Importing to iTunes - AAC or MP3?
TeeGee
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I have decided to put a whole lot of music on to my PC both for space saving and easier access. iTunes gives me several choices including AAC (the default) and MP3 format.
Althought I have an iPad something tells me that MP3 might be better for use on other devices. Are there also easy ways to convert from one to the other if necessary?
Anybody got any thoughts based on practical experience?
TVMIA
Althought I have an iPad something tells me that MP3 might be better for use on other devices. Are there also easy ways to convert from one to the other if necessary?
Anybody got any thoughts based on practical experience?
TVMIA
0
Comments
Regarding AAC & MP3, these days I don't think it matters as much as it did years ago. Most new tech will happily play both formats.
Lossless is a good suggestion but I have several thousand tracks to load in before I start on the old vinyl and also my hearing, for replay, probably is not what it used to be! I still have the CDs anyway.
Local playing, ipod etc were, of course, fine.
So it depends what you want to do with it.
John
AAC is lossless - I thought.
No. It's a lossy format.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Audio_Coding
ACC has both a lossy and lossless variant.
If you want to archive your music go for a lossless format, if you want to put music onto a portable device choose a lossy to save space.
What level of compression you are happy with will be entirely up to you, some people can hear the differences even at very high conversion rates. You'll need to experiment a little to figure out if you can hear the differences, and what level you would be happy iwth.
There's nothing coming up in Google about ACC for audio codecs. Unless you meant AAC.
Edit: There doesn't seem to be anything coming up for AAC in a lossless format. ALAC is lossless though, it's a codec developed by Apple.
If they don't fancy an iPod nano, then maybe sticking to MP3 would be better. More support for AAC files needs to be added to personal audio players by companies who make them.
One thing that really has irritated me though is the lack of artwork when importing to iTuines. All are original CDs yet barely one in ten seem to have any associated artwork. I am sure that Microsoft do better than that with their Media Player. Hey ho!
I would be surprised if that were really the case. Are you sure the ID3 tags are correct? They may need to exactly match as they appear in the iTunes store to tie them together. What does it say when you select get album artwork? And are these albums in the iTunes store?
I suppose quite a few of my collection are not currently available which could be the answer. I can always scan them in later but right now I just need to clear the shelves!
But at high rates 256K there is minimal between them, some preferring aac to mp3 and vice versa.
Most go for mp3 for wider compatibility.
If you have the time & the inclination download any of the free MP3 Tag Editor apps and edit album & track titles as appropriate, then reimport and retry the artwork get.
MP3 sounds great. After not hearing it for about five years, I was surprised to find that it was a lot better than I remember.
No more Itunes and you can just drag and drop.
Best move I've ever made re my IPod Classic.