[jeycam]

I've just bought a Mac. I've got all of my music collection on the external HDD - the most of it is in FLAC but there are few albums in mp3 too. Is there any way to automatically choose all the FLAC files from the direction (Spotlight DOESN'T work for me in this case) and simply convert them to ALAC using Max or iTunes and than just copying the mp3s? I don't want to have my mp3 files converted to ALAC, any way to avoid it?

 

[dallan]

I just choose the column that says file type and highlight them all and drag them over to the X audio toolkit and decompress them to aiff to drag into itunes. Then if you want to recompress them to alac in itunes it is another step. Be sure not to recopy the files if you want them in the folder you choose because itunes will be set up to move them to it's folder as you may know.

 

[jeycam]

I'd do it this way, but I've got every artist and album in a seperate folder, so it doesn't work.

 

[dallan]

Ya my music moving--500gigs has been a chore really. Add to that, until less than a month ago Amarra would only play uncompressed files so i had to uncompress everything. Then the new version was released so i could recompress everything, holy cow it is overwhelming.

 

[iriverdude]

Do not convert lossy to alac. Can't you just use foobar and drag all .flac to playlist, then batch convert to alac? Set directory output path as somewhere else and let it do it's stuff.

 

[jeycam]

I'm on OSX, no Windows yet. It'd be pretty easy to do this on Windows.

 

[iamoneagain]

Maybe use spotlight to highlight just the mp3 and move them to a separate folder. Then you can safely convert everything that's flac on your hard drive to alac thru Max.

 

[jeycam]

Quote:

Originally Posted by iamoneagain /img/forum/go_quote.gif Maybe use spotlight to highlight just the mp3 and move them to a separate folder. Then you can safely convert everything that's flac on your hard drive to alac thru Max.

That's a nice idea, but how to do this?

@Edit
I've got it. I had some problems with Spotlight, as it didn't index my external HDD in a proper way, but now it's absolutely fine. Thanks!

 

[iamoneagain]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jeycam /img/forum/go_quote.gif That's a nice idea, but how to do this?

Think I figured it out. First create a new folder to put the files. Then bring up finder and select the drive your music files are on. In the top right of the finder, type "mp3" in search section. Click on one file and then Command + "a" to highlight all mp3 files. Then right click and select copy. Go back to new folder you created and paste mp3 files there. After they all successfully copied, you can go back to your search and move original mp3s to the trash. Make sure if you have to redo search, don't not highlight the new folder you just made. Otherwise you end up delete all mp3s.

Also before you try this, make sure are using time machine and have everything backed up. You do not want to accidentally delete any files you can't recover.

 

[iamoneagain]

After thinking about this, it's probably easier to just use the finder to find all your flac files. Open finder, select main folder where music is stored, and type flac in search field. You can then drop and drag selected files into Max and convert in batches. Sounds like you have too many to just convert all at once.

 

[AdamWysokinski]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jeycam /img/forum/go_quote.gif I've just bought a Mac. I've got all of my music collection on the external HDD - the most of it is in FLAC but there are few albums in mp3 too. Is there any way to automatically choose all the FLAC files from the direction (Spotlight DOESN'T work for me in this case) and simply convert them to ALAC using Max or iTunes and than just copying the mp3s? I don't want to have my mp3 files converted to ALAC, any way to avoid it?

Good choice jeycam

I use xACT for converting FLACs. On the first tab click add and if your music data was indexed by Spotlight, just enter "flac" (without quotes) in the search field. Select your FLAC files and click "Decode". When finished, add AIFF files (tags should be preserved) to iTunes and then you can convert it to ALAC.
Cheers,
Adam

 

[iamoneagain]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AdamWysokinski /img/forum/go_quote.gif Good choice jeycam I use xACT for converting FLACs. On the first tab click add and if your music data was indexed by Spotlight, just enter "flac" (without quotes) in the search field. Select your FLAC files and click "Decode". When finished, add AIFF files (tags should be preserved) to iTunes and then you can convert it to ALAC. Cheers, Adam

Max will convert flac files directly to ALAC and automatically add to iTunes. I believe you just need to adjust the settings the very first time you use it. It will also transfer all the metadata and album art if the files have them.

You can either use drag and drop method, or hit the "+" in bottom left on program and it will bring up the finder box. Type "flac" within the it's search and bring all the files over. If you are doing all files at once, be sure to have everything else shut down to allow computer to focus on just converting. Also make sure hard drive has enough room for all files.

 

[jeycam]

Everything is done, thanks guys!