[Connectz]

I cannot find an app (for PC) to convert ALAC (.m4a) to FLAC files so I can play them through Foobar on my PC. I tried DBpoweramp and that doesn't work neither does Xilisoft.

Please, I hate using iTunes as a mucis player.

 

[humanflyz]

As far as I know, there is no software that can do this kind of transcoding. What you might do is burn the ALAC as a CD and rip it again in FLAC. Theoretically, this will give you the exact results since ALAC is a lossless format. Hopes this helps.

 

[Connectz]

WOW. Thats gonna take a LONG time. Thanx for replying so quickly, I appreciate it.


MAX will do this on my iMac but that means I have to put the external HD back on the iMac for an hour or so and that means no music while I am on the PC.

Yeah I know, it sucks lol.

 

[boss]

Does the ALAC encoder include a decompression feature? It would be remiss of Apple to neglect this. Perhaps you can decompress the ALACs to .wavs, then compress to FLAC with FLAC's frontend. Problem is, you'd lose the tags. I don't know of any software that can transcode in one step, unless the latest versions of Sound Forge or Audition support ALAC files.

 

[Connectz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by boss Does the ALAC encoder include a decompression feature? It would be remiss of Apple to neglect this. Perhaps you can decompress the ALACs to .wavs, then compress to FLAC with FLAC's frontend. Problem is, you'd lose the tags. I don't know of any software that can transcode in one step, unless the latest versions of Sound Forge or Audition support ALAC files.

MAX ( www.sbooth.org ) will do it but it is only for MAC OS X. I have MAX on my iMac and that will do the job but I was wondering if there was a windows equivalent that would do this for me. I guess I'll let it run on my iMac while I am sleep as this seems like the easier way to go.

I have access to both soundforge and audition but I do not have any experience with either.

 

[Oliver :)]

Quote:

Originally Posted by boss Does the ALAC encoder include a decompression feature? It would be remiss of Apple to neglect this. Perhaps you can decompress the ALACs to .wavs, then compress to FLAC with FLAC's frontend. Problem is, you'd lose the tags. I don't know of any software that can transcode in one step, unless the latest versions of Sound Forge or Audition support ALAC files.

USE AIFF!

Otherwise this sounds like a good approach. Sure it will use oodles of space, but I don't know any direct transcoder either. Just set iTunes to convert to AIFF, select songs, right/control click, off you go. Sort by bitrate / make a Smart Playlist that sorts by bitrate and drag & drop your AIFFs into whatever.

 

[_LN_]

Switch http://nch.com.au/switch/index.html should do the trick.
Alternatively, you could play the files and re-record them using Total Recorder.

HTH,

Ellen

 

[Chri5peed]

Knew there was a reason not to use ALAC, here it is.

 

[jagorev]

Burning CDs takes too long.

My suggestion is to use iTunes to convert ALAC to AIFF, then convert the AIFF to FLAC using Foobar. This should be an order of magnitude faster than burning/re-ripping. Tags should be preserved, I think.

 

[Riboge]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Connectz I cannot find an app (for PC) to convert ALAC (.m4a) to FLAC files so I can play them through Foobar on my PC. I tried DBpoweramp and that doesn't work neither does Xilisoft. Please, I hate using iTunes as a mucis player.

I am puzzled because I convert ALACs to FLACs often with dBpower AMP. You have to download the latest codecs to decode ALAC (none for encode) and for FLAC decode and encode.

 

[FulciLives]

I use a program called "Easy CD-DA Extractor" to convert FLAC to ALAC and it does so very well and yes it can go from ALAC to FLAC just as easily. For any conversion from or to ALAC it is my go-to program.

Please note this is a Windows program and it is payware.

Please note that there is a plug-in for foobar2000 that allows you to decode ALAC so you can use it to go from ALAC to FLAC (but not the reverse).

Website for Easy CD-DA Extractor: http://www.poikosoft.com/
Website for foobar2000: http://www.foobar2000.org/

foobar2000 can't input ALAC without downloading and installing a plug-in but that plug-in is on the foobar2000 website under the section called "components". Simply download the RAR file and extract it to where foobar2000 is installed (under program files ... foobar2000 ... components).

foobar2000 is freeware