Converting Audio Files

[Robyn Hardy]

I am hoping some wise person will be able to help me with a problem I am having. I am using www.animoto.com to make slide shows for KG. To upload music to the site the audio files need to be in MP3 format. As far as I know ( and I stand to be corrected) anything in ITunes is MP4. I have looked at various downloads that are available to do this conversion, such as Switch for Mac but was unable to download this due to my password being rejected. How should I go about converting my music to MP3?
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
Robyn

[Julie Lindsay]

Robyn, one of the best ways to convert to MP3 now is via an online conversion tool. I use zamzar.com with great success. You will find this tool also VERY useful for many other conversions eg Word to PDF, AVI to QTime etc etc

Also, re iTunes, you can convert within this software....it is in options or settings or something......sorry to be so vague, but it is not too hard to find. You can also set your iTunes so that any music you import from CD etc is immediately converted to MP3 format.

As for Mac....I am not sure what the best conversion program is, still too rusty with mac to advise on this as of today. On PC I use WinLame with success.

[Philip Roberts]

Oh ye of little faith! C'mon, this is Apple we're talking about!! Of course there's an easy way to do it!
Julie is entirely correct that iTunes provides plenty of options. It's true that dozens of audio file formats exist which are not all natively handled by iTunes (if you really want a Swiss-Army-Knife application that can handle EVERY audio format ever, I'd recommend Audacity - see link below) but iTunes can certainly deal with mp3.

Here's how:

1. Open iTunes
2. Click on the "iTunes" title in the top left of the task bar (immediately to the right of the little Apple logo)
3. Select "Preferences"
4. Click on the "Advanced" tab.
5. Select "Importing". You should now see the option to choose the import format (see attached image). Choose mp3. This is the default format into which any CD you rip will be converted. It also becomes the "convert to" format. Close "Preferences".
6. To convert any previously-ripped audio tracks into your new format (in this case mp3), first highlight the track(s) in question in the main iTunes library view, then click on "Advanced" in the task bar in iTunes.
7. Select "Convert Selection to mp3" from the drop-down menu
8. You'll see a small orange icon in the left-hand column indicating that conversion is underway and you'll probably get a related indicator in the top window where track info is usually displayed.
9. When you hear the 3-note "finished" sound, you're all done!
10. To upload your tracks to a web source, you'll have to use the uploader's navigation pane to navigate through your Music --> iTunes Library --> (etc) folders which are, by default, listed by artist then album, until you get to the track in question. If you did not delete the original version of the file you converted, then both versions will be in that location. ensure you upload the mp3 version (which may be the only option).

Let me know if this doesn't work!

Philip

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

[Robyn Hardy]

What can I say, you're my hero!
I had gotten as far as choosing advanced menu but of course was choosing 'advanced' from the wrong toolbar.
Please don't desert the ning when you leave QA.
Thanks
Robyn

[Philip Roberts]

You're very welcome.
Desert the ning? Never!
Don't you know that once you sign up to one of these things YOU CAN NEVER LEAVE!!!!
(Well, it's true for Facebook, anyway!).

Let me know how you get on with animoto - I'd like to take a look at what you're doing.