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04-28-2004, 11:04 AM
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#1 of 30 
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Member
Join Date: May 2001
Local Time: 12:28 AM
Local Date: 10-11-2008
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iTunes 4.5 was released today. The best new feature from my standpoint is the ability to print CD jewel box covers from itunes. There are several pre-canned templates and it uses the artwork in iTunes to make a very nice looking cover. Also, there appears to be many printable report options.
Apple also introduced the "Apple Lossless Encoder" which they say can encode a file in its original quality at half the space.
There is something new called "Party Shuffle" but I'm not sure of its purpose yet.
There is also a direct link from each song in your Library to the iTMS (which you can disable).
Windows users can covert WMA to AAC.
Give it a whirl. The printing thing alone makes it worthwhile, IMHO.
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04-28-2004, 01:14 PM
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#2 of 30
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Kyle
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Quote:
| Apple also introduced the "Apple Lossless Encoder" which they say can encode a file in its original quality at half the space. |
We've been able to do that for a long time with shorten and flac.
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04-28-2004, 01:19 PM
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#3 of 30
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Join Date: May 1999
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FLAC is standard, why a new format? DRM?
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04-28-2004, 01:49 PM
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#4 of 30
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Quote:
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We've been able to do that for a long time with shorten and flac.
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But there's no shn or flac plugin for iTunes. ???
And perhaps they can't build shn support into itunes because of open source guidelines?
And really, it doesn't really matter what format its in since its purpose in iTunes is to rip a CD for personal use and not sharing.
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04-28-2004, 02:03 PM
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#5 of 30
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I just tried out the Apple encoder. I imported a 64.5MB track and it imported at 45.9MB. The file extension given is .m4a
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04-28-2004, 02:05 PM
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#6 of 30
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Jumping to conclusions, Apple are trying to push their own "Mpeg4audio" format then?
high resolution ipod featuring dlp hd programming is the best, almost as good as playstation 2 with wega windows media on a super cd! ps2 and tivo do dolby tv with broadband hdtv!
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04-28-2004, 02:21 PM
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#7 of 30
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Quote:
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And really, it doesn't really matter what format its in since its purpose in iTunes is to rip a CD for personal use and not sharing.
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I don't totally agree..open standards aren't just good for sharing, they are good for consumers that want to be able to own multiple brands of equipment and have interoperability.
I'm sure many people use MP3 instead of AAC (or WMA) for their personally ripped music, and I'm sure not all of them do so in order to share. I sure do, and it's because I want the maximum flexibility and future-proofing. I know I won't have to rip or convert again unless I really want to.
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04-28-2004, 02:29 PM
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#8 of 30
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Quote:
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I just tried out the Apple encoder. I imported a 64.5MB track and it imported at 45.9MB. The file extension given is .m4a
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Which is the same that I get when ripping to AAC.
I ripped a 650MB CD and it ripped down to 450MB. Not really "about half", as they say it can do, but better than WAV and AIFF if you are super fussy about sound but don't want full size files, I suppose.
I will stick with 320K AAC, but I suppose if there was something I really, really wanted to be the absolute best that it could be, I can see going lossless.
BGL |
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04-28-2004, 03:10 PM
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#9 of 30
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When I used the Apple Lossless encoder, iTunes reports the track as "1004 kbps." Also, since they assign the extension m4a, is their encoder not just making AAC files at 1003 kbps? And if their lossless file is really just an AAC file, is it not "standard?"
I'd try it on another player but I don't have anything handy to play AAC files besides iTunes.
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04-28-2004, 03:50 PM
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#10 of 30
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Patrick, what I don't know about this dwarfs what I do know, but ripping an entire CD seems to result in different rates. On the tracks on the CD I ripped (Govt. Mule - Dose, FWIW) as Lossless, the rate varied from 819kbps to 1031kbps.
So, there does not seem to be a fixed rate. And when choosing lossless, there are no user settings that you can tweak (at least I don't see them). So, you get what you get.
I don't know that the file extension can be used to draw any conclusions. It obvious that iTunes does treat AAC and Lossless differently. And until I updated my iPod to the latest SW, I could not transfer the lossless files. So file extension of not, the iPod knows they are different.
But as I said, I am way over my head on codecs at this point.
BGL
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04-28-2004, 04:05 PM
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