Converting music files to MP3

iTunes has a built in MP3 converter. Just go to Edit->Preferences and click the Advanced tab. There should be another set of tabs below it and one of them should be named Importing. Click it and under Import Using change it to MP3 Encoder. You would probably want High (160 kbps) or Higher (192 kbps).

Once you've changed your preferred encoding format when you right click a song in your playlist that isn't a protected AAC track (one downloaded from the iTunes Music Store) you should see an option for Convert Selection to MP3. You can select multiple songs (holding shift or ctrl) and convert a larger number at the same time.

I'm pretty sure this doesn't delete the original version though so you'll then have to go through your library and make sure that the m4a one is deleted. As with any transcoding, there will be some loss of data. m4a compresses certain sounds etc. when encoding and mp3 compresses other sounds -- that's how they take up less space. By converting from one to the other, you actually lose the sound of both encoding formats instead of just one. Still, at a high enough bitrate most people don't usually notice an issue.

Thanks for this. I have LG's Fusic phone and service through Sprint. It plays mp3s but not m4as. What sucks is that it costs $2.50 per song through Sprint's service. I would rather download from iTunes and convert. I'll give it a shot.

Edit: And I just saw the part of your post that says this doesn't work for protected AAC tracks. Oh well.

When you convert from one format to .mp3 in iTunes, you'll actually have two copies of the song in your library- the original and the .mp3 version.

I couldn't convert songs purchased from iTunes into .mp3, though, because it said it was a protected format. I didn't try to figure out if it could be unprotected. I assumed it was part of the whole Apple DRM thing.

You can convert any file into an AIFF, then convert it to mp3. AIFF at the bitrate of an audio CD is basically lossless, but then you have 3 friggin copies of the same file, so definitely delete the AIFF after converting it to an mp3.

Is there a music store out there where I can buy songs in mp3 format for a reasonable price? Buying CDs to rip and paying $2.50 per song through Sprint is a little ridiculous. Any help would be great.

Most music stores have some form of DRM on their content. I think emusic or something like that has some DRM free indie MP3's but you're never going to find a library with the selection of iTunes without DRM.

There are pieces of software that losslessly strip the DRM from iTunes tracks I believe. I've never used them and can't attest to how well they work. Option 2 is of course just burning from Protected AAC to audio CD and then rip it back to MP3. Not the best solution but it works.

You can't convert Protected AAC files to AIFF any more than you can convert them to MP3s. So if it's not protected, there's no difference between converting directly from m4a->mp3 vs. converting from m4a->AIFF->mp3. They'll be exactly the same file. The audio is already being converted to a standard PCM wave form in memory (what an AIFF file is) so saving it to the hard drive first doesn't really get you anything.

The only thing I was saying is that if your source file is an m4a you've already lost some audio in there (it's minimal and generally not noticed to a casual listener but it's still missing) and then convert to mp3 you'll have started with a source file that's missing the m4a and also add the missing audio from an mp3 conversion and theoretically may start picking up noticeable artifacts in the music.

Imagine if you took a QuickTime trailer, converted it into Windows Media, then converted it into YouTube and eventually back into QuickTime. By the time it's back into QuickTime you'll have noticeably lost a fair amount of picture quality.

Well, good news for me and everyone else using Sprint. Sprint just issued this press release yesterday:

$0.99 is a lot easier to swallow than $2.50. I guess no one was buying at the inflated price. I know I wasn't.

I don't know if other cell phone makers/carriers are as restrictive with their products, but with my phone's bluetooth, I can transfer any mp3 to my phone wirelessly.

I use T-Mobile and I put MP3 ringtones on my phone that way all the time. I know Verizon used to block some of that though (and maybe they still do).

MyFairTunes (I believe that's what I used, about 6 months ago, maybe) works pretty well. When I used it the fastest it would convert was 2x (so a 5-minute song would take 2.5 minutes to convert), but I believe there are now options for as much as 6x. It's not actually stripping the DRM, it's playing the song back so it can be captured in unprotected AAC. There's no loss in quality, though.

I'm not condoning piracy, mind. I just got sick of having to authorize and reauthorize all my PCs. I always forgot to deauthorize a PC when I was reinstalling Windows, so I ran up against the 5-machine limit once every year or so. Very annoying.