Copying/Burning mp3 files to CD (80 minutes)

hmmm.... Never even thought about that... I was so focused on the length of the .mp3's time I never gave thought to the file size. So, I converted the file to a .wav within iTunes and the file size came out to 793mb even though the mp3 was (something like) 193mb.

I'll try to lower the bit rate and/or the sample rate and see If I can get it reduced. The current bit rate is 1411 kbps and the sample rate is at 44khz.

Thanks for the suggestion. I'll let you know how I make out with it.

Ok... That seemed to work but I had to reduce the sample rate down from 44khz to 32khz. The file size decreased over 200mb to 529mb. Big difference. But now I'm wondering if there isn't a better sample rate converter out there something that will allow me to reduce let's say to about 40khz or so... I want to get the best quality sound I can without the overhead of a .wav file that is too large in size.

Any recommends?

Well I've been listening to both versions of the file (44khz vs 32khz) and have noticed little if any difference in sound quality. Which is a good thing. Another thing I noticed was the length of the song was shortend by 53 seconds. Not sure why!?!?

Anyway, yes I'm trying to burn one big mp3 track to a cd. There is no way for me to break it up as it is one continuous stream of music. So, I'm thinking now it should work out properly. I still haven't burned the CD yet.

Ok... First I tried to use the .mp3 file to burn it within iTunes. Then it said it couldn't burn the play list which got me thinking iTunes was interpreting the entire play list. So I moved the individual .mp3 file to a new playlist and tried. Still iTunes wouldn't allow the .mp3 to be burned onto the audio CD and asked me if I wanted to span the discs. So I created another play list which contained the smaller version of the converted .mp3 -> .wav file. It worked flawlessly and in 2 mins the entire CD was complete.

So there must be something to do with the size of the file(s) as well as the amount of time of the files for Audio CDs.

You maybe right about it shortening the file during the conversion but I tried twice and came out with the same exact amount of time for the .wav files. This leads me to believe both the size of the file and the amount of time (at least within iTunes) must be the issue.

I also (previously) attempted to burn it using Roxio's Toast but had no success burning the large .mp3 file to an audio CD that way either.

iTunes did give me the option to split the file between multiple discs but this is not the result I was looking for...

Either way.. The .wav file is now on an audio CD and I played the entire disc and it worked fine. I didn't even notice a difference in the sound quality between the lower 32 khz sample rate and the discarded 44Khz sample rate. Both the .mp3 and .wav sounded near the same - I did leave it at 16 bit stereo though.

So, problem solved for now I guess. Now, I need to burn the 2nd disc which shouldn't be a problem as the files do not span the total amount of time or file size of a standard 80min/700mb CD.

The more I think about it the more it makes sense. In an .mp3 file the data is compressed; with the .wav file the data is not compressed and is purely raw data. So turning .mp3 files into an audio CD does not necessarily mean it will fit on a standard CD even if the time allotment states it will fit via .mp3 files.

I never ran into this issue before but it's kind of interesting how it all worked out.

Chris, This is true about the "redbook" standard of writing to audio cds. However, I've pushed the envelope on many burned CDs before (with multiple files) and had no problems. But for some reason this one large mp3 was refusing to burn to a CD. I still don't understand why the shortened and more compressed wav files made a difference but they did make the difference from me being not able to being able to burn the file to Audio CD. So converting it to a lower 32khz and a more condensed file must have made a difference. How else can you explain why it burned at the lower rate and not at the higher rate? I don't really have an answer but rather I was baffled myself. I understand about the need for more space for header data but I really don't know.

Chris... something else I forgot to mention. I imported the original audio into an iTunes .mp3 from another audio 80min/700mb CD-R. So either they used an application that was not redbook compliant to burn the disc or I have no idea of how they would have gotten the audio to burn to CD in the first place.

But for whatever reason (and probably due to the over head of header info) I could not replicate the audio CD. Unless there is another way to make a "clone" of the original CD-R?!?!

Any thoughts?

Ed... I think you may be right if you read my previous post... The Audio CD-R I originally used to import it into iTunes must have been burned using a non-red book compliant application. If you are referring to Nero (which I'm familiar with also) you may be correct. It seems like a non-compliant app was used.