2Gen iPod Shuffle Does Not Play .m4a Songs

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2Gen iPod Shuffle Does Not Play .m4a Songs

My 2Gen iPod Shuffle 1GB only plays songs that I purchased from iTunes (.m4p) and will not play any songs that I ripped to iTunes (.m4a). According to iTunes, I successfully transferred 80 songs on to my Shuffle. Under the Settings tab, it shows that all the songs are loaded and I have plenty of capacity available. Under the Content tab, all my songs are listed. I have the latest software version and have reset twice with no success. My iPod Classic plays the songs fine. I appreciate any help or suggestions.

MacBook, Mac OS X (10.4.10)

Posted on Oct 29, 2007 1:32 PM

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Answer 1

Oct 31, 2007 7:16 AM in response to DIFERGM

What bit rate have you ripped the tracks?
The shuffle only plays the following :-

Audio formats supported: AAC (8 to 320 Kbps), Protected AAC (from iTunes Store), MP3 (8 to 320 Kbps), MP3 VBR, Audible (formats 2, 3, and 4), WAV, and AIFF

The iPod classic plays the following :-

Audio formats supported: AAC (16 to 320 Kbps), Protected AAC (from iTunes Store), MP3 (16 to 320 Kbps), MP3 VBR, Audible (formats 2, 3, and 4), Apple Lossless, WAV, and AIFF

Ian

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Answer 2

DIFERGM Author

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Oct 31, 2007 1:01 PM in response to Ian Parkinson

Ian - thanks for your input. My bit rate was well under the limit. This is what I've found out so far. The songs that my iPod Shuffle do not play are the (.wma) songs I converted to (.m4a) using EasyWMA. The converted songs work fine on my MacBook iTunes and iPod Classic, but not the iPod Shuffle. I contacted EasyWMA and it was suggested that I convert the selected songs to either (.mp3) or AIFF. As an experiment, I converted some (.wma) songs to AIFF using EasyWMA and had iTunes convert the AIFF files to (.m4a). Interestingly - it worked. I have no idea why the Shuffle did not recognize the EasyWMA (.m4a) direct converted songs (especially since the iPod Classic and iTunes had not problem playing them) - but apparently the iTunes conversion does something that the Shuffle software requires. Still a mystery, but at least I now have a much wider assortment of music on my Shuffle than I started out with.

Thanks again - George

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