iTunes Music Store and the AAC Format

[glennbp]

We all know the NZ90 will play MP3's (rather nicely I might add), but will it decode the AAC format that Apple's iTunes is now using with it's new 'Music Store'? I would hate to have to carry around an iPod in addition to my NZ90! For those that haven't experienced the new iTunes Music Store, it's simply superb and will be available for Windows computers by the end of the year. Perhaps some new decoding software will become available to decode AAC's!!!:D

[nandaiyo]

AAC format is only found on iTunes and iPods at the moment.

The Music Store rocks! According to Billboard Daily Bulletin:

The service, which went live Monday (Bulletin, April 18), sold an estimated 275,000 tracks at 99 cents apiece in its first 18 hours, according to major-label sources. The feat is especially remarkable when considering that the offering is available only to the limited universe of users of Apple computers.

[itommy]

try this work around

write a CD.
then rip the cd as a mp3's

itommy

[CountZero]

What is interesting is that it should be possible to play AAC format. Remember, the mqv movie format is really MP4 and AAC is part of the MP4 standard.

There are also two files in the RAM that may be related to AAC, Avx AACDecoder and Avx AACEncoder.

So anyone can explain why a developer can't use the decoder to play AAC sound track?

[OcellNuri]

I agree with itommy. This would be a pretty decent short term solution. Some quality loss, but a doulbe encoding doesn't cause any quality loss that is very noticable to the casual listener.

[Caffeine kid]

I love the new AAC format,ripping my cd's sound WAY better then the mp3 format.

Love the itunes 4. ;)

[soybomb]

Be aware that the AACs being sold from the iTunes Store have Apple-developed digital rights components. Meaning while the audio data itself *might* be decodable in the OS 5 Clies with their MPEG-4 support, the DRM wrapper around the data will most certainly NOT be readable.

Luckily, home-ripped tracks from real CDs with iTunes 4 are not DRM'd.

[glennbp]

Here's a quote from a news story about Apple's iTunes Music Store -

And anybody who tries to upload iTunes Music Store songs onto KaZaA will be shocked. Each song is encrypted with a digital key so that it can be played only on three authorized computers, and that prevents songs from being transferred online. Even if you burn the AAC songs onto a CD that a conventional CD player can read and then re-rip them back into standard MP3 files, the sound quality is awful.

I haven't tried this myself, so maybe there's a work around. Has anyone been able to convert the AAC's to MP3's successfully?

[bluloo]

If you have an app that can record audio via any input source then just play the music via iTunes and record the sound via a playthrough recording app like Amadeus or AudioHijack.

You won't be making a copy of the original digital file, rather you'll be recording the sound, in real time, playing through your soundcard. A bit cumbersome but it should work. Not sure how that might impact sound quality.

I'm certainly not suggesting that this should be used to circumvent DRM but it may enable the use of the music on the clie for the time being.

cheers

[lightninja]

I ripped AAC files i bought from the apple music store to cd and then ripped the cd to mp3's no problem. They sound just fine. :)

[nandaiyo]

Has anyone tried this?

Music Store m4p AAC file > Audio CD track > AAC file?

Wondering if that strips the authorization info, and if there's a significant loss in sound quality?

[dennerin77]

Quicktime 6 pro ($29.95) will encode and decode mp4.
I'm thinking about the panasonic e wear sv-av30. Digital pics video and audio. not the best resolution for pics and video, but supports mp4 and can record tv and other stuff through it's av cradle. $299.99 at pcmall.com (100.00 of msrp)