Apr 01, 2015 Try Capo on the Mac. It detects chords, and also offers a spectrogram display. You can click on lines in the spectrogram (which represent frequencies in the audio file) and it automatically generates the tab. It's in the Mac App store (it's a reasonable price, but worth it). You can create your own MP3 file. It’s very satisfying to create and deliver your own MP3 file. This example uses a voice file, because that’s the easiest to create for the most people and more often useful in a typical, rather than a specialist music, Web site.
You can use the Apple Music app on Mac or iTunes for Windows to convert song files between compressed and uncompressed formats. For example, you might want to import some uncompressed files into your music library as compressed files to save disk space. Examples of compressed formats are MP3 and Apple Lossless Encoder. Examples of uncompressed formats are AIFF or WAV.
You shouldn't notice reduced sound quality when you:
- Convert between uncompressed formats
- Go from a compressed to an uncompressed format
You might notice reduced sound quality when you:
- Convert between compressed formats
- Go from an uncompressed to a compressed format
Learn more about audio compression.
For best results, if you want your music in a different format, import again from the original source using the new encoding format.
You can convert the format of songs that are in your music library, in a folder, or on a disk.
Convert songs in your music library
On your Mac
- Open the Apple Music app.
- In the menu bar, choose Music > Preferences.
- Click the Files tab, then click Import Settings.
- Click the menu next to Import Using, then choose the encoding format that you want to convert the song to.
- Click OK.
- Select the songs in your library that you want to convert.
- Choose File > Convert, then Create [format] Version.
New song files appear in your library next to the original files.
On your PC
- Open iTunes for Windows.
- In the menu bar, choose Edit > Preferences.
- Click the General tab, then click Import Settings.
- Click the menu next to Import Using, then choose the encoding format that you want to convert the song to.
- Click OK.
- Select the songs in your library that you want to convert.
- Choose File > Convert, then Create [format] Version.
New song files appear in your library next to the original files.
Convert songs from files in a folder or on a disk
You can import songs into the Apple Music app or iTunes for Windows and convert them at the same time. This creates a converted copy of the file in your music library, based on your preferences in the Apple Music app or iTunes for Windows.
To convert all of the songs in a folder or on a disk, follow the steps below for your device.
Audio Apps For Mac
Older purchased songs are encoded in a Protected AAC format that prevents them from being converted. Learn how to upgrade these and then convert to another format.
On your Mac
- Open the Apple Music app.
- In the menu bar, choose Music > Preferences.
- Click the Files tab, then click Import Settings.
- Click the menu next to Import Using, then choose the encoding format that you want to convert the songs to.
- Click OK.
- On your keyboard, hold down the Option key and choose File > Convert > Convert to [import preference].
- Select the folder or disk that contains songs that you want to import and convert.
The songs in their original format and the converted songs appear in your library.
On your PC
- Open iTunes for Windows.
- In the menu bar, choose Edit > Preferences.
- Click the General tab, then click Import Settings.
- Click the menu next to Import Using, then choose the encoding format that you want to convert the songs to.
- Click OK.
- On your keyboard, hold down the Shift key and choose File > Convert > Convert to [import preference].
- Select the folder or disk that contains songs that you want to import and convert.
The songs in their original format and the converted songs appear in your library.
Learn more
When you convert a file with the Apple Music app or iTunes for Windows, the original file remains unchanged in the same location. The Apple Music app and iTunes for Windows creates the converted file from a copy of the original.
About compression
When you convert a song to certain compressed formats, some data might be lost. These compressed formats give you a much smaller file size, which lets you store more songs. But, the sound quality might not be as good as the original, uncompressed format.
You might not hear a difference between a compressed and uncompressed song. This can depend on the song, your speakers or headphones, or your music device.
If you compress a song and it loses data, you can't uncompress it to retrieve the data. If you convert a song from a compressed to an uncompressed format, its quality doesn't improve. The file only takes up more disk space. An example is when you convert a song in MP3 format (a compressed format) to AIFF (an uncompressed format). The song takes up much more space on your hard disk, but sounds the same as the compressed file. To take advantage of uncompressed formats, you should import songs in these formats.
About copyright
You can use the Apple Music app and iTunes for Windows to reproduce materials. It is licensed to you only for reproduction of:
- Non-copyrighted materials
- Materials for which you own the copyright
- Materials you are authorized or legally permitted to reproduce
If you are uncertain about your right to copy any material, you should contact your legal advisor. For more information, see the Apple Media Services Terms and Conditions.
On the other hand, there are a decent number of websites and services that provide a large collection of good quality audiobooks, free of cost. And if you’re an avid listener, chances are that you already have an audiobook collection of your own.
Now, most of these free audiobook libraries on the Internet generally provide their content in MP3 format. And for many users, this may not be much of a concern, as the files can be played back on just about any media player. But for a dedicated listener, small features like chapter navigation and bookmarking are important. And an MP3 file, on its own, just can’t provide those.
In this article, we’ll explore how you can create your own audiobooks with complete support for chapters and bookmarks.
Page Contents
- 3 Optimize your audio files for the audiobook
M4B – The audiobook file format
A file with an M4B extension, is an AAC encoded, MPEG-4 audio file, usually used within the Apple ecosystem to bundle audiobook files. In addition to storing audio content, M4B file format also supports digital bookmarking (so that you can resume listening from the point you left off last time), and chapter markers (a feature similar to that found in DVDs).
The source of your audiobook
Typically, your audiobook will be a bundle of one or more audio files, created from either of the following sources:
- One or more audio files in WAV / MP3 format downloaded from one of the many online repositories that provide free downloadable audiobooks.
- If you have a good voice and have a good quality microphone, you may also try recording your own audiobooks in WAV / MP3 format.
- There are a few programs like Audiobook Creator that allow you to convert EPUB, PDF ebooks to audiobooks through built-in text-to-speech engines.
Note: If you like to read audiobooks, there are a lot of options to try it out as a professional career. For more information, you can refer to this guide.
Once you’ve got the source audio files, you need to convert the audio files into M4B, while adding chapters and other features that you’d usually associate with audiobooks.
Optimize your audio files for the audiobook
Your audio files might require some additional processing in order to be audiobook-ready. If you have a single file for a multi-chapter book, you need to split the file into multiple ones in line with each chapter. Additionally, if your source file is WAV, it is recommended to convert into AAC that will take less space on your hard drive.
These processing steps could be performed using any audio editing app. In this example, we’ll use iTunes (macOS and Windows).
Convert MP3 / WAV to AAC in iTunes
- Download and install iTunes if you don’t already have it.
- Open iTunes Preferences, and click Import Settings in the General tab.
- Select Import Using: as AAC Encoder, and select a suitable encoding bitrate. Ideally, 64 kbps should be decent enough for audiobooks.
- Import the source audio files into iTunes by drag and drop.
- Select the tracks to convert and click on File >> Convert >> Create AAC version. A duplicate file will be created in AAC format.
You can further organize the audio files in iTunes by updating the Title, Chapter and Author of the audiobook. To do this:
Mac App Create Mp3 Audio Free
- Select a particular audio file (or a group of files) and selectGet Info. If multiple items were selected, click on Edit Items on the popup prompt.
- Go to the Options tab and select media kind as Audiobook.
- Now go back to Details tab and provide the book details.
- Click OK. The file will move to the Audiobook section of iTunes.
Create Mp3 Files
Note: If you need to split your audio file into multiple chapters, you need to perform additional steps before creating the AAC version. Refer to the next section for more details.