Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Wrap Raw AAC Files Into M4A Container
I won’t try to explain the difference between a codec and a container. You just need to know that aac is a codec and mp4/m4a is a container. And also there is no technical difference between MP4 and M4A. M4A is created by Apple just to differentiate between video and audio files inside MP4 container. (Wiki articles: codec, container)
Why it is a good idea wrap raw aac files into M4A container? Because some music players only supports certain file types and aac is not a popular one, one other problem is that aac does not have a standardized documentation for tagging songs. So if you tag your files in one application another application may not be able to read these.
Lately I have been using a wonderful stream saver application called StreamWriter with which you can listen online radios and at the same time save the songs, you can even specify some keywords and StreamWriter will save every song that matches your keywords depending on their tags whether or not you are listening them at the time. Most of my favorite radios are streaming with aac format since it is more efficient than mp3. The problem with aac is like I explained above its tagging features (or lack of them). I cannot use auto tagging programs like MusicBrainz Picard with this format. So I decided to convert all my aac files to M4A without losing any quality. And since aac is a raw format and M4A is only a container it is possible.
Wrapping process:
Download MP4Box for wrapping the files and Batchenc for automating the process for all the files.
Extract all the files in one folder.
Open Batchenc and drag all the files onto it.
Write:
MP4Box.exe -add <infile> <outfile.m4a>
in Command line area, you can change m4a to mp4 if you like (you can also add this line in Batchenc_presets.cfg for future uses – open cfg file in notepad).
If you want you can specify a different output directory.
Click start and few seconds later you are done.
Why it is a good idea wrap raw aac files into M4A container? Because some music players only supports certain file types and aac is not a popular one, one other problem is that aac does not have a standardized documentation for tagging songs. So if you tag your files in one application another application may not be able to read these.
Lately I have been using a wonderful stream saver application called StreamWriter with which you can listen online radios and at the same time save the songs, you can even specify some keywords and StreamWriter will save every song that matches your keywords depending on their tags whether or not you are listening them at the time. Most of my favorite radios are streaming with aac format since it is more efficient than mp3. The problem with aac is like I explained above its tagging features (or lack of them). I cannot use auto tagging programs like MusicBrainz Picard with this format. So I decided to convert all my aac files to M4A without losing any quality. And since aac is a raw format and M4A is only a container it is possible.
Wrapping process:
Download MP4Box for wrapping the files and Batchenc for automating the process for all the files.
Extract all the files in one folder.
Open Batchenc and drag all the files onto it.
Write:
MP4Box.exe -add <infile> <outfile.m4a>
in Command line area, you can change m4a to mp4 if you like (you can also add this line in Batchenc_presets.cfg for future uses – open cfg file in notepad).
If you want you can specify a different output directory.
Click start and few seconds later you are done.
Save Internet radio tracks with Free MusicZilla
Both price per gigabyte for storage and price per megabyte/second for bandwidth is falling consistently. Apart from this there is also a surge in online music services where you can buy your favorite tunes for just under $ 1. But on the other hand there is also the irresistible sweetness of free music; internet radios.
Listening to the same albums and songs becomes boring after a while, no matter how great songs we have in our archives. That is if you don't pirated all the new albums that you can find. There comes internet radios to our rescue; both legally and tastefully.
If you like listening online radios but also want to save your favorite tracks for offline use there is an option for you. With incredibly easy to use Free Music Zilla you can visit a site with streaming audio like Pandora, Last.fm, IMEEM, MySpace, eSnips, or several others and Free Music Zilla will give you the option of saving each song you listen. Just install the application and it will hang out in your system tray.
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