Posted by sbt on 01/02/06 04:04

In article <Cj1uf.3432$DQ4.371441@weber.videotron.net>, NRen2k5
<napsterneorenegade@hotmail.com> wrote:

> Point is, iTunes makes lousy MP3's, and the AAC's which it makes can
> only be played on their (OVERPRICED) iPods.
>
> It's deliberate: They have a crappy MP3 encoder in iTunes so that
> comparatively their AAC format sounds a lot better. So people will use
> AAC, and if they ever want to get an MP3 player, it /must/ be an iPod.
>
> It would take me /a lot/ of convincing to buy anything from a company
> like that.
>

I've been using the LAME encoder as a plug-in to iTunes for almost 3
years now. It's available via AppleScript in the Mac version and as a
plug-in for other versions (check the usual opensource repositories for
your platform). They provide a "basic" MP3 encoder, but don't restrict
what you plug in...iTunes (the application) is pretty open for plug-ins
and the documentation and examples for writing same are freely
available from developer.apple.com.

AAC is based on the published MPEG-4 standard. The DRM stuff is
proprietary (Apple calls it "FairPlay"...ymmv :) ). So, the AACs that
iTunes (the application) generates are compatible with any player that
wants to support mp4s (they have extension .m4a, the protected stuff
has .m4p), but the iTMS stuff isn't compatible unless you strip the
copy protection.

--
Spenser

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