Audio Conversion. best way?

smogsy

smogsy

smogsy

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Hi all,

I have 330 Albums in Apple Loss-less on my Imac, which now i have a copy on my PC. Unfortunately Apple Loss-less really limits your media players options.

I want to convert them to a different format on my PC.

Questions:
1.Which format is best for Best compatibility & Quality rather keep loss-less or closet to.

2. which program can do this?

Currently have 130GB of Music for 330 albums... Though Space is not an issue. Quality is.
 
yeh i know, i like it but much prefer a best player. its not easy to setup foobar how you like it. especially with album art.
 
smogsy said:
yeh i know, i like it but much prefer a best player. its not easy to setup foobar how you like it. especially with album art.
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You're not being very clear - foobar2000 will transcode easily from ALAC to other lossless formats, which is what you were originally asking about.

FLAC is probably the most widely-used lossless audio format, and plenty of Windows players support it out of the box - foobar2000 is the best by a country mile IMO, but if you don't want to use that you could also take a look at MediaMonkey or Winamp. FLAC also probably has the widest hardware support of any lossless codec, but again it's not clear from your original post if you want or need this.

If you'll be using WMP/W7MC exclusively, WMA lossless would be your best bet to keep things simple - WMP does have FLAC support using third-party plugins, but it can get a bit messy and unsatisfactory, particularly if you're using the x64 versions.
 
I would not convert them. You will be wasting your time converting them and you might lose quality and worse gain unnecessary file size with no increase in quality. Just use foobar to play them, you just need to download the component to play that file type.

Then you should start looking for new music in flac format.

to note it is impossible to gain quality from conversion.
 
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I would not convert them. You will be wasting your time converting them and you might lose quality and worse gain unnecessary file size with no increase in quality. Just use foobar to play them, you just need to download the component to play that file type.

Then you should start looking for new music in flac format.

to note it is impossible to gain quality from conversion.
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i already am doing that, but i don't like foobar.... its ok playing the odd song but cannot do what i want it to do without wasting hours of my own time.

Foobar does not have the ability that i can see to sort by genre at all?..
this can be done in any other media player Sort by genre play Foobar has no column for this...

i want pick a genre and play songs within that genre WITHOUT making playlists.

so i want to convert my songs away from ALAC so i have better media player support so i can find a player that meets my needs.

And as captain crush said i cannot find any option in foobar to transcode them?.
 
You are wasting your time. you need to load the columns ui in foobar and then you can sort your music like apple itunes off the id3 tags. That is what you are looking for.

I feel sorry for people with apple music collections.
 
groen said:
Just use foobar to play them, you just need to download the component to play that file type.
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You don't actually need a separate component any more, foobar2000 has supported ALAC out-of-the-box since version 1.1.10.

I wouldn't bother converting them either - might as well stick with ALAC and maintain compatibility with both platforms, which is easy enough if you use foobar2000 or the Windows version of iTunes (yuk).
 
CaptainCrash said:
You don't actually need a separate component any more, foobar2000 has supported ALAC out-of-the-box since version 1.1.10.

I wouldn't bother converting them either - might as well stick with ALAC and maintain compatibility with both platforms, which is easy enough if you use foobar2000 or the Windows version of iTunes (yuk).
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collections are separate anyway i just copy music from imac to pc every few months. Imac is just a Media center.

i would not want to use itunes on Win.... Mac version is amazing Win no thank you...

but if you explain how to
l
oad the columns ui in foobar and then you can sort your music like apple itunes off the id3 tags
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. i can use foobar.

cheers crush for transcode info. why didn't they put that into the top menu seems bit dumb.

Foobar took me about 10 mins to learn and I quite enjoy spending time messing wtih my foobar configuration, quite relaxing. Like sorting my music collection, might take some time but has to be done.
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Really? ive got 330 albums to sort & without column ui thing is would take me hours making playlists of each genre.

Itunes on Mac however everything is done on the fly
 
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smogsy said:
but if you explain how to
l. i can use foobar.
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You don't need columns_ui (unless you want it for other reasons).

Go to File - Preferences - Display/Default User Interface/Playlist View, create a custom column with the name Genre and the pattern %genre%. Then when you right-click on the column headers in the main playlist view, you'll have the option to add a new column "Genre", which you can click to sort.

You can organise and display your music pretty much any way you want using foobar2000, but it does have a learning curve, and if you can't/won't spend a bit of time figuring it out you'd probably be happier with a different player anyway.
 
why do you need to play them on your pc if you have a mac or am I just being silly? And if you have moved from a mac to a pc, then itunes will be by far and away the easiest way....if you don't like the player, then there are others. However, you'll need to spend time with it. If you don't have the time or inclination then just go itunes...
 
3dcandy said:
why do you need to play them on your pc if you have a mac or am I just being silly? And if you have moved from a mac to a pc, then itunes will be by far and away the easiest way....if you don't like the player, then there are others. However, you'll need to spend time with it. If you don't have the time or inclination then just go itunes...
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imac is a media centre plugged into a DAC then into a amp into speakers.

just want them on my pc for gaming sessions, if i wear my headset i cannot hear my speakers as my headset blocks almost all sounds. :)

You don't need columns_ui (unless you want it for other reasons).

Go to File - Preferences - Display/Default User Interface/Playlist View, create a custom column with the name Genre and the pattern %genre%. Then when you right-click on the column headers in the main playlist view, you'll have the option to add a new column "Genre", which you can click to sort.

You can organise and display your music pretty much any way you want using foobar2000, but it does have a learning curve, and if you can't/won't spend a bit of time figuring it out you'd probably be happier with a different player any
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worked!. cheers!
 
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