums with apple lossless

    Dear All,
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    Thank heaven! I thought I might be the only one.
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