and simopn's FIRST POST was the perfect answer. it's built-in, just tell iTunes which codec you'd like imported music to use (the setting was originally for ripping CD's into itunes) and then select a large group of songs, right click, and convert to XXX format, where XXX is the codec you chose.

personally, i found that creating a smart playlist that finds all source format (in your case m4p) files helps a lot. then i'd select a group of songs, say 100 of them. craete a static playlist. select the whole static playlist, say 'convert' then when it was done i could delete those songs. the playlist was then empty and i could repeat the process.

i re-encoded 12GB of mp3 into AAC (which works FAR better with music player on my N95, and brings over the album artwork flawlessly where mp3's didn't). i re-encoded at the same bitrate, but since AAC has twice the storage density, i effectively met the nyquist rate for signal capturing, therefore minimizing any waveform aliasing from the transcoding process. in short: the BULK of audio quality degradation was avoided, with only nuances of the algorithms being captured as errors in my audio, rather than capturing errors in waveform analysis (think of a car driving by, at just the right speed the wheels seem to spin backwards. that's aliasing. your eyes need to capture the image at twice the rate the wheels are spinning, or higher (nyquist) in order to properly render the motion of the moving wheels in your head. want to know the 'refresh rate' of your eyes/brain? watch a spinning wheel and record the rate of spin as it slows at the moment you perceive the switch from appearing to spin backwards to when it spins forwards. that rate is the rate at which your eyes/brain are able to perceive new images. that rate will be greater in your peripheral vision than your frontal vision (faster in the rods than in the cones, cones see color, peripheral vision with rods are black and white and more responsive).

that was a fun post.
-bit

and simopn's FIRST POST was the perfect answer. it's built-in, just tell iTunes which codec you'd like imported music to use (the setting was originally for ripping CD's into itunes) and then select a large group of songs, right click, and convert to XXX format, where XXX is the codec you chose.

personally, i found that creating a smart playlist that finds all source format (in your case m4p) files helps a lot. then i'd select a group of songs, say 100 of them. craete a static playlist. select the whole static playlist, say 'convert' then when it was done i could delete those songs. the playlist was then empty and i could repeat the process.

i re-encoded 12GB of mp3 into AAC (which works FAR better with music player on my N95, and brings over the album artwork flawlessly where mp3's didn't). i re-encoded at the same bitrate, but since AAC has twice the storage density, i effectively met the nyquist rate for signal capturing, therefore minimizing any waveform aliasing from the transcoding process. in short: the BULK of audio quality degradation was avoided, with only nuances of the algorithms being captured as errors in my audio, rather than capturing errors in waveform analysis (think of a car driving by, at just the right speed the wheels seem to spin backwards. that's aliasing. your eyes need to capture the image at twice the rate the wheels are spinning, or higher (nyquist) in order to properly render the motion of the moving wheels in your head. want to know the 'refresh rate' of your eyes/brain? watch a spinning wheel and record the rate of spin as it slows at the moment you perceive the switch from appearing to spin backwards to when it spins forwards. that rate is the rate at which your eyes/brain are able to perceive new images. that rate will be greater in your peripheral vision than your frontal vision (faster in the rods than in the cones, cones see color, peripheral vision with rods are black and white and more responsive).

that was a fun post.
-bit

2009/1/27 Disqus <>

Personally, I buy the flipping CDs. And can then rip them in a bazillion formats over the next 50 years without once losing an ounce of unnecessary quality.

Rant over.

Personally, I buy the flipping CDs. And can then rip them in a bazillion formats over the next 50 years without once losing an ounce of unnecessary quality.

Rant over.

edit: ahhh i re-read your post. in that case try what simon said, but i would not do it. all the good name brand mp3 players out there today play aac files anyway. in fact … i think it's hard to find something sold today that does not play aac files.

I covered it here: http://www.symbian-guru.com/welcome/2008/11/sal…

However, if you're open to change, I'd HIGHLY recommend MediaMonkey. It's not as pretty as iTunes, or as user-friendly, but it's miles more powerful.

Sorted.

Sorted.