Apple Event: May 7th at 7 am PT
I've recently switched from Windows and I have over 400 cd's ripped in WMA lossless format. Is there a program (free or reasonably priced commercial) that will run on the mac and batch convert these files without loosing tags or album art? I used goldwave on my last PC to convert to MP3 however it didn't support apple lossless.
Thanks
MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.2)
WMA is a problem on Macs because it is a proprietary Windows format. Basically you need to have Flip4Mac and to do conversions it will have to be one of the payware versions.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/wmcomponents.mspx
The easiest way to convert is to do it all for free on a PC first.
WMA is a problem on Macs because it is a proprietary Windows format. Basically you need to have Flip4Mac and to do conversions it will have to be one of the payware versions.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/player/wmcomponents.mspx
The easiest way to convert is to do it all for free on a PC first.
Text removed; recommended converter doesn't support WMA lossless.
Message was edited by: Dave Sawyer
I have had this same exact problem for about 4 years now. I keep checking online every few months but never have any luck. What gives? Is there nobody out there that can program an application to transcode efficiently while maintaining metadata including album art?
I bought and owned over 1,000 cd's by 2003 when I decided to rip them all with WMP (Windows Media Player 9) on a PC into WMA Lossless without DRM (Digital Rights Management). I used the slow but detailed error correction so it took a long time to complete this project. Many of the CD's were from different countries (as I had been living in different countries) so some had different songs and album art than the US Versions. As a response I had to continually over-ride the built in suggestions for metadata from WMP and had to manually type in song titles and search for album art online, then copy and paste it into the folder the files were in. WMP would then import that file into the WMA metadata. It took a lot of evenings but it was worth it and I had the best music collection I knew of while traveling for another 5 years. I was ahead of the curve as far as digital music went.
In 2008 I switched to a MacBook Pro and haven't had easy access to my music collection sense. In 2011, I ripped another batch of about 150 new CD's I've bought into Apple Lossless but now have to keep 3x music collection folders. 1) WMA Lossless, 2) VBR MP3 (converted for itunes without art), and 3) Apple Lossless. I have thought about switching back to a PC but I do like my mac so I'm stuck with no options.
There are very few applications that can transcode WMA Lossless to Apple Lossless, less that can do so without bloating the file size to almost double, and none that keep the size similar to WMA Lossless while maintaining the album art already saved in my music collection's folder hierarchy. (To clarify itunes on mac doesn't, Flip4Mac doesn't help, Auditri does not, VLC does not, Song bird does not, Pro Audio Converter does not, easyWMA does not. I've even installed VMware (virtual machine to run Windows on my mac) to try dbpoweramp and no luck.) And with all these trials I've also noticed it takes just as long to transcode on my Intel i5 MBP as it did on my AMD Athalon XP PC in 2003.
I'm very confused so any help would be greatly appreciated.
I'm not sure where you are confused. It looks like you have done some careful research and discovered there really isn't a tool to do what you want. That said, I did a Google search and uncovered:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/auditri/id411149991?mt=12
http://www.telestream.net/flip4mac-wmv/wmv-player-pro.htm - note there are several flip4mac versions with different capabilities.
Fair enough. I haven't purchased flip4mac pro or for that mattter quick time pro. Anyone try these?
I ended up loading windows 7 in a virtual machine and used iTunes for Windows to do the conversion. I only had just over 400 cds (and a few albums ripped from LPs). Some of the artwork came over and the Itunes Store recognized most of the CDs correctly. I had to find artwork online to copy into about a dozen of the CDs but that was it. Artists, titles, Tracks, time, and Genre come across fine. I used a clean backup of my library because I often had problems with WMP mixing up metadata and changing artwork. Lossless to Lossless worked well (based on a spot check with a spectrum analyzer on a number ot tracks) Non of the CDs or albums were top 40 or mainstream radio so I was pleasantly surprised that Itunes store had artwork for almost all of them. I couldn't find a completely automatic solution (I think WMP is the culprit here) but the conversion wasn't that difficult or time comsuming. I also noted that the files were slightly smaller than on windows (WMP was about 150 GB, Apple Lossless was just over 140 GB for the entire library).
Just for anyone's info that is still dealing with this issue, I did end up paying for the Flip4Mac Pro 3. As far as I can tell it does not offer batch conversion in any manner as advertised. I'm currently waiting for a response from them with clarification on how to batch convert or a refund.
How do I convert WMA lossless to apple lossless
