Getting Itunes DRM music files to operate with RAZR?

rherron

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Here is what a lossy song looks like:

s2-wnplmp3spectral.jpg
 

rherron

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Sound waves go up an down. Lossless formats compress the range of the up and down and have the tell-tale crop strait across the top -- they look like a plateau when looking at a spectral analysis of them. Once a song is in a lossy format, the frequencies cropped out and compressed down don't come back. You cannot change the data that is there, only the format that it is in. Once you go lossy you cannot go back. This is why people (like me) who are into music and collecting live shows keep the FLAC files, or archive the WAV files, or make a data disc, or whatever.

There are many, many websites devoted to the whole lossless v. lossy audio issue. Here is a great explanation of the entire issue:

http://www.audiohub.org/get/fa/fa.htm

Bittorrent became popular, initially, because people who are into live shows and trading music (many bands allow this -- I'm not talking about illegal stuff) don't want to degrade the quality of the recordings by converting them to MP3, and so there is a need for a method of distribution that is quick for extraordinarily large data exchanges.
 

Alphaman

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Yes. Precisely. You can encode CDs you own in a lossless format (Apple Lossless and WAV are the two lossless formats supported in iTunes) and put that music in your iTunes library, but you cannot download (buy) anything from iTunes Music Store in any lossless format. Lossy formats are used because the file size is smaller and most people cannot tell the difference in the formats, particularly when the lossy formats are encoded at high bit rates (like 256). I will say that the protected AAC format that Apple uses for it's downloads is very, very good, and 99.9% of folks could care less that it is a lossless format (witness the extraordinary success of iTunes), but it is. Burning whatever you download to CD doesn't alter the original quality in anyway, it simply makes the files bigger if you keep them in WAV, and allows you to convert to MP3 if you want to -- which is no better, and quite possibly significantly worse (depending upon the bit rate used).

So ITunes is really selling me half a song and not the whole thing?

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rherron

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So ITunes is really selling me half a song and not the whole thing?

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A little less than half. Here's the breakdown on a 4:16 track as an example:

MP3: 9.8 MB
AAC: 9.8 MB
Apple Lossless: 23.6 MB

AAC is the format songs come in from iTunes. AAC is superior to MP3 but no lossy coding scheme is as good as a WAV file (the format your music is in on a CD). Back in the days of P2P file sharing (think Napster) it was a lot quicker to grab an MP3 version of a song than a WAV version, and people didn't have tons of space on their computers then, etc. So everything got encoded to MP3 and we've been plagued with lossy music ever since. :)

Ever listen to SIRIUS/XM radio? Notice on some songs that there is a faint jangly sound? Crap, crap, crap. I have it in my car, but I only listen to news and sports on it (and even that sounds a little sketchy sometimes). Music people don't like lossy music. It sounds pretty bad.

But...

AAC is the best of the lossy bunch, IMO.

Wiki on AAC: Advanced Audio Coding - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 

SEColwell

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Use doubletwist download to PC and get from market on your device it syncs to iTunes pulls your music podcast ect. And gives you the option of what to sync to your device ......you can pay a fee bucks and do it ota or free by usb

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Graymayre

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Lossless files have a variable bit rate that can range from 500-800 for most CD ripped. I try to archive lossless as much as I can, but I will reduce to 320 usually for portable use. I usually save my archives in the rare event a DJ wants a copy of it, which has happened :p
Or in the event I get an epic sound system

The answer is 42.
Oh, wait, you mean to tell me you need to know the question now?
Well, I can't answer that.
 

Byakushiki

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A little less than half. Here's the breakdown on a 4:16 track as an example:

MP3: 9.8 MB
AAC: 9.8 MB
Apple Lossless: 23.6 MB

Ever listen to SIRIUS/XM radio? Notice on some songs that there is a faint jangly sound? Crap, crap, crap. I have it in my car, but I only listen to news and sports on it (and even that sounds a little sketchy sometimes). Music people don't like lossy music. It sounds pretty bad.

But...

AAC is the best of the lossy bunch, IMO.

Wiki on AAC: Advanced Audio Coding - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sadly, the majority of people are usually satisfied with 64/128kbps mp3s nowadays. Paired with a set of UE's, I fail to understand how people can stand that crap, dare-I-say. Though ALAC audio files can vary a bit, one 4:11 song runs 33.2MB for me. 16bit/44.1kHz FLAC is usually more than enough for most music people.

Breakfast beats worrying.
 
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