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[rythmdivine]

Hi,

I need some help differentiating between apple lossless and lossy m4a in MC. I am trying to auto convert my apple lossless files into lossy m4a for use in my S6 Edge Plus. But the problem is I have some lossy m4a that doesn't require converting. As far as I can tell MC calls both files m4a even though one is lossless. So I need a way of telling MC that only lossless m4a needs to be converted. I have no clue as I am retricted to only file types to differentiate between the two.

Any suggestion/help will be appreciated.

Rythm Divine

[blgentry]

Well, I learned something figuring this one out. 

You are definitely correct that MC has a File Type of M4A for both lossy AAC files *and* for lossless ALAC files.  So I opened the Tagging Pane and started looking at other values.  There is was staring at me:  A field I'd never seen before:  Compression  .

Compression shows the difference between ALAC and AAC quite clearly.  ...and shows some interesting stuff for MP3s too.

You can do a search using that field.  Or you can display Compression as a column in any view and sort by it.  That should make it very easy for you to locate your ALAC files.

Good luck.

Brian.

[rythmdivine]

Hi Brian,

Thank you for your response. I am not just trying to differentiate between the two. I need to tell MC to automatically convert and then sync only m4a files that are lossless while leaving lossy m4a untouched. If its just to identify which is which, i can easily use the bitrate column which shows my lossy at 256 (they are all itunes purchased files) and the lossless at a higher bit rate. I just dont know how to tell MC to convert only lossless m4a files while syncing as I have lossy m4a too that should not be touched. 

To put this in perspective, there is an option in MusicBee to "only convert files with lossless format" meaning that it will ignore the lossy ones while converting the lossless where all file types are m4a.

Any suggestion will be appreciated.

Rythm Divine.

[blgentry]

Ok, I see.  You want to do Handheld Sync against these files and have the lossless ALACs converted to some other format, but not have the lossy AAC files get touched.

I just spent some time playing with this and I can't figure out an automatic way of doing it with a SINGLE handheld definition.

The best I can come up with is two handheld sync definitions.  I just tested it and it works.  Here's the setup:

1.  A master playlist that you want to sync to the handheld.  Let's call this list "Mix" for this discussion.
2.  A smartlist that takes that list and matches against ALAC files only.  This list would be called Mix - ALAC .
3.  A smartlist that matches against Mix, but matches everything *other than* ALAC.  Call this list Mix - lossy .
4.  Handheld sync definition pointing to your target.  It's playlist is Mix - ALAC .  It's conversion options convert to whatever format you want.  I used MP3 as a test.  Allowed file types should only be your convert-to format.  Again, I used MP3.  Call this MyDevice - ALAC .
5.  Another handheld definition pointing to the exact same directory or device as MyDevice - ALAC.  But this time the allowed file types are your lossy files.  It's playlist is Mix - lossy.  Call this MyDevice - lossy .  You shouldn't need any conversion options here.  Just set your allowed file types.

After setup, you'll have those two Handhelds that automatically find their proper file types and know how to convert the ALACs.  You'll just press Sync on each one in turn, and it will load everything up that you want.

I don't know if this will work for your particular use but as a proof of concept it definitely works.

Brian.

[fitbrit]

Well, I learned something figuring this one out. 

You are definitely correct that MC has a File Type of M4A for both lossy AAC files *and* for lossless ALAC files.  So I opened the Tagging Pane and started looking at other values.  There is was staring at me:  A field I'd never seen before:  Compression  .

Compression shows the difference between ALAC and AAC quite clearly.  ...and shows some interesting stuff for MP3s too.

You can do a search using that field.  Or you can display Compression as a column in any view and sort by it.  That should make it very easy for you to locate your ALAC files.

Good luck.

Brian.

Yeah, I love the compression field. Very useful to look at on autoimport of video files - can then tag video and audio codecs upon import and use them as part of the filename later.

[RoderickGI]

Or you could just use a Smartlist to find all your ALAC files, then convert them losslessly to FLAC files, with the appropriate file extension change to .flac or .fla.

Then MC will convert all the FLAC files as required for syncing. Of course, you may want to keep all your ALAC/m4a files as they are for other reasons.

But then again, if you left the files as they are, and set the MC to convert to the same lossy format that your lossy m4a files are already in, I would expect MC to do a conversion only as required. However, the built in encoders don't actually allow you to set much in the way of final output format, and using an external encoder would mean that MC had little control.

What happens when you set the audio conversion mode to "Specified output format only when necessary" or "Specified output format only when necessary (including high bitrates)"? Do all files get converted still?

[imeric]

Glad to see some other folks posting on this!! I think it's an area where JRiver needs improvement...I've been asking for this too:  "only convert files with lossless format"

I like everyone's suggestions but you want this to be a one step process for syncing...

Here is what I did in a similar issue on an Ipod and an SD card (should work on Android...):

I too have a bunch of Apple Lossless files (m4a), a very few iTunes purchased AACs (m4a) and a fair amount of 320 kbps MP3s... What I do with my Ipod is choose MP3 extreme for the autoconvert and select:
Specified output format only when necessary (including high bitrates).

This works like a charm and only converts my M4a Lossless files (not sure though if it converts the lossy M4As in MP3s I don't have enough lossy m4a files to care but I don't think it does....)
What's also nice with this method is it will leave ALL your MP3 files untouched including 320kbps as long as you select MP3 extreme.  LAME is very good at high bitrates IMHO you only get benefits with AAC at around 128kbps...

One thing I've done before with another SD Card for the car is to cheat a bit and use MP4 and MP3 as the only compatible file extensions compatible in the handheld settings for audio. This way it would only convert the ALAC files and leave the MP3s untouched...